Audacity Forum

So I've been trying to figure out why many mp3's sound so much better in windows media player and stevethefiddle pointed out it uses enhancements, wow or something. Anyway tried turning it off and sure enough it sounded like the 'original' file. So, is it possible to use some kind of wizardry with Audacity to get an similar effect?

Hello again

Yes there's various things that you can do, but the first thing to ask is why do the songs sound better with WMP? After all, if they are commercial recordings then a lot of studio time and money have gone into producing the "perfect" mix, so why is it that by enabling a few gadgets on WMP does it suddenly sound better? Is it because you are playing the music through tinny little computer speakers? Is it because you are not playing the original "perfectly mixed and balanced" studio recording but a badly compressed MP3 copy? Is it because you're playing a home studio recording and the WMP effects compensate for a "thin" sound in the original recording?

For whatever reason, the WMP effects are compensating for some deficiency or other.

I've used WMP with the effects turned on, and yes, when playing through my tinny little computer speakers the music sounds loads better - but if I connect the computer to my proper sound system it sounds dreadful - far too much bass, too much tinny treble and all echoey.

In order to make the right sort of "improvements" we need to know exactly what we are trying to improve.

If you're interested in using effect, you will find Audacity 1.3.12 is very much better than the old 1.2 version. I'd highly recommend upgrading.

Audacity 1.3.12 has an effect called "Equalizer", which is very much like the Graphic Equalizer in WMP - that's one effect that you could start experimenting with straight away.

Oh wow, downloaded 1.3.12 and threw in the same track and it instantly sounded amazing! Great stuff. So I'll just ditch the old one I had and use this from now on. Thanks steve!