Bad sound using Stereo Mix

[wildbill001]

normalizing helped but the "Freecorder clip" still sounds the closest to the original--at least to my ears. Wish I could figure out how or if I should update the IDT HD driver. Oh, well. At least I have the freecorder and can edit those in Audacity.

Bill W

[kozikowski]

Did you go through the Windows Control Panels and look for special effects associated with your sound card? I wrote down where our Win7 machine put ours, but the notes are at work. I say that because it's difficult or impossible to start with the Freecorder one and get to the Audacity version, but I have no trouble believing you can start with the flat, off-balance Audacity one and spiff it up artificially to get to the FreeCorder one. It's one of our constants that Audacity doesn't do anything in real time past record, play and certain timer functions, and it's a complete slave to what the computer is doing.

You said Freecorder captures much like the original. How are you listening to the original? Through the same computer? Managing recursive sound pathways in a modern computer isn't simple.

Koz

[wildbill001]

Unfortunately work has intruded onto the really important stuff. I should be able to look into in tonight.

As for the original. Streamed via Rhapsody in both instances. So I would record one. Shutdown Rhapsody. Start Rhapsody, record the second. Everything is playing through my "NATA Multimedia Speaker System" that I have had and used for years. They are certainly not Infinity or Klipsch or anything really good but they hold their own.

I'll report back about the special FX stuff, hopefully tonight.

[kozikowski]

Excellent. Meanwhile I'll paw through my notes that I made before they took the Win7 machine away from me. Koz

[kozikowski]

Win7-64 SP-1
Start > Control Panels > Audio Control Panel
[ ]EAX Effects (deselect)
[ ]CMSS-3D (deselect).

Start > Control Panels > Sound > Communications.
[X]Do Nothing.

Start > Control Panels > Sound Effects Manager > AC97 Audio Configuration.
Zero out, turn everything off or bypass the tools.

You may not have all these panels. You may have more.

Koz

[wildbill001]

Finally found it. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be any type of effects that are applied during recording. There is Noise cancellation and/or Acoustic Echo cancellation. Both are unchecked.

Playback does have a bit of a cheesy equalizer but both recordings are played through that and through the same speakers so I don't see how that could affect it.

Backed to being stumped.

Bill W
P.S. I just got another system put together today, a desktop. Need to load windows and then will try Audacity on that one to see if there is any difference. I'll let ya'll know how it goes.

[kozikowski]

...there does not seem to be any type of effects that are applied during recording.

Doesn't have to be. Remember, you're playing the work normally and running the record side at the same time to capture it. Both pathways at once and all the effects both directions are in the loop.

Does Stereo-Mix make your head hurt yet?

Koz

[wildbill001]

DOH! (forehead slap)

Yes, it does now. Geez what was I thinking? Right, so I'll remove effects this evening and give it another whirl.

Bill W

[wildbill001]

Attached are recordings with EVERYTHING set to the defaults, which is basically no equalizing in or out. Audacity recording sounds even worse than before but the freecorder still sounds pretty good.

I don't know where to go from here. Guess I'll just use freecorder for catching snippets off the web and Audacity for editing. But I am still open to any suggestions.

Bill W

[kozikowski]

Where are you getting the work from, what's the URL?
Koz