Audio Capture from Web Browser (Chrome)

Greetings

I’m just trying to capture song audio from streaming services (Pandora, YouTube, TV shows etc). I did find the proper settings to capture from the internal sound card so I am getting audio into Audacity. Default settings produce a weird “ultra bass” with decreased voice. I did not find any tutorial to help me out.

I’m just looking to achieve basic capture, and export to MP3 and Apple Lossless (I did get those FF extensions to do that). Is there any tweaks I need to do to get it to capture “plain” audio like I want to? I’ve already mastered the alvin and the chipmunks setting myself here.

The Mixer Toolbar let’s me adjust the volume (right slider) but the input slider (the left one) will not move (i’m trying to tone down the recording input it’s too high and noticed it won’t budge while I have been playing with the settings).

I’m running Audacity 2.3.0 build date 9-24-18, WIN 10 Home v1803 All I can see for the sound is “Realtec High Definition Audio”.
It is an HP Notebook PC, LAPTOP-7L0EJLS9, 4G ram, 64 bit.

Thanks in advance for any help here.

Michael

The Mixer Toolbar let’s me adjust the volume (right slider) but the input slider (the left one) will not move (i’m trying to tone down the recording input it’s too high and noticed it won’t budge while I have been playing with the settings).

I assume you are using WASAPI loopback? That will capture the sound with no alterations, which is usually a good thing…

You can run the Amplify effect with a negative dB amplification value (actually attenuation) after recording.

It is set to Windows WASAPI (do not see any reference to “loopback” anywhere) and did not change any default settings when I begin test recordings.
Saved as M4A and imported into iTunes for me to check recording quality. Quality is overbearing bass with diminished vocals-could that be attributed to some clipping occurring? I can’t seem to control recording input (lots of red when monitoring input).

I did notice that “red input” varying depending on different songs played while testing-is that possibly due to different web source recording? (example-in the days of Napster, some downloads were crap, some not, it varied all over the place depending who did the ripping of the music).

Thanks again!

Bit late to this discussion, but I was having the same issue recording Chrome audio using WASAPI and loopback, and searched for an answer, ending up here.

I eventually found that the way to fix is is to open the App volume device preferences (>Sound Settings>Advanced Sound Options) in Windows and adjust the App volume for Chrome.
It was preset to 100% in Windows, but I adjusted down to around 40% and this fixed the issue for me, allowing the audio to be captured correctly. at a sensible level.

Hope this helps.

Look here: Tutorial - Recording audio playing on the computer - Audacity Manual

Since you said you are a newbie, and based on the description of your problem, is it possible you are recording from your PC speakers? As DVDdoug has suggested, on your Device Toolbar, make sure you have Windows WASAPI selected, and your speakers (loopback).


I hope this helps. :smiley: