Am I recording in mono?

Audacity 3 Help Forum Windows
1

Hi all.
I’m ripping an LP, in order to remove clicks and stuff. But when I look at the meters, left and right channels are identical, ie. they seem to have had the same input. Could I, without knowing it, somehow have hit a “Record in mono” feature, and - in case - where do I find out if this setting/box is checked?

Thanks in advance,
Ole K

2

Please see How can I record in stereo?.

Gale

3

Thanks. Got it. :slight_smile:

Ole K

4

Am I recording in mono?

There is a “trick” you can use to check…

The Vocal Remover effect subtracts left from right to remove everything in the “center”. If both channels are digitally identical, you’ll get dead silence.

If you happen to have a mono record and you record it in stereo, the left & right channels will be slightly different so you won’t get total silence when you subtract. It will be very quiet but the clicks & pops will be different in each channel (and sometimes out-of-phase and/or time-shifted) and the defects will remain at full-volume.* I think the “Simple” setting works across the full frequency range… The filter is there because bass is normally centered and removing vocals will also kill the bass.


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  • When you have a mono record you can use that to your advantage by selecting the best channel at any moment in time. Even when a scratch affects both channels, it’s often offset by a few milliseconds in each channel and you can remove it.
5

Thanks again. That was a clever trick. It appeared the entire recording was in mono!