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Gray_Wolf Gray_Wolf is offline
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0dBFS+ Levels in Digital Mastering

http://service.tcgroup.tc/media/Leve..._AES109(1).pdf

Interesting. I have noticed that in my better recorded stuff
that the maximum levels tend to be at least -3dB and some as low as -6dB.

There are a few songs I have that the audio level, in my poor acoustic
environment, ranges from too low to too loud in my quieter moods.
(kman eat your heart out)

IIRC they were recorded at least 20 years ago.

GW
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gray_wolf wrote: "kman, eat your heart out"


I never said ALL engineers were guilty of bad practices, and
besides, I came to realize two years ago where the "hot CD"
edict came from.

Semi-related, look at the levels on the DR Database entry
for the 1987 CD release of Billy Joel's "The Stranger"

http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/88060

Only a few of the tracks peak to within 1dB of full scale,
with one track peaking 8dB below it(!)

I OWN this edition, and it sounds just great on my
players.
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(Joel, continued):

OTOH, all of the tracks on this this 2004 "remaster" of The
Stranger appear to have been dynamically compressed and
or peak-limited:
http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/94338

The sound is strained and edgy, and lacks
the emotional cues of the original CD in my previous post.
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Whoever decreed that ALL audio tracks MUST peak within
1/1,000,00dB of full scale must be on something strong!!
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On 10/10/2015 2:45 p.m., wrote:
(Joel, continued):

OTOH, all of the tracks on this this 2004 "remaster" of The
Stranger appear to have been dynamically compressed and
or peak-limited:
http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/94338

The sound is strained and edgy, and lacks
the emotional cues of the original CD in my previous post.


Peaks touching 0dBFS (for one sample) has nothing to do with 'loudness',
dynamic range, or "strained harsh sound", but you've finally grasped
that, haven't you ?u.

Actually 0dBFS peaks can cause problems on many DAs, but backing off
half a dB should fix that. But not those symptoms you meantion.

geoff


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On 10 Oct 2015, geoff wrote in
rec.audio.pro:

Peaks touching 0dBFS (for one sample) has nothing to do with
'loudness', dynamic range, or "strained harsh sound", but you've
finally grasped that, haven't you ?u.


No, it will take at least another 2 years before he gets it.

Actually 0dBFS peaks can cause problems on many DAs, but backing
off half a dB should fix that. But not those symptoms you
meantion.

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On Saturday, October 10, 2015 at 2:07:04 PM UTC-4, Nil wrote:
On 10 Oct 2015, geoff wrote in
rec.audio.pro:

Peaks touching 0dBFS (for one sample) has nothing to do with
'loudness', dynamic range, or "strained harsh sound", but you've
finally grasped that, haven't you ?u.


No, it will take at least another 2 years before he gets it.

Actually 0dBFS peaks can cause problems on many DAs, but backing
off half a dB should fix that. But not those symptoms you
meantion.


SIDEBAR

I was mixing and mastering a project on Logic Express a year or so go. The tracks had been recorded by someone else. I was called in to mix and master.. I was having a particularly difficult time mixing one track. The vocal would sound pretty grungy during short sections, but no level indicators were showing anything alarming.

Finally I put a compressor in the two mix and without any adjustment, it was showing 8 dB gain reduction! I did a global reduction of 8 dB and the vocal grunge stopped and the whole mix opened up. Somewhere in Logic Express a digital buss was being overloaded, but there was no place to see it.

This doesn't happen in Pro Tools.

Regards,

Ty Ford
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Ty Ford wrote:

Finally I put a compressor in the two mix and without any adjustment, it wa=
s showing 8 dB gain reduction! I did a global reduction of 8 dB and the voc=
al grunge stopped and the whole mix opened up. Somewhere in Logic Express a=
digital buss was being overloaded, but there was no place to see it.

This doesn't happen in Pro Tools.


Oh, it sure used to! Pro Tools 4 did that kind of thing all the time. These
days all the Pro Tools busses are 32-bit floats, though, so they are next to
impossible to overload.
--scott

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Ty Ford wrote:
Somewhere in Logic Express a=
digital buss was being overloaded, but there was no place to see it.


This doesn't happen in Pro Tools.


