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[benn600]

I want to have my music more closely leveled to have it sound more like the same volume.  A simple general increase or decrease uniform to the entire song would be great.  However, when I enable replay gain, it seems to lower my songs WAY down.  Am I doing something wrong?  It seems like an adjustment of +12 (max) helps but it is still lowered quite a bit from the unmanaged level that I get.

On the same topic, I leave my speakers turned to about 60% and never touch the volume.  I only adjust it from my keyboard control.  Do other people do this?  It is much easier for me and seems to work well.

How does the power usage work in this case?  When speakers are turned up high and on but with no output, do they take very little power?  In other words, do they only take power to actually create the sound waves?  It seems like they would.  Also, what does the average computer speaker set take?  I am using the Altec Lansing ATP4 4.1 setup which I highly recommend except for the fact that it is not digital and no longer for sale.

I bought the ATP3 as my first real set of computer speakers (2.1) and loved it.  Cost about $60.  I could have got the ATP4 for $140.  I waited and later found the ATP4 on eBay.  I won the speakers for right around $60 or less--now that's an amazing deal!  I did quite well.  Lol if the seller is reading this.

[Bill Ko]

I want to have my music more closely leveled to have it sound more like the same volume.  A simple general increase or decrease uniform to the entire song would be great.  However, when I enable replay gain, it seems to lower my songs WAY down.  Am I doing something wrong?  It seems like an adjustment of +12 (max) helps but it is still lowered quite a bit from the unmanaged level that I get.

I believe that the reason why all the songs are turned down so low is because MC assigns a value of 83 dB for the target gain.  (83 dB was not an arbitrary number.  It is the same level used by radio stations.)

The reason why all the songs are lowered so much is because most songs are recorded much louder than that, so the resulting "gain" is actually a "loss!"

Bill

[benn600]

That makes sense!  I really don't want any gain.  I want it to take the middle most song I have and then, on a curve, gradually increase the volume of softer songs and tone down the loudest songs..

Another way would be to take the loudest song and leave it alone.  Then only increase the quiet ones.  This is probably a good solution.

[zirum]

On the same topic, I leave my speakers turned to about 60% and never touch the volume.  I only adjust it from my keyboard control.  Do other people do this?  It is much easier for me and seems to work well.

I have this theory that it is best to keep the computer volume as high as possible, without disorting the sound. This way the static noise (the constant generated sameleveled sound) will be a lot less than the sound. Having a bit difficult explaining. I'll try in an example to.

Say I want sound of 10 (ignoring any db convertions aso.)

Case 1: When I turn the computer to high output, and amplifier to low (when high output, it don't need to amplifie much to get output 10), I have output 5 on computer, amplifing 2, getting 10.

Case 2: When I turn the computer to low output, and amplifier to high (when low output, it need to amplifie much to get output 10), I have output 1 on computer, amplifing 10, getting 10.

In both cases the computer generates a static noise, undependent on the sound level. this is of say, level 0.1 before the amplifier. In case 1 it would be 0.2 after amplifier, but in case 2 it would be 0.5. Hence the case 1 is to preffer.

There is also the aspect of volume trailing noise, which little other than better audio system can fix...

I do not know any actual results of this, but it's a theory I have, that I try to follow. Probaly objections to this in the outer world

[zirum]

How does the power usage work in this case?  When speakers are turned up high and on but with no output, do they take very little power?  In other words, do they only take power to actually create the sound waves?  It seems like they would.  Also, what does the average computer speaker set take?  I am using the Altec Lansing ATP4 4.1 setup which I highly recommend except for the fact that it is not digital and no longer for sale.

A amplifier is always on, put there is not much power consumption when there is nothing it can amplify. The volume of a amplifier is just a signal decreaser. Hence the amplifier get less singal to amplifiy and the result is lower. Thats why some recivers write -60db as value on the volume. Increasing sound will give make it -59db. This value tells you it decrease the input signal with 59db. when reacing 0db the input signal is not decrease anything. Some amplifiers may even go above 0db, which means it has an minor amplifier on the input singal as well.

A step of 3 db is a doubling of the effect actually, but a human cannot hear it as that. Actually it's almost the lowest difference we're able to notice I read somewhere once...

[benn600]

That is a very interesting explanation!  Thanks for telling me that!

We have a Yamaha receiver and I always wondered why it was negative but that makes sense--it decreases the input otherwise it would amplify at 100% of its capability and blow you away.  Now I have a question.  When we got our receiver, we ended up going with the cheapest 7.1 we could find (~$600 in stores, I think, new on eBay for $300!)  The power was a little less than the next one up.  I must say at the moment, we could not ask for more power!  The capability is plenty loud to blow us away in our theater room and its 0dB on a good input would start to hurt, so we rarely go higher.  It does, however, have a +15dB or so.  Would the next amplifier (with ~10 more watts/channel) go higher than +15?  Or would it just start out higher at each level?

