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DeeAa[_4_] DeeAa[_4_] is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Hey,

Using Cubase 6 64bit here w/built in plugins and then some freeware
and otherwise accumulated older ones through JBridge.

Any suggestions for a simple, accurate VST delay plug (maybe down to
sample level?) for track phase alignment use?

I have been doing it manually/visually for a long time, but now that I
record demos with a fixed set for a long long time, I'd like to assign
a fixed delay for each track to align it proper, and then I can just
dump the recorded files to tracks in Cubase and they're all set both
mix and alignment wise and I get raw-mixed demo in seconds from the
session. (an 8-track Zoom recorder in use, so I mix in 24bit 44.1).

The Cubase's own delay with zero FB and 100% seems to work quite OK
and works with .1ms accuracy, which is fine for them demos anyway, but
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?

Or any other suggestions/caveats to the method from u pro guys here?

Cheers,

Dee
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Phil W[_3_] Phil W[_3_] is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

"DeeAa":

Using Cubase 6 64bit here w/built in plugins and then some freeware
and otherwise accumulated older ones through JBridge.

Any suggestions for a simple, accurate VST delay plug (maybe down to
sample level?) for track phase alignment use?

I have been doing it manually/visually for a long time, but now that I
record demos with a fixed set for a long long time, I'd like to assign
a fixed delay for each track to align it proper, and then I can just
dump the recorded files to tracks in Cubase and they're all set both
mix and alignment wise and I get raw-mixed demo in seconds from the
session. (an 8-track Zoom recorder in use, so I mix in 24bit 44.1).

The Cubase's own delay with zero FB and 100% seems to work quite OK
and works with .1ms accuracy, which is fine for them demos anyway, but
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?


Have you tried
http://www.voxengo.com/product/latencydelay/

already? It might do, what you´re looking for.


Hope that helps,

Phil

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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Dec 13, 10:38*am, "Phil W" wrote:
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?


Have you triedhttp://www.voxengo.com/product/latencydelay/

already? It might do, what you´re looking for.

Hope that helps,

THANKS a million! That's perfect! I had completely forgotten those
Voxengo plugs, I've used some of them before. I'll definitely get all
those free ones at least right away.

Cheers,

Dee
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Scott Dorsey Scott Dorsey is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

DeeAa wrote:

The Cubase's own delay with zero FB and 100% seems to work quite OK
and works with .1ms accuracy, which is fine for them demos anyway, but
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?


That's about an inch of positioning. That's about as accurate as you will
ever be.

Or any other suggestions/caveats to the method from u pro guys here?


My suggestion is that when you start having to do careful alignment, sit
back and think about what is going on and why there is so much leakage
and whether you might want to consider miking things differently. You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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Les Cargill[_4_] Les Cargill[_4_] is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Scott Dorsey wrote:
wrote:

The Cubase's own delay with zero FB and 100% seems to work quite OK
and works with .1ms accuracy, which is fine for them demos anyway, but
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?


That's about an inch of positioning. That's about as accurate as you will
ever be.

Or any other suggestions/caveats to the method from u pro guys here?


My suggestion is that when you start having to do careful alignment, sit
back and think about what is going on and why there is so much leakage
and whether you might want to consider miking things differently. You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....
--scott



You can't analytically, but there is an approach that
I think minimizes things. All this is my opinion and practice,
not something "standard" (SFAIK).

This comes up when I record live multitrack. You pick something to be
the "center" ( usually the snare drum ), find a snare hit from when the
drummer is warming up and align everything else to that. Overheads are
a "stereo track" and are moved in lock-step ( even if they're seperate
..wav files ).

Snare and kik are close miced, overheads aren't. But snare needs to be
the most focused thing. Generally, the kik has been EQ'd to where the
snare isn't at issue.

Works fine, and can probably be shown to be as good as it gets. the main
thing it does for me is to reduce the amount of bandwidth
necessary to make the snare audible.

