Settings and Input levels - URGENT HELP PLEASE.

Audacity Help Forum Windows
1

Hi,

I am in Audacity Version 2.1.2. I obtained through the website and the .exe installer.

I have decided because of certain other software I have which I need, to remain with Windows 7.

I have bought a Tevion USB Turntable BNIB off a friend. Its never been out of the box. A bargain at £24.99, (I hope!).

Obviously the software was a little out of date so I have downloaded and installed the latest versions of Audacity and LAME.

I am not brilliant with this technology but with the aid of YouTube I try to learn as I go along and I’m making progress. However I have come across a couple of stumbling blocks.

I have been following a couple of channels on YouTube, with one in particular that runs a series of tutorials, (Audio-Technica USA), covering subjects covering initial download of software, installation, setting up of Windows 7 and Audacity, recording and exporting to MP3. The whole 9 yards!

Problem is, the video, although not ancient by any means, is a bit out of date.

One particular set of settings I’m trying to figure out are for the Real Time Conversion (RTC) and the HQ Conversion (HQC) available from the Edit/Preferences/Quality menu. It seems that the terminology has changed in the drop down menus.

The video instructs to set the Real Time Conversion to “Fast Synch Interpolation” and the High Quality Conversion to “High Quality Synch Interpolation”.

The terminology in my drop down menus for these options is different and in both cases are as follows:

Low Quality (Fastest)
Medium Quality
High Quality
Best Quality (Slowest)

I’m not sure what to use and what is the equivalent of what is stated in the video.

Also, comparing different videos from different channels, there seems to be a difference of opinion regarding the setting of the Bit Rate for the Default Sample Format. Audio-Technica USA instruct the use of the 16 bit option. A different channel on YouTube instructs 32 bit. Not being an expert I need some guidance and further explanation please.

For the time being I have set up for 16 bit and used the default settings for RTC and HQC until I receive some clarification.

Experimenting with everything attached and connected, I am trying to record a vinyl album to my laptop. I am having problems with the input level. Even if I move the slider indicator down to 0.1/0.2, the wave seems very big, in fact it appears to be off the scale if I try to increase it any more than 0.2.

There seems to be no lea way to reduce but if I increase anywhere over 0.2, it is apparent that I cannot achieve the recommended 80% I have noted. All I seem to have is distortion.

Can anyone shed any light on this please? Am I doing something wrong?

I would appreciate any help forthcoming.

2

We do not make or verify YouTube videos. You would be far better following our official documentation. Then you won’t have mismatch between documentation and software.

See: Recording with USB turntables or USB cassette decks.

Choose the correct USB audio CODEC as recording device in Audacity’s Device Toolbar then you should not get recording distortion. Check if there is a gain knob somewhere on the turntable. Sometimes this is on the bottom of the turntable.

See Quality Preferences for documentation of that. The defaults shown in the image on that page, including 32-bit float sample format, are preferable unless you know what those terms mean and have reason to change them.



Gale

3

I referred to YouTube as a port of call because I am struggling with your on-line manual.

I have always believed that a picture paints a thousand words and if you can actually see someone doing what you want to achieve then that is a good way of teaching. Basically, with my limited knowledge, experience and my low level IT literacy, I didn’t really know where else to look.

There is no gain knob/control on my deck.

I installed your software but it is not as I would have preferred, “Plug and Play” and I’m really struggling with it.

Obviously settings have to be made and modified and a simple understanding of the terms and settings is a great advantage, but I am tending to get “bogged down” trying to read your user guide. I am finding I have to put it up on a tablet next to me while I am trying to figure out what to type and click on my computer because I cannot keep switching the pages. Even then, with all the links to other areas from within the paragraphs laid down I am tending to get lost quite quickly.

All I want really is a simple procedure, beginning to end, explaining to me so that the last few vinyl albums that I have which cannot be replaced with CD’s or downloaded MP3 files can be transferred to my computer, my MP3 player and CD.

Where do I find that?

4

Are you choosing the USB Audio CODEC for the turntable as recording device in Device Toolbar?

Here is an example image of Device Toolbar:

Choose the USB Audio CODEC in the second box. We cannot tell you what the device is called exactly. If you don’t see the USB device, do Transport > Rescan Audio Devices in the Audacity Menu Bar at the top.

If you connect the RCA cables of a USB turntable to the computer mic port, then choose the mic recording device, you will get excessively loud recordings.

What type of music is it?

You don’t need to change anything in Quality Preferences, from what you have said so far.

You can resize the Audacity window and the browser window then read the Manual alongside Audacity.

Is there any other problem apart from hard to tame recording level?

If you have Audacity recording correctly from the turntable, exporting to WAV and burning to audio CD is described below. Work through the pages from the top:

http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/basic_recording_editing_and_exporting.html
http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/splitting_a_recording_into_separate_tracks.html
http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/burning_music_files_to_a_cd.html


Gale

5

In which case have a look at this workflow tutorial in the Manual: http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/sample_workflow_for_lp_digitization.html

WC

6

One particular set of settings I’m trying to figure out are for the Real Time Conversion (RTC) and the HQ Conversion (HQC) available from the Edit/Preferences/Quality menu. It seems that the terminology has changed in the drop down menus.

