The tracks will be mixed down to two stereo channels?

[Gentle_Jihad]

Every time I try to export a 2 track file as an mp3 in the Audacity 1.3 Beta, it says "The tracks will be mixed down to two stereo channels in the exported file". I have Lame_v3.98.3 for Windows installed, yet it won't export a two track file as an mp3, but it will export 1 track files as them. Do I have the wrong Lame Encoder? Or do I have it installed wrong? How can I export a two track file to an mp3?
Thanks.

[Gale Andrews]

Every time I try to export a 2 track file as an mp3 in the Audacity 1.3 Beta, it says "The tracks will be mixed down to two stereo channels in the exported file". I have Lame_v3.98.3 for Windows installed, yet it won't export a two track file as an mp3, but it will export 1 track files as them. Do I have the wrong Lame Encoder? Or do I have it installed wrong? How can I export a two track file to an mp3?

How many tracks with mute/solo buttons do you have, and does each say mono, left, right or stereo above those buttons?

You can't export an MP3 with more than two channels:
http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/File ... og#compare

So if you have two stereo MP3s each with a left and right channel, they will be mixed to a single two channel (stereo) MP3 and will give the message you quoted "The tracks will be mixed down to two stereo channels in the exported file". If you have only a single two channel MP3 you should not see the message you quoted.



Gale

[Gentle_Jihad]

Thanks for the reply Gale.
So here's a screenshot of what I wanna export: http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/3278 ... crnsht.jpg

Basically, I took two songs, edited out parts I didn't like/ added effects (Phaser, Wahwah, Fade in/out, ect) and made it so the 2nd song begins playing a few seconds before the 1st ends, so it blends together (they're both techno, so I'm going for a DJ like effect) there's no real way (as I can tell) to make both blend together on one track.. So what would your suggestion be?

I'm not sure on all the terms your using, like mono and stereo is 1 or 2 speakers right? I want it to phase between the 2 speakers in certain parts, so I want it to be stereo, right? Is that a possibility?

I get the same error message when I try to export the song as a WAV as well.

Any help is greatly appreciated! I spent hours working on this and it sucks I cant even do anything with it!

Thanks,
Charles

[Gale Andrews]

Thanks for the reply Gale.
So here's a screenshot of what I wanna export: http://img269.imageshack.us/img269/3278 ... crnsht.jpg

I get the same error message when I try to export the song as a WAV as well.

It is not an "error", it is just a warning (that you can switch off in the "Warnings" Preferences) advising that you have more than one stereo track. Accordingly, your two stereo tracks (each stereo track in turn having two channels, left and right) will be mixed down into one stereo track when you export.

Audacity can only play back in mono (one channel) or stereo (two channels), so when you play your project in Audacity it is already mixing the tracks down to stereo. Similarly, the exported MP3 will be mixed down to stereo (one file containing left and right channels). The MP3 will have exactly the same balances you hear now when you press Play in Audacity, with the central overlapping part mixed together. The only difference will be the expected degradation in sound quality because you are exporting to a lossy format. If you want to see visually what the playback or export looks like mixed into one track, click Edit > Select > All, then Tracks > Mix and Render. You can always Edit > Undo it.

I would say though from looking at your screenshot, that the central overlapping part will distort. The volume of tracks when mixed together is always combined, and the lower of your two overlapping tracks is already almost at the maximum possible level of +/-1. I suggest you play that overlapping part and see if the green playback bars in Meter Toolbar start showing red clipping lights to the right of the bars. If so, you have distortion. What you'll want to do is use Envelope Tool to bring the volume of each track down in the area where they overlap.

If you actually want to export a four-channel file so that channels 3 and 4 are empty except at the overlap, it can be done if you export as WAV having set Import / Export Preferences to "Use Custom Mix". If you export a six-channel WAV you can even convert it in other software to MP3 Surround Sound (5:1), but I don't think from your description this is what you want.


Gale

[Gentle_Jihad]

Thanks alot Gale, You fixed my problem! by combining the tracks I can now export the songs no problem.

Thanks for all the help!!