Guitars, bass, keys all live on either much more distant
close mics or are DI. "Much more distant" means
they're way away from the 3:1 rule distance. You'll still get them
in the overheads, and there will be some combing, but it's not
as significant.

--
Les Cargill


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Mark Mark is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

*You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....
--scott


now that's interesting....

why not?

if you have one sound source and 3 mics, (or even N mics) you should
be able to align all of them to one sound source..

if you have two or more sound sources then you can't align 3 mics but
neither can you align 2 mics (which is also interesting)

so I don't see any difference between 2 or 3 or N mics. you can
always align them to 1 sound source and you cannot align them to 2 or
more sound sources?


Mark
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DeeAa[_4_] DeeAa[_4_] is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Dec 13, 6:16*pm, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

My suggestion is that when you start having to do careful alignment, sit
back and think about what is going on and why there is so much leakage
and whether you might want to consider miking things differently. *You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....


Not perfectly I suppose, but it sure helps. See, I'm doing 8-tracks
and some of the tracks are D/I so they have zero delay. Some of the
tracks like the overheads are like 4 feet over the highest cymbals
because I need a balanced drum sound due to so few tracks - can't have
just the cymbal crashes like I'd get with miking too close - and some
are close miked like the snare. Only 4 drum mics, see.

Since the recording is live, for instance the guitar that is D/I also
bleeds quite heavily to the said drum overheads, and it plays real
havoc with the sounds...delaying especially the D/I stuff ~3-4ms makes
wonders for the sounds, the instruments don't sound like there's a
chorus on all the time :-)

If this were studio I'd of course somehow separate the two, or have
the guitar lower, but it's not and the 100W guitar tube amp roars
right next to the drums, bloody loud, like we want it live. The idea
is not to make perfect recordings, but to capture live band rehearsals
as nicely as possible, so that the mics etc. remain there always in
the same place - each rehearsal I just hit record and then import to
Cubase and export to MP3 and it gives a very decent demo recording.

I'll post an example recording some of these days.

Cheers,

Dee
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DeeAa[_4_] DeeAa[_4_] is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Dec 14, 7:30*am, DeeAa wrote:
On Dec 13, 6:16*pm, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

My suggestion is that when you start having to do careful alignment, sit
back and think about what is going on and why there is so much leakage
and whether you might want to consider miking things differently. *You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....


Not perfectly I suppose, but it sure helps. See, I'm doing 8-tracks
and some of the tracks are D/I so they have zero delay. Some of the
tracks like the overheads are like 4 feet over the highest cymbals
because I need a balanced drum sound due to so few tracks - can't have
just the cymbal crashes like I'd get with miking too close - and some
are close miked like the snare. Only 4 drum mics, see.

Since the recording is live, for instance the guitar that is D/I also
bleeds quite heavily to the said drum overheads, and it plays real
havoc with the sounds...delaying especially the D/I stuff ~3-4ms makes
wonders for the sounds, the instruments don't sound like there's a
chorus on all the time :-)

If this were studio I'd of course somehow separate the two, or have
the guitar lower, but it's not and the 100W guitar tube amp roars
right next to the drums, bloody loud, like we want it live. The idea
is not to make perfect recordings, but to capture live band rehearsals
as nicely as possible, so that the mics etc. remain there always in
the same place - each rehearsal I just hit record and then import to
Cubase and export to MP3 and it gives a very decent demo recording.

I'll post an example recording some of these days.

Cheers,

Dee


Here's a very short clip of very drunken song intro with latencies
corrected to sample accuracy...makes it way clearer.
I may have too much of room verb there, but it serves well to mask the
overall ugly verb mush coming from the mostly concrete-wall small room
we play in.

I think it works really well for training demo purposes, and what
more, it needs no mixing - this is what you get now dumping the zoom
material onto a ready-made mix template, so I can export the training
in minutes after recording and it sounds quite fine. If I want to mix
it further that is easy enough as well.

Amazing this technology, even a hobbyist like me can make quite
acceptable demos that are a far cry better from what we did in the
80's and 90's with some multitrackers or even in many a studio.

