I’m relatively new to this bag, but from a technical background, and I’ve got along OK so far meeting the ACX specs after following the audacity instructions etc. However, I have a problem I can’t easily fix. Yes I can edit out these ticks but it takes a LONG time and I’m down for a 9 hours audiobook!
Here’s an image of what they look like and I’ve attached a clip. They are also present when I’m talking as well, you can hear if not easily see them. I’ve tried increasing the buffer to 200ms, and reducing the recording quality to 24bit. Not sure what to try next! Oh and I tried unplugging my mouse, didn’t help. And I shut down firefox and other apps except audacity and open office to read the script from. Thoughts?
I’m on Linux Mint Cinnamon. Audacity 2.4.2 Flatpak. Laptop is an Acer Aspire 3
It’s nothing obvious. Do the clicks occur if you record “nothing” (start recording then go and make a cup of tea / coffee, come back and press “Stop”.)
What sort of mic are you using, and how is it connected to your computer?
Thanks for answering.
Just tried recording “nothing”. No clicks. Then I did a bit of speaking, also no clicks. They seem to start to occur after 30s or so… I think they happen more often the longer the track. Clearly some processing issue… just don’t know what to do!
I am using a marantz pod pack 1. USB. I tried using a different USB port, didn’t help.
I’ve moved it, but it’s usually the same half dozen people that answer questions.
How long were you recording “nothing” for? If only a few seconds, try it for a few minutes.
Do NOT turn down the recording level when recording “nothing”, leave everything exactly as it is when you are recording your voice.
Hi
Just tried that. Ran it for a minute by the radio, both a woman and man presenter spoke. No clicks. However, the waveform is very different. The whole thing is much more noisy. I did a noise reduction to see if that allowed some clicks to appear but it didn’t.
Thanks
Em
Curious.
Now try again with you speaking instead of the radio. Do to recordings, one where you speak any old nonsense but concentrating on not moving while you speak, and one where you relax and do a “normal” voice recording.
Hmmmm well if you insist! But when I record I don’t move; I’m aware any motion can be picked up so I get comfortable, stay still and go for it.
What’s interesting to me is that the frequency (how often, not Hz) of the occurrences appears to increase during the recording. I really think this is a processing issue of some sort. I appreciate that gives no explanation of the radio result. UNLESS the radio audio is easier to process? I know too little about the type of processing which goes on during a recording to speculate.
You know all there is to know about that - there is no processing during recording.
The sound card converts analog to digital, and Audacity writes the digital data to disk, and that’s about it.
Rightyho, so I did a recording whilst sitting like statue throughout. The clicks are there as before Also, they definitely occur more often as the recording proceeds.
I don’t really understand what you mean by there not being any processing. Doesn’t converting analogue to digital count as processing? Or even the writing of data to RAM or a drive? Just the conversion needs memory and CPU right? There is a length of data required to convert the signal to requisite resolution. Or am I misunderstanding the definition of processing?
Are there any settings on the laptop or audacity I can fiddle with to try to reduce the problem? Starting to panic a bit as the weekend is the only time I get to do recording!
My sister has a similar setup with linux mint and audacity. Different laptop is all, and she doesn’t get the clicks!
I mean the data isn’t modified by a process.
I guess that the conversion from analog to digital could be called “processing”, but once the data is received by Audacity it is a stream of numbers that are written to disk. Audacity doesn’t care what the numbers are, it just writes what it receives.
Yes I use a pop shield. And the clicks occur in between speech, when I am sitting there doing nothing. First one is a few seconds in and is during speech. Now I know what I’m looking for, I can find them within speech too. Here are two waveform examples, one when the click is between speech, and one during. It’s seriously annoying, if it was a work I could use Matlab to code a match filter and find it and remove it! That would be a fair bit of time developing though and time is what I don’t have! Perhaps there is a plugin?
During quiet:
During speech:
Thanks again for your help
I wonder if this is an USB artifact. I would be tempted to try interfacing your microphone to Audacity via JACK. Yes, I know it’s another layer of audio management but at least it’s going through a chain optimised for audio capture from USB devices.
“Pulse” is the default sound system for most Desktop Linux distros. It provides a multi-client audio server layer between applications and the ALSA drivers.
You can tell Audacity to record directly from the ALSA device driver (bypassing Pulse) by selecting the “hw” option that corresponds with your USB mic as the “recording device” in the Device Toolbar.
- there is no processing during recording.
Also, they definitely occur more often as the recording proceeds.
