Manipulating Decibels

Typo: should have been -1.9 dB (now corrected in my original post.

Select all, then “Effect > Amplify” shows the peak amplitude to be -1.9 dB.
or install this “show peak amplitude” plugin Peak Amplitude (Analyze plug-in) which shows the peak amplitude to be -1.87 dB.


For 100 ms window rms:

Select a “noise only” section.
Nyquist Prompt effect.

(linear-to-db (peak (rms s) ny:all))

Repeat for a couple of other “noise only” sections to check.

For a window size equal to the selection length, same procedure as above but replace the code with:

(let ((step (truncate len))
      (s-sq (mult s s)))
  (linear-to-db
    (snd-fetch 
      (snd-sqrt 
        (snd-avg s-sq step step op-average)))))

Or as Gale suggested: “Analyze > Contrast”

Alternatively, use this “wave stats” plug-in: "Wave Stats" plug-in which gives you peak, rms, and DC offset measurements.

Interesting to note that each of these rms measurements give slightly different values, but they are all in the same ballpark.


I used 100 Hz 12 dB/Octave.