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[Rusty]

Thanks for reading my post, I appreciate it ...

I am about to make a Compilation CD, but the volume levels of a number of tracks are different.  Now I've never used Normalisation in any form before & am unsure whether to use it now before encoding & burning.

Obviously I want the best quality burn & I suppose most would probably say ... "Well don't normailise". But if I were to normalise at this pre-burning stage could you possibly advise me as to what percentage setting would be optimal to even out the volume levels yet introduce the minimal amount of noise?

Kindest regards & thanks for any advice you may like to offer - Rusty.

[Rusty]

Re-Posted due to nil responses ...

Is replay gain a better option?

[Matt]

Hey Rusty.

Normalization isn't going to do what you want.  However, Replay Gain is the perfect solution.  The only hitch is that it's not the easiest to use when burning in MJ 8.

If you want to try it, do this:

1) analyze the replay gain of the files you want to burn
2) put them in Playing Now, switch the playback output to "Disk Writer"
3) configure the DSP Studio to use Replay Gain, and any other DSP's you want on the CD
4) play the playlist -- it'll dump the files to disk (it'll make a bunch of WAV's)
5) add these WAV's to the CD burner and burn them

If you do a forum search for "Disk Writer", you may find some more helpful threads about how to do this.

Hope that helps.

-Matt
JRiver, Inc.

[shelly]

Matt,

1) analyze the replay gain of the files you want to burn
2) put them in Playing Now, switch the playback output to "Disk Writer"
3) configure the DSP Studio to use Replay Gain, and any other DSP's you want on the CD
4) play the playlist -- it'll dump the files to disk (it'll make a bunch of WAV's)
5) add these WAV's to the CD burner and burn them

How are steps 4-5 different than the normal process of burning to a cd.  I thought files are always converted to wav's before being placed on the cd.  Are you saying that unless this is done manually, that replay gain is not applied?  Thanks.

Shelly

[Matt]

Are you saying that unless this is done manually, that replay gain is not applied?

Correct.  DSP's aren't used when doing a regular decode for burning.

However, Disk Writer allows you to pipe the data through the MJ playback engine, so any regular playback features like DSP, cross-fading, etc. work.

[gvag]

Matt -

Are you saying that unless this is done manually, that replay gain is not applied?
Correct. DSP's aren't used when doing a regular decode for burning.

However, Disk Writer allows you to pipe the data through the MJ playback engine, so any regular playback features like DSP, cross-fading, etc. work.

I followed the steps outlined and MJ created the wavew files but the DSP effects did not come thru.  Any thoughts on what went wrong?

thanks

[Matt]

Was the DSP on for sure?  Can you hear the DSP running when you play through the soundcard instead of the disk writer?  They should be the same...

(p.s. DSP is disabled for WMA's due to licensing restrictions)

[sekim]

Matt,

Any chance this could be done with mp3 cds in the future? I understand the workings of this, but the fact that an mp3 cd file in wav form would be gigabytes in size before conversion is not very appealing.

[gvag]

Matt -

Sorry my mistake, its working just like you said, my mistake.

Thanks

[Stebajo]

The most clean and easy solution that I found is to use a simple and free software: MP3Gain. It can quickly analyze and adjust mp3 files so that they have the same volume. Just set it at about 93db, analyze and apply to your mp3 files before burning. It's all!
There is no quality lost in the change because the program adjusts the mp3 file directly, without decoding and re-encoding.
I always apply it to my files also  just to listen to them really at the same volume and ready to burn.

MP3Gain

[gvag]

Matt -
The ability of MJ to output wave files from lower bitrate formats using DSP effects is really incredible. I've got a number of albums from eMusic that but I've been trying to improve the sound quality so it would be worthwhile burning them and have them available on our good sound system.

One approach I was trying was converting the MP3s to wave files, using EAC to join them then openning up the appended file in WavePurity and processing it with various effects in place. Not very successful.

Another solution I explored was Diamond Cuts Enhanced/CDR program which they advertised as being able to burn CDs with the same effects as their Enhance/MP3 applet. Not true, after contacting their tech support it turns out that Enhance/CDR was the fore runner of their DCart32 program and apart from some bug fixes has not had any work done on it in about two years. Not only that but their touted 100 effects are not equivalent to those supplied with Enhance/MP3 and even if you could figure out how they acheived those effects you'd have too process the source file multiple times to apply each effect individually. Of course if you pop for their Platinim version of DCart32 at $199 US then you get the ability to apply multiple effectrs and filters in one pass of the file. BTW, the special price for Enhance/CDR is $29 US!!

So J River should get out there and blow its horn some more with yet another feature that other software only tries to do or does but at darn near ten time the price.

So after all this buttering up I have a few requests.

Could you change it so that CD Writer uses the settings from File Naming & Locations/Output File Locations for its output?

Would it be possible to have the Output Mode of Playback use the Converter instead of Disk Writer? I have a real mixed bag of files in my library and I don't like using the DSP with my high bitrate Lame, Ogg, or Ape files. If I could re-encode my lower biterate files to use the DSP effects that would be a big plus. But I'm thinking this probably isn't possible. If not, how about a flag to specify whether DSP is enabled for a particular file or better yet a setting that enables/disables DSP depending on the format and bitrate.

