I am a very unsophisticated audacity user with limited goals, specifically, recording old LPs to the computer. When I try to record with playthrough on, the sound is excellent but when I play back the recording, there is heavy static. Is there anything I can do to correct this (as a non expert)?
That’s kind-of strange because the “playthrough” is using the same digital audio data that you are recording. If you can get good sound playing the turntable through the computer, you can record the same good sound… We just need to figure-out what’s going wrong…
It’s probably not important (since you are playing good sound throught the computer) but, is this a turntable with a built-in USB connection, or do you have a seperate USB interface?
What do your levels look like? Do you see red in the waveform? Is most of the waveform hitting 1.0?
One way to check your peak level is to start the Amplify effect. It will scan your file, and if the default Amplification setting is zero or negative, your levels are (probably) too high. If you see something like +3 to +6dB your levels are perfect and you’ve got a different problem. (The default adustment you see is the amount of change required to bring the levels up or down to the “digital maximum” of 0dB.)
If you wish, you can cancel the Amplify effect after checking the levels… Right now we are just trying to diagnose the problem. If your recording level was too high your waveform will be clipped (distorted flat-topped waves) and reducing the volume now will not remove the distortion.
After this problem gets solved… It is a good idea to set your peaks at (or near 0dB) after all editing & processing. That’s called normalizing, and you want to normalize the whole album as one file. The idea is to change all of the songs by the same amount so you don’t mess-up the relative loudness between songs. (And the peak doesn’t correlate well with loudness, so all songs with 0dB peaks don’t sound equally loud.)
Did you go through a USB hub instead of home run cables to the computer? Live audio doesn’t like that very much. Are you using USB connected external hard drives? Koz
Thanks for helping out - and so quickly too - but I sort of did get stuck on some of this - my stuff is in CAPS BELOW
That’s kind-of strange because the “playthrough” is using the same digital audio data that you are recording. If you can get good sound playing the turntable through the computer, you can record the same good sound… We just need to figure-out what’s going wrong…
It’s probably not important (since you are playing good sound throught the computer) but, is this a turntable with a built-in USB connection, or do you have a seperate USB interface? THE TURNTABLE HAS A BUILT IN USB
What do your levels look like? Do you see red in the waveform? Is most of the waveform hitting 1.0? THE LEVELS ARE HITTING 1 AND SEEMINGLY GOING OVER IT AND ARE ALL BLUE - IN THE SOUND METER AT THE TOP WHEN IT RECORDS IT IS ALL TGHE WAY TO 0 AND SHOWING A LITTLE RED ON THE RIGHT
One way to check your peak level is to start the Amplify effect. It will scan your file, and if the default Amplification setting is zero or negative, your levels are (probably) too high. If you see something like +3 to +6dB your levels are perfect and you’ve got a different problem. (The default adustment you see is the amount of change required to bring the levels up or down to the “digital maximum” of 0dB.) THAT WAS SET AT 0.0. WHEN I CHANGED IT TO 3.0 IT WAS MARGINALLY BETTER
If you wish, you can cancel the Amplify effect after checking the levels… Right now we are just trying to diagnose the problem. If your recording level was too high your waveform will be clipped (distorted flat-topped waves) THERE DIDN’T SEEM TO BE FLAT TOPPED WAVES - RATHER THEY SEEM TO GO BEYOND THE TOP and reducing the volume now will not remove the distortion.
After this problem gets solved… It is a good idea to set your peaks at (or near 0dB) after all editing & processing. That’s called normalizing, and you want to normalize the whole album as one file. The idea is to change all of the songs by the same amount so you don’t mess-up the relative loudness between songs. (And the peak doesn’t correlate well with loudness, so all songs with 0dB peaks don’t sound equally loud.)
THANKS AGAIN