The video instructs to set the Real Time Conversion to “Fast Synch Interpolation” and the High Quality Conversion to “High Quality Synch Interpolation”.

I recommend you just leave the defaults. Unless you’re changing the sample rate, there’s no “conversion” anyway (except conversion to MP3 which is different), and the weak link is your analog record.

I am having problems with the input level. Even if I move the slider indicator down to 0.1/0.2, the wave seems very big, in fact it appears to be off the scale if I try to increase it any more than 0.2.

There seems to be no lea way to reduce but if I increase anywhere over 0.2, it is apparent that I cannot achieve the recommended 80% I have noted. All I seem to have is distortion.

Check your Windows settings for any “[u]enhancements[/u]” and turn them off. You can also try a different [u]Audio Host[/u] to see if that makes a difference. Audacity won’t alter the digital audio data (other than adjusting the volume which is done through the Windows drivers) but Windows can muck-up the sound.

If the ADC (analog-to-digital converter) in the turntable is clipping (distorting), software & drivers can’t fix that.

There seems to be no lea way to reduce but if I increase anywhere over 0.2, it is apparent that I cannot achieve the recommended 80% I have noted. All I seem to have is distortion.

Does it sound OK at 0.2? Don’t worry about hitting 80% volume on the peaks. It’s OK at around 50% so if it sounds OK you can boost the levels digitally after recording (with Audacity’s Amplify effect).

there seems to be a difference of opinion regarding the setting of the Bit Rate for the Default Sample Format. Audio-Technica USA instruct the use of the 16 bit option. A different channel on YouTube instructs 32 bit. Not being an expert I need some guidance and further explanation please.

I’m sure your turntable is 16-bits. Audacity uses 32-bit floating-point for internal processing and there are technical reasons for that. CDs are 16-bit/44.1kHz.

There’s a lot of “audiophile opinion” that you need high resolution for analog vinyl. But, the noise on a record limits its usable resolution and anybody with normal hearing can tell that CDs (16-bit/44.1kHz) are superior. That is, they are technically superior… Some people do prefer the sound of vinyl and to them, vinyl sounds better, but that’s not a limitation of the CD format.

All I want really is a simple procedure, beginning to end, explaining to me so that the last few vinyl albums that I have which cannot be replaced with CD’s or downloaded MP3 files can be transferred to my computer, my MP3 player and CD.

Let’s start with getting a good recording. Save (Export) it to WAV and then we can talk about making a MP3s or a CD. (Audacity doesn’t burn CDs.)

7

Are you choosing the USB Audio CODEC for the turntable as recording device?

Yes I am. I have renamed the device from within Windows 7 and called it Tevion USB Turntable so it is easily recognisable.

If you connect the RCA cables of a USB turntable to the computer mic port, then choose the mic recording device, you will get excessively loud recordings.


I am using a USB cable connection from the turntable to the computer and monitoring through the computer speakers. There is a facility to use RCA cables which are there if I want to hook up to an amplifier in stereo system, but I do not need to do this. The cables are permanently connected to the turntable hanging out of the back.

What type of music is it?

The album is called “Ragtime” it is an old 33 that I have had for many years. It never got released onto CD. It is a Midlands combo from Wolverhampton that I used to follow when I was young. They play mainly ragtime jazz.

Is there any other problem apart from hard to tame recording level?

I have come to any more bridges for me to cross yet as it were, I expect that I will encounter a few challenges along the way, but for now my main obstacle is the seemingly uncontrollable amplitude of the recording level. I am trying to achieve an 70-80% amplitude but I can’t seem to control the level down around 0.1/0.2. Any higher and looking at the wave profiles they appear to be clipping, which I assume is distortion.

I haven’t got as far as saving off or exporting to MP3 or WAV or the like yet. One step at a time as they say!

8

If the waves have flat tops then you have clipping.

If your peaks are at 0.8 with input level of 0.1 or 0.2 then that is OK. Some records are loud and some USB ports are “hot”. If you have multiple USB ports there is no harm in trying another one.


Gale

9

I am having problems with the input level. Even if I move the slider indicator down to 0.1/0.2, the wave seems very big, in fact it appears to be off the scale if I try to increase it any more than 0.2.

There seems to be no lea way to reduce but if I increase anywhere over 0.2, it is apparent that I cannot achieve the recommended 80% I have noted. All I seem to have is distortion.

Check your Windows settings for any “[u]enhancements[/u]” and turn them off. You can also try a different [u]Audio Host[/u] to see if that makes a difference. Audacity won’t alter the digital audio data (other than adjusting the volume which is done through the Windows drivers) but Windows can muck-up the sound.

If the ADC (analog-to-digital converter) in the turntable is clipping (distorting), software & drivers can’t fix that.

