Amplify effect does not (audibly) amplify - what does it do?

[VenusAndMars]

I use Windows 7, SP1 | Audacity 2.0.5

When attempting to get a song which was playing noticeably quieter in Winamp (5.666) than the ones preceding it as well as the ones following, I thought I'd try the Amplify... effect:



This looked hopeful until I listened to the now seemingly amplified song - there was no audible difference whatever. What did I do wrong/how does one go about raising the perceived loudness/volume of a track?

Thank you.

[steve]

This looked hopeful until I listened to the now seemingly amplified song - there was no audible difference whatever.

Did the song sound noticeably louder when played in Audacity immediately after amplifying?

[VenusAndMars]

Thanks steve.

Did the song sound noticeably louder when played in Audacity immediately after amplifying?

No, as I said in the OP: This looked hopeful until I listened to the now seemingly amplified song - there was no audible difference whatever.

Sure I listened to it; I was anxious to see if had finally found the solution to what has been a problem for the looongest time - moste titles are tolerably equal in terms of loudness(?) volume(?) but once in a while one will be so loud as to have the neighbours pounding the walls while another (like Dylan's 'I threw it all away' in the example) can barely be heard.

I had used several third-party programs portending to normalize volume across all my music tracks, but they hadn't worked, and so I had more or less given up on it.

[steve]

No, as I said in the OP: This looked hopeful until I listened to the now seemingly amplified song - there was no audible difference whatever.

In that case it would appear to be a problem with your playback system. From looking at the pictures that you posted, the amplified waveform should be noticeably louder.
Check your sound card settings to see if it has any effects enabled that could be automatically "levelling" the playback.
Also. ensue that you don't have Skype or other voip programs running in the background (they can mess with recording and playback levels).

[VenusAndMars]

Check your sound card settings to see if it has any effects enabled that could be automatically "levelling" the playback.

No, I had been experimenting with this option before in my attempts at volume normalization 'across the board', but scrapped it as that method engendered problems of its own.

I forget what they were right now, but I am satisfied that that did not solve the problem.

[steve]

The image in your last post shows the settings for the "headphones" device, but the default device is shown as DFX speakers. Have you checked the settings for DFX speakers?

[VenusAndMars]

Uh...no, that's not it either:



as you can see, the DFX Speakers Properties dialog doesn't even have the Enhancements/Loudness Equalization tab.

[kozikowski]

You could force the effect to reveal itself. Put a song on the timeline, select the whole thing by clicking just above MUTE. Effect > Fade Out. Play it. The song starts out normal volume and fades to dead silence. Somewhere in the song, the system will have to make a decision to "give up." It will be interesting to hear what it does at that point (attach).

Koz

[VenusAndMars]

OK, thx. I will in a half hour as I was 'otherwise engaged' just now. Stay tuned;)

[VenusAndMars]

Done and done. It happened to be John Hiatt's 'Cry Love'. It 'gave up' right where I would have expected, where the green arrow points:



And? Look, good buddy, is it kidding me you are? Because these suggestions have all been 'shots in the dark' and if you are not exactly sure of what you are doing, let's call it quits.

I'm a busy guy with tons to do.