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Located in W-518
and B-515, our state-of-the-art
audio and computer labs are used
for teaching language to classes
of up to thirty-two students. Since
both audio labs are digital, the sound files created
during the session may be saved
as mp3 files to a USB drive or to your personal
file space (P drive).
A few quick GUIDELINES
for the use of the Modern Languages
labs:
1. Access to W-518 is only available
at scheduled class times. There is
no drop-in access.
2. B-515 may be used outside of class
times whenever the proctors have opened
it for general use.
3. The purpose of all lab classes
is language practice, not web-surfing
or emailing.
4. No food or drink may be consumed
in either room.
5. As always, please remember to log
out at the end of class.
6. If, at the start of each class, you suspect a
problem with your machine, move to
another if there is one spare.
7. Logging in is necessary before
you can use any lab computer. The
procedure is the same as in other
campus labs. If you have difficulties
logging in, check that you have not
inserted a space at the beginning
or end of either your username or
password. If you still cannot log
in, go and see a proctor.
8. The digital player/recorder called
MEDIA ASSISTANT, used in both labs, has a number
of advantages over a traditional
recorder. One of these is bookmarking.
While the master audio source is being
transferred to the students' machines,
bookmarks may be set that allow you
subsequently to skip quickly backwards
or forwards to a particular location.
To set a bookmark, wait for natural
transitions in the recording (such
as the beginning of each question)
and set consecutive bookmarks by clicking
on the numbered buttons in the lower
half of the player window. Bookmarks
may also be set during playback.
10. When the instructor has finished
sending the master audio, your media
player (locked up to that point apart
from the bookmark buttons) is unlocked,
and the play, record and rewind buttons
become active. Move around the sound
clip using the rewind and bookmark
buttons. Click on the green PLAY button
to listen again to the master audio
and to any responses you made while
your media player was recording. Click on
the red button to replay the master
audio but record new responses of
your own.
11. The volume on your headset is
adjustable using the normal Windows
volume control on your machine and
cannot be adjusted by the instructor.
Left click on the loudspeaker icon
in the tray at the bottom right of
your screen to adjust the overall
volume. Right click on it to open
the set of controls. The media assistant audio
uses the "Line-in" audio channel,
and that control needs to be at around
the mid point. If you hear a strong
background hum, the reason might be
that the Line-in balance is set too
low.
12. Only one audio clip may be present
in the player memory at once. That
means that if, when you have replayed
and worked on an exercise, your instructor
is ready to send you the next audio
clip but you wish to return later
to the clip you have just worked on,
you should save it to the default location
(C-drive on your lab machine), to
a USB drive inserted into your machine
and selected as the destination for
the save, or to your personal file
space (P drive).
13. Media Assistant saves audio clips to different
formats. If you wish to
replay your audio files in other campus
labs or on your own computer, you
must save them in .mp3 format. To
do that, just select .mp3 on the 'Save
as' drop-down menu. Naturally, such
files do not have anything more than
the master audio track, but they are
compressed and therefore do not fill
up your personal file space as fast
as the proprietary versions or the .wav version. You must
allow approximately 1 megabyte of
space for each minute of an mp3 recording.
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