Audacity Forum

Hello Again All;

I have an analog turntable/stereo from which I am importing my LP`s to Audacity for it`s help. Going through my sound card enables me to adjust the input signal balance and volume which is a good thing because my stereo has a natural bias to the right channel. I assume it is best for the recording to get everything coming in as close to balanced as possible and that leads to my question.

As the signals are represented across the scale I notice the lighter green portions of the channel bars are not equal in the overall recording while the darker green portion is very close to equal. This method is how I judged my adjustments to volume and balance between the two channels (the left channel being of less amplitude). I would ask for any comments from ya`ll about your opinions (or facts) of whether I should try to bring the signal in equalizing the lighter or darker portions of the bars while staying below a recommended 1.3 or so on the scale. I`ve searched through the forums and have found no specific topic covering this subject. Would favoring one method over the other lead to a more accurate representation of the original recording? I am not experienced with recording applications or sound manipulation so any help could be in dummy terms if possible. Thank You all for a wonderful tool in Audacity.

plain

The lighter shade of green is the peak level and the darker shade of green is the RMS (average) level.
To avoid clipping (distortion) it is essential that the peak level does not reach 0 dB.
During recording it is generally recommended to aim for a peak level of around -6 dB (so as to allow a bit of "headroom").

For the final exported production, it is generally recommended that the peak level is close to, but below 0 dB - typically people will amplify the final mix to bring the peak level somewhere between -1 and -0.1 dB.

The RMS level may provide a closer approximation of how loud something will sound than the peak level.

Hi stevethefiddle;

Thanks for taking time to get back to me.

I said 1.3 but meant -1.3 of course. I`m curious, why not have the darker green on the signal bar as the first color if it is the average signal? I had presumed the opposite circumstance regarding the bar`s colors as I now see them.

Now this leads to a point I would like guidance on from people with experience. Do I adjust the in signal to balance the averages of the two channels with peaks kept below -6 or not worry about the averages and just try to balance the peaks? I believe I have pretty much succeeded in balancing the peaks, although they are quite a bit closer to zero than recommended. I tried to get the peaks to zero (ver. 1.3.11) and if I got a red bar on the right side I backed off till it went away. (of course I had to restart Audacity several times) Then I looked over the signal and observed no peaks that went off the chart so to speak.

plain

plainolguy wrote:(of course I had to restart Audacity several times)

There's a caveat for that: Clicking anywhere on the Record Level meter will reset the Peak and Overload indicators. It also toggles Source Monitoring on/off if you're not in Record mode.

if the two are reasonably close just fix it after the recording
use normalise to zero
amplify to zero
then amplify back to -3 for use
or -12 if you plan to process the data with eq compress etc
then repeat as above

it is also possible that the bias is in the stereo amp or preamp, but some turntable/needle combos will tend to naturally push on one side of the groove more making one side louder than the other.
whatever, some devices will let you tweak the balance there if your recording is way off.

plainolguy wrote: I`m curious, why not have the darker green on the signal bar as the first color if it is the average signal? I had presumed the opposite circumstance regarding the bar`s colors as I now see them.

Sorry, typo error.
The dark green is the peak level. The light green is the RMS level.