On 10/11/2015 10:25 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:

Oh, it sure used to! Pro Tools 4 did that kind of thing all the time. These
days all the Pro Tools busses are 32-bit floats, though, so they are next to
impossible to overload.


Most DAWs from at least the last five years are like that. Even on the
PreSonus StudioLive console, you can send 16 full scale channels to the
main stereo bus, scrape the output meters off the pin with the main
fader, and all the distortion goes away.



--
For a good time, visit http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com
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On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:40:06 PM UTC-4, wrote:
gray_wolf wrote: "kman, eat your heart out"


I never said ALL engineers were guilty of bad practices, and
besides, I came to realize two years ago where the "hot CD"
edict came from.

Semi-related, look at the levels on the DR Database entry
for the 1987 CD release of Billy Joel's "The Stranger"

http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/88060

Only a few of the tracks peak to within 1dB of full scale,
with one track peaking 8dB below it(!)


Sounds like a darn fine reason to buy it!!!
I'll cherish the multi-tracks, don't need a Sony Boy to remaster. Thanks.

Jack


I OWN this edition, and it sounds just great on my
players.




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On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:47:34 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Whoever decreed that ALL audio tracks MUST peak within
1/1,000,00dB of full scale must be on something strong!!


I was told, no clipping! Otherwise, Loudness Wars would have never existed.

Jack
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On 12/10/2015 4:03 p.m., JackA wrote:
On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:47:34 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Whoever decreed that ALL audio tracks MUST peak within
1/1,000,00dB of full scale must be on something strong!!


I was told, no clipping! Otherwise, Loudness Wars would have never existed.

Jack



Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.

geoff
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On 12/10/2015 4:27 PM, geoff wrote:
Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.


Rubbish. To gain maximum "loudness", moderate to severe clipping is
commonly used. Sure you could compress without clipping, but just look
at the waveform of nearly every pop CD released in the last decade if
you want to see clipping *IS* part of the loudness wars.

Trevor.





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On 12/10/2015 7:32 p.m., Trevor wrote:
On 12/10/2015 4:27 PM, geoff wrote:
Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.


Rubbish. To gain maximum "loudness", moderate to severe clipping is
commonly used. Sure you could compress without clipping, but just look
at the waveform of nearly every pop CD released in the last decade if
you want to see clipping *IS* part of the loudness wars.

Trevor.



That's where generalisations are unhelpful when one is trying to be concise.

No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed, though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.

Loudness is achieved by extreme compression and/or limiting. If digital
clipping occurs, that is a *technical error* - not inherently part of
the hyper-compression process. And the same 'loudness' could be achieved
without any clipping.

That it may be a common error, or a deliberate misuse, is a different story.

You can also clip to hell, and *not* have hyper-compression or loudness.
Lots of distortion though. But you know that.

geoff

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On 12/10/2015 6:43 PM, geoff wrote:
On 12/10/2015 7:32 p.m., Trevor wrote:
On 12/10/2015 4:27 PM, geoff wrote:
Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.


Rubbish. To gain maximum "loudness", moderate to severe clipping is
commonly used. Sure you could compress without clipping, but just look
at the waveform of nearly every pop CD released in the last decade if
you want to see clipping *IS* part of the loudness wars.


That's where generalisations are unhelpful when one is trying to be
concise.

No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed,


Have you actually looked? Or perhaps you don't buy any pop music?


though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.


So not relevant to what I said in that case. While I don't buy much pop
myself, I have looked at very many of those disks to see why so many big
artists (who can afford the best people) sound so bad. :-(


Loudness is achieved by extreme compression and/or limiting. If digital
clipping occurs, that is a *technical error*


Yes, but I am NOT talking about theory, I am talking about what ANYONE
with a DAW can see for themselves!


- not inherently part of the hyper-compression process. And the same 'loudness' could be achieved
without any clipping.


No, it's already hyper-compressed before the gain is adjusted into
clipping for that little bit more.


That it may be a common error, or a deliberate misuse, is a different
story.


No, that it is deliberate *IS* what I was saying.


You can also clip to hell, and *not* have hyper-compression or loudness.
Lots of distortion though. But you know that.