Short clip:

http://deeaa.pp.fi/spookbox/LATENCYTEST.mp3

Cheers,

Dee
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Scott Dorsey Scott Dorsey is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Les Cargill wrote:
Scott Dorsey wrote:

My suggestion is that when you start having to do careful alignment, sit
back and think about what is going on and why there is so much leakage
and whether you might want to consider miking things differently. You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but you
cannot align three.....


You can't analytically, but there is an approach that
I think minimizes things. All this is my opinion and practice,
not something "standard" (SFAIK).

This comes up when I record live multitrack. You pick something to be
the "center" ( usually the snare drum ), find a snare hit from when the
drummer is warming up and align everything else to that. Overheads are
a "stereo track" and are moved in lock-step ( even if they're seperate
.wav files ).


Yup. Same way you build a mix, you start with whatever is most important
and build the thing around it.

Works fine, and can probably be shown to be as good as it gets. the main
thing it does for me is to reduce the amount of bandwidth
necessary to make the snare audible.

Guitars, bass, keys all live on either much more distant
close mics or are DI. "Much more distant" means
they're way away from the 3:1 rule distance. You'll still get them
in the overheads, and there will be some combing, but it's not
as significant.


And you can turn that to your advantage too.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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Scott Dorsey Scott Dorsey is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Mark wrote:
=A0You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but =

you
cannot align three.....

now that's interesting....

why not?

if you have one sound source and 3 mics, (or even N mics) you should
be able to align all of them to one sound source..


Imagine three microphones in 3-space. You pick a "master" mike to be your
center. The third mike is 20 mS behind, so you advance it 20 mS. The third
mike is 20 mS ahead of the master mike, but it may only 20mS away from the
second mike as well. So you can make it match the master mike, but doing
that causes it not to match the second.

if you have two or more sound sources then you can't align 3 mics but
neither can you align 2 mics (which is also interesting)


You can if they are all on a flat plane, but not in three-space.

so I don't see any difference between 2 or 3 or N mics. you can
always align them to 1 sound source and you cannot align them to 2 or
more sound sources?


I wish I could draw a picture, it would be a whole lot more clear.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."


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geoff geoff is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

DeeAa wrote:
Hey,

Using Cubase 6 64bit here w/built in plugins and then some freeware
and otherwise accumulated older ones through JBridge.

Any suggestions for a simple, accurate VST delay plug (maybe down to
sample level?) for track phase alignment use?

I have been doing it manually/visually for a long time, but now that I
record demos with a fixed set for a long long time, I'd like to assign
a fixed delay for each track to align it proper, and then I can just
dump the recorded files to tracks in Cubase and they're all set both
mix and alignment wise and I get raw-mixed demo in seconds from the
session. (an 8-track Zoom recorder in use, so I mix in 24bit 44.1).

The Cubase's own delay with zero FB and 100% seems to work quite OK
and works with .1ms accuracy, which is fine for them demos anyway, but
I wonder if there's a handy plugin that'd be even more accurate and
maybe programmed just for the said use?

Or any other suggestions/caveats to the method from u pro guys here?


Doesn't Cubase calculate all that and apply it automatically ? Sheesh !

Or are you aligning for mic distances ? Can't you just click-and-slide
tracks manually to near sample resolution ? If not, try a different DAW !

geoff


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Mark Mark is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Dec 14, 10:37*am, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Mark wrote:
=A0You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, but =

you
cannot align three.....


now that's interesting....


why not?


if you have one sound source and 3 mics, (or even N mics) you should
be able to align all of them to one sound source..


Imagine three microphones in 3-space. *You pick a "master" mike to be your
center. *The third mike is 20 mS behind, so you advance it 20 mS. *The third
mike is 20 mS ahead of the master mike, but it may only 20mS away from the
second mike as well. *So you can make it match the master mike, but doing
that causes it not to match the second.

if you have two or more sound sources then you can't align 3 mics but
neither can you align 2 mics (which is also interesting)


You can if they are all on a flat plane, but not in three-space.

so I don't see any difference between 2 or 3 or N mics. *you can
always align them to 1 sound source and you cannot align them to 2 or
more sound sources?


