Making a CD play forever.

[FlamHappy]

Hi,

I want to play a CD full of nice instrumental prelude music 24 /7 through a mixer channel so no matter what day or time it is we can raise that fader and voila, prelude / postlude music.

As far as those inexpensive round CD players go, does random or shuffle playing mode essentially mean playing forever as long as power is applied to it?

Is there a better way? We don't want to use the AV pc or give our volunteers more to think about that raise a fader / drop a fader. They already have thier hands full.

Thanks in advance,

:Ron

[KeckCreative]

In theory, random and repeat options turned on should allow it to play continously. However, you may find that a CD player running 24/7 won't last long. Spinning the CD is of course a mechanical process and the laser is always on. You might consider using a simple mp3 player instead. You'll be able to get a lot more variety on it and since it typically is solid state memory there is less mechanical failure potential.

[petereit]

Agreed. Find a cheap, used mp3 player that has an A/C adapter. It doesn't even need to be a newer model or have much memory since you'll only be loading it with one CD's worth of music. You could probably find one at a garage sale for a couple bucks.

Or my favorite source -- just ask your congregation if anyone has one taking up space in a junk drawer.

[FlamHappy]

I have a couple sansa mp3 players the I use for Through the Bible MP3s. While I know they can loop on an mp3 (we do this by mistake) I don't know if there is a loop all songs forever function. - guess I'll have to look.

Thanks.

[bpalermini]

I did that a long time ago for music on hold on a office telephone system. Two different CD players lasted 4 - 6 months each running 24/7 in the time I was there.

[bladeaudio]

You could do this with a cheap DVD player. Just create a DVD that starts playing automatically and loops. This is pretty easy if you have some decent authoring software like Adobe Encore.

Then just connect the audio outputs of the DVD player to the console, don't even worry about the video connection. When the power comes on to the unit, it will start playing the DVD and loop until it gets turned off.

[FlamHappy]

Well just after I posted this question I went to see if in the drawer of past goodies was a transformer suitable for running an mp3 player and what should I find? My wife's old portable cd player that she thought she got rid of. That makes it fair game for ministry I say, so down to the church with it I went. It has a loop all function and it is presently AFAIK playing our prelude cd over and over and shall be for ever more or lazer death which ever comes first!

We'll see just what it's made of by George!

Thanks for all who chimed in.

[mifantrax]

Another very good solution are the old 4x or a little higher speeds CD-ro that has an audio output and a play button, they last very long and with a decent power source you get what you need.

[FlamHappy]

Well, I put the rascal in Tuesday morning and today it was still playing so... yippy skippy so far.