[AZ Nomad]

On Tue, 08 Jan 2008 19:09:24 GMT, GregS wrote:
In article , AZ Nomad wrote:
On Tue, 8 Jan 2008 09:50:13 -0800, Richard Crowley wrote:
"Steven Liburd" wrote ...
I am experimenting with converting my vinyl collection to CD. Perhaps it is
my equipment, but it seems that the volume level of my vinyl is somewhat
lower than my CDs. Is it me, my equipment, or is there a standard gain that
I should apply to files converted from analog to digital before I burn them
to CD?

1. Use an appropriate recording level to begin with.
It should be easy enough to estimate where the "loudest" parts
of the tracks are by visual inspection. Set the recording level
to 3dB below the playback peak (to allow for surprises).

Make sure the stylus drop wasn't recorded (cut it out if necessary),
and run a declick filter before normalizing. There's little point in
reserving 10db of dynamic range for the clicks and pops.

I don't fully understand what he is referring to, but its all about levels.
On my stereo system, I have to turn the volume control full up to listen to vinyl,
and way down for anything else. Maybe its compression the question is about ?

I wasn't talking about compression, just gain. If 0db is the peak level
your recording medium can handle and you record vynyl, you're very likely
to have clicks and pops going up to 0db. If loudest music level is down at
-12db and you run a normalization filter, you're going to get very poor
results. It'll see the pops at 0db, and do nothing. If you filter out the
pops, then the normalizing filter has a chance to bring the -12db music up
to 0db.