There seems to be no lea way to reduce but if I increase anywhere over 0.2, it is apparent that I cannot achieve the recommended 80% I have noted. All I seem to have is distortion.

Does it sound OK at 0.2? Don’t worry about hitting 80% volume on the peaks. It’s OK at around 50% so if it sounds OK you can boost the levels digitally after recording (with Audacity’s Amplify effect).

I made an error in the figures I was reporting on for the input recording level. I missed a decimal point out - I would make a great accountant!

I am not reading 0.2/0.3. I am actually not getting my slider over 0.02! This means that the coloured scale is just going from green into yellow at between -9dB and -6dB. Does that sound right?

At 0.03 it is slipping into the red at -3dB.

I recall, I think, it’s been a long time), when I used to transfer vinyl to cassette tape from my Pioneer PL75 turntable to my Technics tape deck, I used to have to monitor the analogue Vu meters on each channel to make sure they weren’t hung over to the max all the time, but it was OK for them to creep over there occasionally, it seemed that it couldn’t be helped that there was going to be a bit of distortion. Am I getting uptight about something or nothing?

It just seems that there doesn’t seem to be a great deal of adjustment that can be made and what there is of it is very, very fine.

10

I am actually not getting my slider over 0.02! This means that the coloured scale is just going from green into yellow at between -9dB and -6dB. Does that sound right?

That’s perfectly acceptable, and almost perfect. I usually shoot-for between -3dB and -6dB. I appreciate that it’s a pain for you to adjust the levels, but without an analog level control you’re probably stuck with that inconvenience.

You can adjust-up the levels digitally after recording (and after any additional processing).

I recall, I think, it’s been a long time), when I used to transfer vinyl to cassette tape from my Pioneer PL75 turntable to my Technics tape deck, I used to have to monitor the analogue Vu meters on each channel to make sure they weren’t hung over to the max all the time, but it was OK for them to creep over there occasionally, it seemed that it couldn’t be helped that there was going to be a bit of distortion.

Digital recording is a little different…

As you go above 0dB on analog tape the tape gets magnetically saturated and it begins to “soft-clip”. For example, If you record a +3dB signal, the peak might get pushed-down to +2dB. If you get up to +10dB, you might get hard-clipped down to +5dB. (Those are all made-up numbers… It depends on the tape and the machine’s calibration.)

When it comes to clipping, digital is worse! Your ADC is hard-limited to 0dB… You can only “count” so high with a given number of bits and that count is defined as 0dB. Your ADC (and DAC, and WAV files) absolutely cannot go over 0dB and if you try you get hard clipping (nasty distortion). (You may not hear a little bit of hard-clipping but you should avoid it whenever possible.)

But, here’s the good news - There’s almost no noise* with digital (other than noise from the “analog side”). With tape you need to record hot to keep the signal above the tape hiss. But, with digital there is no tape hiss and pros often record at -12 to -18 dB (with low-noise high-quality 24-bit equipment). Of course in the final-mix the peaks are usually adjusted-up to 0dB (or to nearly 0dB)




\

  • There is something called quantization noise which you can hear at 8-bits, but you cannot hear at 16-bits. Quantization noise rides “on top of” the signal so you can hear it at low levels (at 8-bits), but unlike tape it does not exist when there is silence.
11

I have recorded the album in question twice now. It’s driving my missus mad! We probably won’t want to listen to this music again for a while after I’ve finished!

Any way, I’ve done one full album at 0.02 where the amplitude of the wave profile barely got over 0.5 (50%) and another at 0.03 where the amplitude I estimate to have reached between 0.8-0.9 (80-90%).

The latter recording is where the coloured meter was hitting orange at many points but rarely red. The former never got past yellow.

I asked for a second opinion on playback getting my wife to have a listen without me telling her which was which. I let her listen through a decent pair of head phones to make it a bit more binaural and she preferred the version that was set to 0.03, i.e. the one which I thought was bordering with distortion, so perhaps I was worrying about nothing.

I’m not a musician. I think what I might try is sending my mate who is a grade 8 piano player a sample and see what he says.

This is quite interesting, I’m getting into this!

Tomorrow, I’m going to have a go at exporting to WAV and MP3. What problems am I likely to encounter?

12

OK - I knew it wouldn’t be too long before I had another problem/question!

I am now at the stage of having saved my project and I’m now going in to edit.

I don’t intend at this stage doing anything too complicated. I am just labelling the beginning of the individual tracks, (I recorded the whole album, pausing and restarting after flipping to side two), and then deleting out sections of the long pauses between tracks. Therein lies my problem of the day!

When I delete sections of the long pauses between tracks, the track labels shift and I find myself having to move them back to the delete point. It doesn’t seem to just shift the individual track labelling point either, it appears to be accumulative, i.e. it shifts them all along. In fact when you eventually get toward the back end of the recording, the label points have moved so far I find I have to zoom out to find them and move them closer to where they should be.

Is this normal?

Why should this happen?

Can they not be fixed?

13

Either drag the selection down into the label before deleting, or turn on Sync-Lock Tracks.


Gale