Right, I certainly know what CAN be done, and unfortunately the common
practice these days is to do it BOTH ways to gain even more "loudness".
ie. first compress the hell out of it, *AND* let it clip as much as they
think they can get away with.

Trevor.




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On 12/10/2015 9:48 p.m., Trevor wrote:


Right, I certainly know what CAN be done, and unfortunately the common
practice these days is to do it BOTH ways to gain even more "loudness".
ie. first compress the hell out of it, *AND* let it clip as much as they
think they can get away with.


I suggest that the clipping does more with harshness than loudness, and
adds comparatively little in comparison to compression and limiting.

..... which makes it even more pointless and vile.

geoff

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On Monday, October 12, 2015 at 1:27:32 AM UTC-4, geoff wrote:
On 12/10/2015 4:03 p.m., JackA wrote:
On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:47:34 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Whoever decreed that ALL audio tracks MUST peak within
1/1,000,00dB of full scale must be on something strong!!


I was told, no clipping! Otherwise, Loudness Wars would have never existed.

Jack



Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.

geoff

__________

Actually, I was criticizing the need to have
all tracks on a CD peak within 1/10 of full scale,
for WHAT EVER reason.
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On Monday, October 12, 2015 at 1:27:32 AM UTC-4, geoff wrote:
On 12/10/2015 4:03 p.m., JackA wrote:
On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:47:34 PM UTC-4, wrote:
Whoever decreed that ALL audio tracks MUST peak within
1/1,000,00dB of full scale must be on something strong!!


I was told, no clipping! Otherwise, Loudness Wars would have never existed.

Jack



Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.


Neither does 3kHz!!!

Jack

geoff


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On Friday, October 9, 2015 at 9:40:06 PM UTC-4, wrote:
gray_wolf wrote: "kman, eat your heart out"


I never said ALL engineers were guilty of bad practices, and
besides, I came to realize two years ago where the "hot CD"
edict came from.

Semi-related, look at the levels on the DR Database entry
for the 1987 CD release of Billy Joel's "The Stranger"

http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/88060

Only a few of the tracks peak to within 1dB of full scale,
with one track peaking 8dB below it(!)

I OWN this edition, and it sounds just great on my
players.


Like dull sound, meet Keith!...

http://www.keithhirsch.com/target-cds

Jack
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I was told, no clipping! Otherwise, Loudness Wars would have never existed.

Jack



Loudness and loudness wars have nothing to do with clipping.


just like in a cascade of analog stages, there are various forms of clipping.

In analog, you can clip the output stage or you can clip in the pre-amp.

On a CD, you can clip by having several consecutive samples on the CD reach full scale or you can clip the signal at an earlier stage and have that clipped signal accurately recorded on the CD.

In other words, you don't have to be at full scale to have clipping.

It's still clipping either way.

Mark






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geoff wrote:

No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed, though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.


The problem is that in the digital world, clipping is whatever you define
it as. I tend to set metering so three consecutive FS samples light the
over light, and so that is clipping.

Aggressive limiting that flat-tops the signal isn't necessarily clipping,
it's just aggressive limiting. But at what point does limiting turning
into clipping? The point at which three consecutive FS samples appear.

Much of the k man's confusion has to do with the fact that he can't get
the difference between reference levels and loudness.. and once you start
adding limiting, it doesn't matter _what_ your reference level is because
you can go infinitely high over it and still not light that red light.

Now... the truth is that I have seen some pop CDs that have as many as
eight consecutive FS samples... and I would call that clipping. But,
someone else who decides to calibrate their over light differently
might not, and that is the problem when you start using the word 'clipping'
in the digital world.

Loudness is achieved by extreme compression and/or limiting. If digital
clipping occurs, that is a *technical error* - not inherently part of
the hyper-compression process. And the same 'loudness' could be achieved
without any clipping.


The question is where limiting ends and clipping begins, and where that
exact line is actually is a philosophical question and not a technical one.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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wrote:

Actually, I was criticizing the need to have
all tracks on a CD peak within 1/10 of full scale,
for WHAT EVER reason.


Why? There's nothing wrong with that. If the D/A converter is properly
designed, it's going to reproduce what went into it exactly.

Peak levels have nothing to do with actual loudness. I can have a very
quiet CD with one triangle hit that goes up to 0dBFS without even
sounding very loud because it's so brief.

