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When viewing the waveforms in Audacity (or anything else), the very
"bottoms" of the waveforms looked "chopped" like they are peak
limited, but the very "tops" look normal (ragged).
Link to picture of waveform:
http://www.postimage.org/image.php?v=aV2idr9S
Then I tried really putting a loud sound into the mic. It's my voice
droning and changing pitch quite loudly in the microphone. The
waveform is so strange and not symmetrical. It undulates with the
raising and lower of the pitch of my voice:
Link to picture of waveform:
http://www.postimage.org/image.php?v=gx1nuWE9
Does anyone know what is going on?
Your second waveform is normal -- sounds, particularly vocal sounds, are
often asymmetrical.
Your first waveform, however, has problems. You're right in that the
negative excursions are clipped at about -0.7, whereas the positive
excursions clip at +1.0. Something in the system, possibly in the mixer, is
clipping asymmetrically, which means it's probably broken.
I'll add, though, that it would be more useful to show a waveform which
doesn't clip the positive excursions either. If you record so that the
positive excursions hit +0.9 maximum, do the negative excursions still clip
at -0.7?
Peace,
Paul