How to remove the booming noise from a tape recording?

[MrYossu]

Hello,

I'm a bit of a novice with Audacity, so apologies if this is obvious.

I have some old spoken word tapes, and when played, there is a lot of booming (like low frequency noise) in the background. This makes the voice hard to hear. I have tried them on a good quality tape deck, but they are old recordings, presumably on low-quality tapes, and the noise is always there.

Is there any way of cleaning up the audio with Audacity? I have tried fiddling around, but as I don't really know what I'm doing, I haven't had any success.

Thanks for any help

[steve]

Upgrade Audacity to the latest 1.3.x version (currently 1.3.9)

Then select a short section of the track and use the Equalization effect (Effects menu).
Select the "Graphic Eq" view.
Pull down the sliders to the left as in the picture below and click OK.

Sliders to the left are bass frequencies - those to the right are treble.

You will need to experiment to find the best settings.
Use Ctrl+Z to "Undo".

When you have found settings that you are happy with, select the entire track (double click on the track) and apply the Equalization effect.

Reduce bass

screenshot.png (51.92 KiB) Viewed 2038 times

[MrYossu]

Thanks very much

Whilst the quality still leaves a little to be desired, it's a huge improvement on what it was before. At least you can hear the voice now!

By pulling down the frequencies below about 300Hz, and boosting the ones above, it is pretty clear, although the voice now sounds like the recording was inside a tin box! Any ideas what I could do to improve this further.

Thanks VERY much for the help.

[steve]

it is pretty clear, although the voice now sounds like the recording was inside a tin box! Any ideas what I could do to improve this further.

The best that you will get is by finding a happy compromise between tinny and boomy. Note also that it may sound significantly different on different headphones/speakers.

[MrYossu]

OK, thanks. I just wondered if there was some other effect that would reduce the tinniness. I'll play around with the equalisation some more.

Thanks again