Latency not corrected [SOLVED]

Audacity 2.3.2 on Windows 10 Home, Dell Inspiron 15 5000

Preferences: Devices
Latency: Buffer length: 100 ms
Latency Compensation: -100 ms

…and yet, when I record a second/third/etc track, it does not do the compensation - the new tracks are not aligned, and there are no arrows at the Zero-Second mark. I have no idea why this isn’t working.

  • Win

Follow the procedure described here to set up latency correction: https://manual.audacityteam.org/man/latency_test.html

Your latency compensation came out exactly 100 ms? That’s hard to believe. There’s a super tiny chance of hitting it exact like that.

This is mine.

Screen Shot 2020-04-18 at 17.06.30.png
Koz

Steve: I did that.
Koz: Does it matter?

I’m not new to Audacity and overdubs. I’m showing you the end result of what I did - as it turns out, manually cutting a 100ms bit from the overdubbed track is pretty darned close to perfect on this machine. What I’m asking is, how come Audacity isn’t doing the auto-alignment on this machine that it does on my other machines?! “Set a Latency Compensation, and it will make that correction when you overdub a track” - but it doesn’t.

http://haus.org/music/ - Audacity overdubs on every album.

Does it matter?

It might. It’s good to pay attention to observations and discoveries, whether they seem valuable or not.

I believe Audacity comes out of the wrapping set for Latency Correction of about -100 ms. When you discover what your required correction really is, you’re supposed to add it to, or subtract it from the factory default. Try changing that setting to -200 ms and see what happens.

Koz

I think that is probably what is confusing you. Audacity no longer records before zero, so arrows at the zero second mark will never occur as a result of recording. Look at the position of the clicks when doing the latency setup and aim to get them as close as possible.
If the ticks in the new track are later than the ticks in the original track, the latency compensation needs to be more negative.

Ah - I didn’t know that, so that clears up one bit of confusion. But still - no matter what number I put in, Audacity is not correcting the latency at all. I don’t mean it’s over-doing it or under-doing it, I mean it’s not compensating, I mean it’s not correcting, I mean it’s not adjusting, I mean my two tracks are misaligned.

I am experiencing the exact same problem. I apply the new compensation value and there is no compensation when doing overdub. I am using 2.4.1 with Windows 10.

What is your recording device, and what settings do you have in the Device Toolbar?

Thank you for the attention…
Problem solved. I did the latency test and set compensation at -196. Was still off. Ran the test again…and again. Each time added or subtracted the the difference in compensation and ended up with a latency compensation of -255. Now it is on the money. Imported a .wav a friend had sent. Overdubbed bass and it was perfect.

Well, now it works. I started from scratch - set the compensation to Zero, recorded an overdub, measured the offset, and it was 195ms - higher than expected, but not unreasonable. I plugged that in, recorded another overdub, and it worked! I’m reluctantly willing to chalk this up to Operator Error.

  • Win

EDIT: To answer your question:
Host = MME
Mic = USB Audio CODEC (USB Dual Pre)
Out = Headphone (Realtek(R) Audio)

Thanks for the updates.
Pleased to hear it is now working.