I wish I could draw a picture, it would be a whole lot more clear.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."


If there is only one sound source and the source doesn't move, then I
don't see what difference it makes if the 3 mics are in a line or in a
plane or whatever.

There is a scaler value of time delay from the source to each mic and
if additional delay is added so that the total for each is the same
then they are aligned for that source at that location.

What am I missing?

Note, I don't think any of this really matters that much in practice
but it is an interesting academic discussion.



Mark

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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Dec 14, 9:57*pm, "geoff" wrote:

Doesn't Cubase calculate all that and apply it automatically ? *Sheesh !

Or are you aligning for mic distances ? *Can't you just click-and-slide
tracks manually to near sample resolution ? If not, try a different DAW !

Mic distances, yes. Otherwise the tracks are of course aligned upon
importing. And I have been doing it manually, but it is much easier
with a delay, since the mics stay put. This way I only need to import
new tracks to a project each time and it's all aligned and ready just
like that. Plus the results are consistent and you can tweak the
latencies to get the best sound every time instead of just winging it
manually every time.

Kind of like delay is used in fixed PA system, this is.
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Frank Stearns Frank Stearns is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Mark writes:

On Dec 14, 10:37=A0am, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:
Mark wrote:
=3DA0You can
align two microphones at different points in space with one another, b=

ut =3D
you
cannot align three.....



-snips-


Note, I don't think any of this really matters that much in practice
but it is an interesting academic discussion.


If you use spots with a main pair and want a good sounding recording, it matters a
_great deal_.

It's true that as multiple sound sources spread out on a stage, alignment gets more
difficult (and mathematically impossible for all sources at the same time).

The problem is worse still if the spots are not close to being points on a line
between source and main pair (which might be elevated).

There are ways to mitigate this:

1. Don't use spots. (For my venues, clientele, and rep, I could never get away with
this, however.)


2. Careful how you use the spots. The "less equal" the energy used from the spots to
the main pair, the less you'll manifest problems. (Note that I said "energy" and not
metered level or fader setting. We're talking about the "energy" of a given
instrument or voice we're trying not to damage.)

If the energies are nearly equal between the two (or N) microphones, you'll have the
greatest potential for problems (comb filtering, phasing). So, if you can, avoid a
blend of exactly equal energies.


3. Use delay values that while not perhaps arithmetically exact (because often they
can't be), they'll push you out of the worst of harm's way. Keeping in the mind the
Haas threshold for the ear to detect echos, you can get close to 40 mSec, which is
typically way more than you'll need for a *net* correction of alignments.

(Much more than that and you're probably aligning to microphones that live in the
far-field soup anyway, and that soup perhaps has lots of room reverb that's
uncorrelated and helps mask timing issues.)

When I use delays these days, they're "roughed in" by my best guess based on
distances, at roughly 1 mS/foot. (And you must think in 3 dimensions -- it's all too
easy to "bird's eye" think in just 2, but that will bite you every time unless
microphones and sources are exactly on the same plain -- and that's unlikely.)

Next I temporarily set the energies to be as equal as possible so as to hear
worst-case mis-alignments. Then I listen while single-sample-stepping the delay
value. Sometimes the time window for a "sweet spot" is only a few samples wide.

I do this one spot at a time against the main pair, then cross check; but
cross-leakage with the spots shouldn't be a huge problem unless you've got
microphones with poor pattern control or they were not well-placed originally.

Now everything should mix pretty well. For grins, disable the delays, and listen as
focus and overall tone likely goes to hell.

Good luck with it.

Frank
Mobile Audio
--
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Tom McCreadie Tom McCreadie is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Mark wrote:


If there is only one sound source and the source doesn't move, then I
don't see what difference it makes if the 3 mics are in a line or in a
plane or whatever.


