General information about the audio functionality in OneNote 2003 (837846)

MORE INFORMATION

The audio functionality of OneNote 2003 gives you the ability to create an audio recording of a meeting, a presentation, or a lecture while you write notes. The notes that you write are linked with the recorded audio so that when you play back the audio, OneNote 2003 highlights the notes that correspond to the audio. You can also pause on a note and play back the audio that was recorded when the note was written.

The audio for your note page is stored in a WMA file format by using the Microsoft Windows Media Audio 9 Voice codec by default if Windows Media Player 9 is installed. If Windows Media Player 9 is not installed, OneNote 2003 uses Microsoft Windows Media Audio 8. The Windows Media Audio 8 codec has lower quality and larger audio files. The WMA files are stored in the same folder as the OneNote .one file (by default, in your path\My Documents\My Notebook folder).

Start recording

You can start the recording of audio by doing one of the following:

• On the Standard toolbar, click Start/Stop Recording. This starts the Audio Recording toolbar and the audio recording.
• You can also use the menu to manage your audio recording. The Tools menu contains the Audio Recording options. The Audio Recording option contains the commands that you must have to perform the following actions:
  • Record
  • Play
  • Stop
  • Pause
  • Delete Recordings

Whichever method that you select to start the recording of audio, a comment that shows when the audio recording was started appears on the page unless there is not a selection on the page. For example, if you have multiple page tabs selected, and start recording audio, the comment does not appear on any one of the pages.

Note You may have to turn on the boost (or gain) setting of your microphone for better results. The boost (or gain) setting is typically in the Advanced properties for your sound or volume control. To access the properties of your sound or volume control, double-click the Volume icon in the notification area of the Microsoft Windows taskbar. If you want help setting up your hardware, click Start, click Help and Support, and then search for the microphone. You may have to contact the manufacturer of your computer, your microphone, or your sound card if you require additional help.

For information about how to contact the manufacturer of your computer, your microphone, or your sound card, click the appropriate article number in the following list to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Audio Recording toolbar

The Audio Recording toolbar provides the following options as listed in the following table:

Option	Functionality
Play	Plays back recorded audio.
Stop	Stops the recording or the playback of audio.
Pause	Pauses the recording or the playback of audio.
Record	Starts the recording of audio.
Audio gauge	You can use this option to move forward and back through the recorded audio. Audio gauge displays the total playback time and the current position of the audio. You can also change the position of the slider to move to different points in the audio.
See Playback	By default, See Playback on the Audio Recording toolbar is active, causing OneNote 2003 to select in turn each item that you created during the recording. If you want to listen without following along in your notes, click See Playback to turn it off.

Play back audio

There are three ways to play recorded audio.

• You can use the Audio Recording toolbar.
• You can use the Audio Recording commands found on the Tools menu.
• You can playback audio that is associated with a specific note. To do this, click the note that you want to play, and then click the Speaker icon that is associated with your note.

Linked Audio options

The Linked Audio section of the Options dialog box (on the Tools menu, click Options) provides the options that control how audio is recorded. The Linked Audio section controls the device that is used for the audio recording, where the input is coming from, the codec that is used, and the format. This lets you control the quality and the size of the audio files that are being recorded by adjusting the codec, the format, and the device that is used to record audio. The following table describes each option that is available in the Linked Audio section:

Option	Functionality
Device	Lists the sound cards that are available and are installed in your computer.
Input	Lists the audio input. You will typically select the microphone here. Some sound cards list the What you hear option. If you select the What you hear option, any audio that you play on the computer will be recorded.
Codec	You can use this option to change the codec that is used for recording the audio. Windows Media 9 codecs are used when Windows Media Player 9 is installed. The codecs that are displayed will vary depending on the hardware or the software that is installed. Different sound cards contain additional choices. Windows Media Audio 9 Voice is the default option. The following codecs may be present: Windows Media Audio 9 ACELP.net Windows Media Audio 9 Voice Windows Media Audio 9 Professional Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless For information about these codecs and other codecs, visit the following Microsoft Web site: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/codecs/audio.aspx
Format	You can use this option to change the format of the recorded audio. When you change the format, you can control the quality or the size of the recordings. If you want to increase the quality of your audio recording, select a higher bite rate. For example 20 kilobytes per second (KBps) instead of 12 KBps. Note that the larger the bite rate, the larger the audio file size. Select a smaller bit rate to decrease the audio file size, but the quality of the audio may not be as good.
When you play linked audio, rewind from the start of the paragraph by the following number of seconds	You can use this option to specify how many seconds before the paragraph to play back. This is useful because you typically do not write notes at the exact instance when the relevant audio is recorded. Setting this option helps synchronize the playback of the audio.

Audio Issues

Stop a recording

To stop the recording of audio, use one of the following methods:

• On the Audio Recording toolbar, click the Stop button.
• On the Tools menu, select Audio Recording, and then click Stop.
• On the Standard toolbar, click the Start/Stop recording button.

E-mail audio files

You have the option to send the audio file with the OneNote file when you send your .one file by using e-mail. By default, this option is disabled. To e-mail audio files, click Options on the Tools menu, click the E-mail category, and then click to select the Attach a copy of linked audio files check box.

