Split Stereo

Special Interest Groups Audio Processing
1

Audacity forum,

I use Audacity 1.2.6 and want to split the stereo input from
the speaker. I select a “New Audio Track” and then get the
pull down menu by clikcing on “Audio Track”. I get the menu
but the “Make Stereo Track” and “Split Stereo Track” are not
highlighted. How do I get these choices enabled?

Thanks for any reply.
jerryd

2

Are you in stop mode? You can’t edit if you’re playing the track or in pause mode.

Any reason for you still being using 1.2.6? If not consider upgrading to the latest beta 1.3.12. Many tasks are much easier to do in this version and in recent systems (Windows Vista, 7 and MacOS-X 10.5/10.6) is far more stable than the old 1.2.6 version.

You can get it from here: http://audacityteam.org/download/

3

If you have created one mono audio track in your project, you cannot split it since is is not a stereo track, and you cannot make a stereo track since that requires two mono tracks one above the other.

http://manual.audacityteam.org/index.php?title=Track_Drop-Down_Menu#split

If you want your mono audio track to play back through one speaker, use the Pan control.

– Bill

4

Audacity forum,

Thanks for the replies.

I will upgrade to 1.3.12 when it’s out of beta.

To further explain my problem, I’m not trying to display an
audio file or project, I have a stereo signal plugged into my microphone
jack and want to have a real time split display of the audio
going in.

When I go the the preferences and select “stereo” in “channels”
I get 2 tracks but both are channel 1 data.

And when I try to turn on “Split Stereo Track” it’s not
highlighted.

Any suggestions.

jerryd

5

1.3.12 won’t be out of beta… The next stable release will be 2.0 which might still take some time to be ready. Nonetheless 1.3.12 despite being labelled as beta is quite stable and in most of the modern systems it’s actually much more stable than the much older 1.2.6 which is not being maintained anymore. So it’s safe (recommended for Windows Vista/7 and OS-X 10.5/10.6) to upgrade to 1.3.12.

Microphone jacks are, usually, mono. Connecting a stereo jack to a mono mic connector won’t give you a stereo recording.

You can’t split tracks while recording. You can only do that after you hit Stop. Audacity does not support real time editing.