[zirum]

No it would probaly not go any higher (not that it got anything to do with it...). A amplifier is described with a watts. This is a number to represent  the "volume" it may generate at maximum power. This varies alot, but in general, you can use it as a pinpointer of how powerfull a amplifier may be. at 0db, the signal is amplified as much as it "can", but some manufactors try to fake/work around this by interly amplifing the singal. But in a ideal world, a signal should be at max, when not altered at all. What we see in real world is that the signal varies from source and decoder, so there is not correct "level". Therefore a amplifier has a margin before it clips.

So it is a yes, to your last assumption i guess. A bigger amplifier, would just start out higher at the same level (making the input the same level). But then again this only counts for Class D amplifiers (I think thats whats it called). Or was i Class T...?!?

Ok, sorry, but i should go to bed. 8 beer does something to a mind. I'll get back to you tomorrow. Then i'll have 12...

[Bill Ko]

I have this theory that it is best to keep the computer volume as high as possible, without disorting the sound. This way the static noise (the constant generated sameleveled sound) will be a lot less than the sound. Having a bit difficult explaining. I'll try in an example to.

Say I want sound of 10 (ignoring any db convertions aso.)

Case 1: When I turn the computer to high output, and amplifier to low (when high output, it don't need to amplifie much to get output 10), I have output 5 on computer, amplifing 2, getting 10.

Case 2: When I turn the computer to low output, and amplifier to high (when low output, it need to amplifie much to get output 10), I have output 1 on computer, amplifing 10, getting 10.

In both cases the computer generates a static noise, undependent on the sound level. this is of say, level 0.1 before the amplifier. In case 1 it would be 0.2 after amplifier, but in case 2 it would be 0.5. Hence the case 1 is to preffer.

There is also the aspect of volume trailing noise, which little other than better audio system can fix...

I do not know any actual results of this, but it's a theory I have, that I try to follow. Probaly objections to this in the outer world

This is correct, because noise figure calculations being what they are, the first amplifier (in this case, the computer) always has the greatest effect on noise, so you want the signal to noise ratio to be as high as it can be, and that is accomplished by "cranking up the volume" on the first stage.  There, that was pretty simple. 

Bill

[RobOK]

Somewhat related....


I have a number of songs that have a replay gain of -16 or -17 or so.   That seems like a big decrease.  Should I take some action with these MP3s?

When these are in my playlist, they have a big effect on the volume (I think).

[RobOK]

benn600....

I created a playlist called "Strange Volume"  :


[Replay Gain]=>16 or [Replay Gain]=<-16.5


And found a couple of odd ball files that had +40 or something.  I have a manual play list called "SPECIFIC EXCLUDES" that I drag files that I want to really be sure never show up, and most playlists are based on that.  So i got rid of some of the bad offenders that way.

One outlier in your Playing Now list can affect the volume for the whole list.

[Two Wire]

I have a question concerning replay gain. I use an external program to set the gain of my music files, which is time consuming, but effective. I have never really played around much with MC's volume leveling. Does MC actually change the gain level of files, or does it determine the differences between the actual level,  and desired playback level, and store this information in a database, to be recalled when the file is played? Leaving the actual file is unchanged

[enervation]

does it determine the differences between the actual level,  and desired playback level, and store this information in a database, to be recalled when the file is played? Leaving the actual file is unchanged

Yes, MC leaves the file unchanged, simply playing it back at a different volume.

[Two Wire]

Thanks, enervation. I have often wondered about that, but never got around to testing this out myself.

[dlone]

MC does it at a track state
Unlike something like mp3gain where you can pick 'album level' as an option

The difference is that in MC, each track wil be set to play at the same volume, but in mp3gain the "quiet" track will still play back at a lesser voulme

Ah, there's nothing like a quiet introspective song really banging the speakers to spoil the mood 

[Two Wire]

Very disquieting, but to me, not as bad as the interruptions that occur in live performances with track changes. I know alt m can be set to do this but not everybody using the computer does, or they forget. It would be nice if albums could be flaged to switch to gapless playback when selected.

[Alex B]

MC does it at a track state
Unlike something like mp3gain where you can pick 'album level' as an option

The difference is that in MC, each track wil be set to play at the same volume, but in mp3gain the "quiet" track will still play back at a lesser voulme

Ah, there's nothing like a quiet introspective song really banging the speakers to spoil the mood 

Not quite,

Album Gain was introduced in MC10. MC lets the user decide between the album gain and track gain. Both are available in the ReplayGain options. MC calculates the album gain values on the fly. The files need to be analyzed, imported and have correct tags.

[TXgary]

Alex B question for you on replay gain?

Does Media center 11 or 12 use the same field and process to calculate replay gain as Microsoft's Media Player?  I have a very slow xp pro machine and it will not run mc 8 up so I am using Media Player.  Ok job, but volume leveling must be done in Media Player, not acceptable to have replay gain calculated already in the mp3 file header.... why is that??  I thought there was a standardization?

Thanks for your reply