Move or copy linked audio

You can copy and paste the audio notes in a page to a different location on the page and the linked audio will be retrained. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Select the top edge of a note container or a paragraph.
2. On the Edit menu, click Copy if you want to copy the audio, or click Cut if you want to move the audio.
3. Click in the new location where you want the audio to be.
4. On the Edit menu, click Paste.

The linked audio will remain when you click Paste.

Note If you do not select the whole note container, the audio will not be retained when you click Paste. If you use this method to copy or to move the linked audio text to another page in the same section, the audio is also not retained unless it is in the same page group.

To create a page group, use one of the following methods:

• On the Insert menu, click New Subpage.
• Right-click the Page tab, and then click New Subpage.

When you move to the sub page while you are recording, the audio will continue to be linked.

You can move pages with the audio to a different location or to another folder. To move the whole page, click Move page to on the Edit menu. If you move the page into another folder, the linked audio files (WMA) are moved into the new folder.

If you move your section (*.one) files to another folder by using the Operating System instead of the OneNote 2003 interface, the links to your audio files are lost. OneNote 2003 stores audio files as separate files (*.MWA) and these files must be moved with the .one files. If you already moved the section without the audio, you can move the audio files to the folder and the audio will play, but the sound icon will not appear.

To play the audio, point to Audio Recording on the Tools menu, and then click Play. To prevent this problem, move the .MWA files with the .ONE files.

Audio is not linked on other pages

OneNote 2003 will not continue to link the audio if you move to other pages. The audio will remain on the original page. If you want the audio linked on more than one page you can use page groups.

To create a page group, use one of the following methods:

• On the Insert menu, click New Subpage.
• Right-click the Page tab, and then click New Subpage.

When you move to the sub page while you are recording, the audio will continue to be linked.

Audio device is not detected

If there are no audio devices installed, OneNote 2003 does not turn off the ability to start recording audio. When OneNote 2003 does not detect an audio device, you receive the following error message: Verify that your audio options are configured correctly.

To do this, follow these steps:

1. On the Tools menu, click Options.
2. Click Linked Audio.

If you want help setting up your hardware, click Start, click Help and Support, and then type microphone in the Search window.

You may have to contact the manufacturer of your computer, your microphone, or your sound card if you require additional assistance.

Requirements to record sound

If you are not running DirectX 8.1 and Windows Media Player 8, you receive the following error message:For the latest version of DirectX, visit the following Microsoft Web site: For the latest version of Microsoft Windows Media Player, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

Cannot start recording audio

If you start playing back previously recorded audio, and then click the Pause button, nothing happens when you try to record audio by clicking the Record button later. You have to click the Stop button before you click Record.

Large audio recordings are lost

There is no limit on the size and the length of recorded audio. If you start the recording and you forget to stop the recording, the file can grow very large. If the file grows so large that you run out of disk space, you receive a dialog box with the following message:The location you are trying to save is out of storage space.When you quit OneNote 2003, you are informed that your audio will be lost.

Cannot undo or remove audio files

If you use the Undo button after you record, the audio file is not removed from the notes. For example, if you click Undo after you stop the recording, the audio file is not removed and the audio remains linked to the notes.

To remove the audio, on the Tools menu, point to Audio Recording, and then click Delete Recording.

Note This removes all the audio recordings from the current page. If you only want to remove one recording, follow these steps:

1. Open the My Documents folder.
2. Open the My Notebook folder.
   
   Note If your section is located in a folder other than the My Notebook folder, open the appropriate folder.
3. Look for files that have the .WMA extension.
   
   The recordings are named according to the name of the page in sequential order. For example, if the page is named PAGE1 the audio files will be named PAGE1.WMA, PAGE1 - 2.WMA. Check the date and the time stamp of the audio files to determine the file that you want to remove.
4. Delete the file.

Audio recording is incomplete or is automatically canceled

OneNote 2003 will silently stop recording on many events that would otherwise cause the recording to become unlinked with the notes or to become incomplete. Some of the actions that cause OneNote 2003 to stop recording include the following:

• The E-mail button. If you click the E-mail button or if you click E-mail on the File menu and the Attach a copy of linked audio files check box is selected in the e-mail category of Options under the Tools menu, the recording will stop.
  
  Note This problem occurs even if you e-mail a page that contains no linked audio.
• If you move or if you copy a page to another section or to another folder the recording stops.

OneNote 2003 does not keep the selected codec

You may experience one of the following symptoms when you try to select a codec in the Linked Audio category.

The Linked Audio category is located in Options under the Tools menu.

• You may not be able to select the codec in the Linked Audio category.
• When you select the codec, the Format drop-down menu becomes blank.
• When you close the Options dialog box, the codec selection returns to the previous selection.

For example, if you are currently using Windows Media Audio 9 Voice and you try to switch to Windows Media Audio 9 Lossless, OneNote 2003 switches back to using Windows Media Audio 9 Voice when you click OK.

This problem occurs if there are no selectable format properties for the codec. OneNote cannot use any codec that does not have any format options.

Audio (WMA) files do not have the correct file names

If you start recording on a page without giving the page a title, the audio file that is created has a file name of Audio Recording #.wma. There is no way to distinguish the file that is linked to specific pages. To prevent this problem, make sure that the pages have a page title before you start the recording.