Mark


I have to agree with Mark on this one. For a single sound souce arriving at any
number of mics (mic1, mic2, 3..etc.) located anywhere in 3D space. - it's
always mathematically possible to time align the signal of the secondaries
(mic2, 3 ...) to that of elected master, mic1.

I think the flaw in Scott's reasoning is his "The third mike is 20 mS ahead of
the master mike, but it may only 20mS away from the second mike as wel.". Please
correct me if I misinterpret, but it seems from that second phrase that he's
thinking in terms of the travel distance, and thus time, between mic2 and mic3?
But that is of no relevance - the sound is not being relayed via mic2 to mic3 or
vice versa. The only tiimes that matter are source - mic1, source - mic2,
source - mic3 etc., not mic2 - mic3.

All academic of course, as the above is merely compensation for a single sound
source, not, say, a full orchestra. And only mathematically at that, with no
consideration for all the psychoacoustic factors. Frank Stearns makes a lot of
good ponts there.
--
Tom McCreadie

Live at The London Palindrome - ABBA


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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

"geoff":

Doesn't Cubase calculate all that and apply it automatically? Sheesh !


Cubase does have "latency delay compensation" for plug-ins.

Can't you just click-and-slide
tracks manually to near sample resolution? If not, try a different DAW !


Cubase also offers this function, just like any other serious DAW.
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Scott Dorsey Scott Dorsey is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Mark wrote:

There is a scaler value of time delay from the source to each mic and
if additional delay is added so that the total for each is the same
then they are aligned for that source at that location.

What am I missing?


You got three mikes, A, B, and C.

The time AB is the time delay between one pair.

The time AC is the time delay between another pair.

But... what is the time difference BC? It's not necessarily AB-AC.

Note, I don't think any of this really matters that much in practice
but it is an interesting academic discussion.


I think it can help explain some of the diminishing returns when you start
trying to line everything up on the mark perfectly.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment



What am I missing?


You got three mikes, A, B, and C.

The time AB is the time delay between one pair.

The time AC is the time delay between another pair.

But... what is the time difference BC? *It's not necessarily AB-AC.


See Tom's post...

the delay between the mics doesn't matter

it is the delay from the source to each mic that matters.

Mark
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment


"Mark" wrote in message
...
"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
...
What am I missing?


You got three mikes, A, B, and C.
The time AB is the time delay between one pair.
The time AC is the time delay between another pair.
But... what is the time difference BC? It's not necessarily AB-AC.


}See Tom's post...
}the delay between the mics doesn't matter
}it is the delay from the source to each mic that matters.

I wonder what signal he would use to line the two mics up with each other
and not the sound source even if it did matter?
I guess that's why he says it can't be done properly :-)

Trevor.


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Scott Dorsey Scott Dorsey is offline
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Mark wrote:

the delay between the mics doesn't matter

it is the delay from the source to each mic that matters.


But it does, because in the real world you have an individual source at
each mike.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."


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Carey Carlan Carey Carlan is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

Mark wrote in
:

If there is only one sound source and the source doesn't move, then I
don't see what difference it makes if the 3 mics are in a line or in a
plane or whatever.


What no one has explicitly said is that there is never a single point
source. You either have several instruments scattered across a stage or a
large group (orchestra, chorus).
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Tom McCreadie Tom McCreadie is offline
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Default Good simple delay for track alignment

On Fri, 16 Dec 2011 14:29:42 GMT, Carey Carlan wrote:

Mark wrote in
:

If there is only one sound source and the source doesn't move, then I
don't see what difference it makes if the 3 mics are in a line or in a
plane or whatever.


What no one has explicitly said is that there is never a single point
source. You either have several instruments scattered across a stage or a
large group (orchestra, chorus).


Well I did explicitly say:
"All academic of course, as the above is merely compensation for a single sound
source, not, say, a full orchestra. And only mathematically at that,

with no consideration for all the psychoacoustic factors".
--
Tom McCreadie

What's brown and looks good on a banker?..a Rottweiler
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