Thanks

[Rusty]

Gidday Matt - Thanks very much for your reply.

My music files are a mix of APE, MP3 & sometimes WAV ... For this
particular compilation CD they were APE. Now I may be a bit of a dummy, but I tried to do as you described. It was a labourious exercise & at the end of it all I couldn't hear any change. The same tracks were still louder.

What setting should I have applied to the Replay Gain?

Do I have to do it for every song?

When you say for step one to "analyze the replay gain of the files you want to burn" what does this achieve ... Maybe I did it wrong but they all appeared to be the same. But that shouldn't have been the case should it, so maybe I didn't do that right either.

As to my other post re:making this whole process simpler (& if possible via a one button action). The question still stands ... "Is it possible to make this whole volume levelling process way more simpler (& fool proof) than it is at the moment"? Because surely this is one of the things that many, many people will want to do with MJ = Make Compilations & they'll all want the songs to be at the same volume level.

Kindest regards - Rusty.

[Stebajo]

---As to my other post re:making this whole process simpler (& if possible via a one button action). The question still stands ... "Is it possible to make this whole volume levelling process way more simpler (& fool proof) than it is at the moment"? Because surely this is one of the things that many, many people will want to do with MJ = Make Compilations & they'll all want the songs to be at the same volume level.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Rusty,

MP3GAIN (newest and of the same author)will perform REPLAYGAIN analysis, and apply the suggested gain adjustment directly to your mp3 files. See http://www.geocities.com/mp3gain/
Nothing of simpler and about setting you could try 93db instead of 89db, like I said in my previous post.

Stebajo

[Charlemagne 8]

Stebajo,
The Replay Gain at the link you posted is the same Replay Gain that is linked to in MJ's Replay Gain Analysis tool. A different route but they still end up in the same place.
The website also makes the statement "No players currently support Replay Gain". Has this changed lately? That would be nice.
Does that mean that unless a player supports RG, even an MP3 player won't play the changes?
The way I understand it, Disk Writer just pipes the playback into an entirely new WAV file that can be converted to MP3 or CDA with all of the enhancements intact.
What would be nice is if you could HEAR what was being put into that WAV file. As it is now, there is silence during the process ... a little unnerving to wait for 150 or so songs to be converted to WAV (with the goal of making an MP3 disk) at 1:1 time ratio and not knowing if it's being done right or not.
CVIII

[TheyCalledMeThe]

Shame On J-river for expecting such an effort from us! SHAME! SHAME!

[sekim]

>>> a little unnerving to wait for 150 or so songs to be converted to WAV (with the goal of making an MP3 disk) <<<

My point exactly from above. Then, unless the format that you choose to convert to supports ID3.2 tags, the whole thing is pointless. Replay Gain needs files that support these type of tags. Ape will not work. Yet, another reason to choose mp3 for its many features.

[Stebajo]

Hi Charlemagne 8,
what I'm trying to say is that if I have to analyze all my files to make them at the same volume, I prefer that change be almost permanent and so useful also with other players (i.e. with Nomad JB) or always ready to burn.

>>>The website also makes the statement "No players currently support Replay Gain". Has this changed lately? That would be nice.
Does that mean that unless a player supports RG, even an MP3 player won't play the changes?

I'm not sure but believe that MJ support it, anyhow I find more useful, simpler & faster to use MP3Gain and not ReplayGain, so I disable it in MJ during playback.
MP3Gain adjusts the mp3 files directly, without decoding and re-encoding so without quality lost in the change.
This is one of its links: MP3Gain

Only if I want make permanent the MJ's DSP enhancements I use DiskWriter to decode and pipe the playback into an entirely new WAV file that can be burned (CDA) or re-encoded to MP3. But always after to have used MP3Gain.

In every case, if I get an MP3 on internet it is a good norm before to check if it is not corrupted, so I analyze it with MP3Utility (MP3Utility) and with MP3-Library (MP3-Library) to analyze again and eventually to fix it.
To fix mp3 is important in particular before to burn CD or upload them to a player device that could give problem with corrupted files, like Steve well knows.

Please, I would like to know what mp3-analyzer and fixer you as other users in this forum are using.

Thanks
Stebajo

[Charlemagne 8]

I thought that Replay Gain Analysis WAS MP3Gain. Matt has said that the changes to MP3 files become part of the MP3 file. and this from the MP3Gain link above:

For a further explanation of Replay Gain (the statistical analysis done by MP3Gain), see http://www.replaygain.org

That is exactly the same link as in the Replay Gain Analysis tool. So I guess I'm still confused about the whole thing. I really thought I understood.
CVIII

[Stebajo]

>>>So I guess I'm still confused about the whole thing. I really thought I understood.

Yes, it isn't so clear, anyhow I can only say that again there are updates of MP3Gain...

I think that the best thing is to try them both and to choose what you prefer.

Happy holidays!  

Stebajo