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Record Audio From Any Mac OS X Application
MrFreak writes "Have you ever wanted to grab a sound from DVD Player or record a RealMedia stream to AIFF? It's previously been impossible to do this digitally, but the folks at Rogue Amoeba have released a piece of software called Audio Hijack that allows you to record audio from any OS X application. Additionally, it can apply live audio effects to any application, so you can add an equalizer to MAME or play Quake 3 with a live echo or flanger effect."
I don't know about you, but I've been able to do this with my Sound Blaster Live! Value, always. Even with the newest version of the the Creative AudioHQ. All you do is set the recording device to Wav/Direct Sound and record with your favorite recording software. You can use the EAX or the Advanced EQ if you want.
There is also "What U Hear". Which allows you to record everything that comes out of your speakers. So I can record my Line in, a playing mp3, and my friend on the microphone simultaneously.
The ability to do this on the mac may be a new thing. And it's obviously a nice way around some DRM. But it's been around for a long time. At least 3 years.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
We already have this in Linux (*BSD, etc.). It allows you to rip RealAudio streams, et. al.
... /dev/dsp for sound) without having to modify or
~/> dpkg -p vsound
Package: vsound
Description: Virtual loopback sound recorder and real audio converter
This program allows you to record the output of any standard OSS
program (one that uses
recompile the program. It uses sox to convert and save the raw data
into the desired file format and can help to convert real audio files
to some other non-proprietary format.
The website for vsound is here.
Marques Johansson
The anti DRM capabilities seem to be its most lauded application. Fortunately, naming it "Audio Hijack" will calm the RIAA's fears. :)
Weren't we just talking about how this kind of tweaking and hacking is supposed to be impossible with Mac OS X?
You are mistaken. There are VST effects in OS X, you will find a directory /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST on any MacOS X installation.
Audio Units are the native plugin format on OS X, like DirectX has a plugins on Windows. VST is a cross-platform plugin API written by Steinberg (and actually supported on OS X by applications like Ableton Live). Emagic is not using VST any more in it's OS X sequencer Logic, but that's probably because Emagic's owner Apple wants to push Audio Units and Emagic is a direct competitor to Steinberg.