I am a fairly elementary user of Audacity (v2.2.2, Windows 10). I use it to trim, cut, and do some elementary enhancements of my recordings. I have a problem that I think Audacity has the tools to solve, but I don’t have the skills.
I made a stereo recording (about 1 hour long) made with a single USB microphone. In replay, there are 2 or 3 spots, about 1 to 2 minutes in length, in which there is noise on one channel. The second channel is fine. I have no idea what might have caused this and would be interested to learn, as I don’t want it to happen again. More importantly, though, I would like to fix my existing recording.
I’m not sure how to go about it, but if I could copy the contents of the good channel over the bad parts of the other channel, this would produce a fix.
I suppose I could simply silence the bad sections of the one channel and export, but this might sound funny on playback, with one speaker cutting out suddenly.
Any suggestions or tutorials would be appreciated very much. Thank you in advance.
Are you playing back in Audacity or in some other program?
In Audacity, is there any visible difference between the left and right channels?
Does the “noise on one channel” occur in the same place each time that you play it?
The noise occurs in the same places each playback in both Audacity and in the WAV export played with Microsoft’s Groove Music player.
In Audacity, the only visible difference (that I can notice) in the Waveform between the left and right channels are in those places where there is noise.
Thanks for your help.
When recording from a single (mono) microphone, it is generally best to record in mono. To do that, look in the Windows Sound Control Panel and ensure that the device is set to record mono, then launch Audacity, then set Audacity to record mono in the device toolbar and ensure that the USB mic is selected as the recording device.