So you _want_ your peak levels to be at 0dBFS. The question is where
you want your _average_ levels to be, because that's where loudness comes
from.

Now, there IS a reason to leave plenty of headroom when you're going to
be doing processing afterward, or on an original recording when you can
never be sure something loud and unexpected won't happen. But that has
absolutely no application to a final release CD.

I know we have all explained this to you many many times and you don't get
it, but I am going to try again.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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On Monday, October 12, 2015 at 9:26:03 AM UTC-4, Scott Dorsey wrote:


Much of the k man's confusion has to do with the fact that he can't get
the difference between reference levels and loudness.. and once you start
adding limiting, it doesn't matter _what_ your reference level is because
you can go infinitely high over it and still not light that red light.


--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."



Yes I can, if explained properly. By YOU Scott - and
"N___" - keep it shut!! Let Dorsey have the floor.


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On Monday, October 12, 2015 at 9:31:32 AM UTC-4, Scott Dorsey wrote:
wrote:

Actually, I was criticizing the need to have
all tracks on a CD peak within 1/10 of full scale,
for WHAT EVER reason.


Why? There's nothing wrong with that. If the D/A converter is properly
designed, it's going to reproduce what went into it exactly.

Peak levels have nothing to do with actual loudness. I can have a very
quiet CD with one triangle hit that goes up to 0dBFS without even
sounding very loud because it's so brief.

So you _want_ your peak levels to be at 0dBFS. The question is where
you want your _average_ levels to be, because that's where loudness comes
from.

Now, there IS a reason to leave plenty of headroom when you're going to
be doing processing afterward, or on an original recording when you can
never be sure something loud and unexpected won't happen. But that has
absolutely no application to a final release CD.

I know we have all explained this to you many many times and you don't get
it, but I am going to try again.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."



Thanks for that explanation Scott.


My issue with peak normalization(which is what
you describe above is called), is that a song
with a lower peak-to-average ratio, peak normalized
alongside a song with a higher peak-to-average,
WILL SOUND LOUDER than the one with the higher
peak to average.


OTOH: If I use my ears to loudness-normalize 3-4
songs of different genres or production eras
(stuff from the 1970s, 1990s, and last month),
the final result is that they will all sound
equally loud to my ears, but some of them
my not peak at 0dB full scale - when I look
at the meters during playback. And in my
mind there's NOTHING WRONG with that; as long
as they all sound about as loud as each other
and sound GOOD.
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On 13/10/2015 12:25 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:
geoff wrote:
No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed, though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.


The problem is that in the digital world, clipping is whatever you define
it as. I tend to set metering so three consecutive FS samples light the
over light, and so that is clipping.


No, you first have to normalise the gain back to 0dBFS for that to work
since many CD's are first *severely clipped* then normalised to about
-0.3dBFS, so your clip lights will never come on. BUT the flat tops
remain regardless!


Aggressive limiting that flat-tops the signal isn't necessarily clipping,
it's just aggressive limiting.


Rubbish, peak limiting that causes flat tops IS clipping. YOU simply
don't understand what they have done, or the difference between
compression and limiting it seems.


But at what point does limiting turning
into clipping? The point at which three consecutive FS samples appear.


I'd agree with that, BUT it doesn't have to be FS, simply whatever point
they have renormalised to after clipping. That is the bit you seem not
to grasp.



Much of the k man's confusion has to do with the fact that he can't get
the difference between reference levels and loudness..


It seems you don't get the difference between 0dBFS and the chosen
maximum normalised level yourself.


and once you start
adding limiting, it doesn't matter _what_ your reference level is because
you can go infinitely high over it and still not light that red light.


Or if you create square waves from sine waves and renormalise to
anything slightly less than 0dBFS. No red light, and NO "limiter" is
required to do that!


Now... the truth is that I have seen some pop CDs that have as many as
eight consecutive FS samples...


Hell, you haven't looked much, I have seen HUNDREDS of consecutive
samples at maximum NORMALISED level, ie FLAT TOPS!


and I would call that clipping.


Me too.

But,
someone else who decides to calibrate their over light differently
might not, and that is the problem when you start using the word 'clipping'
in the digital world.


NOPE, clipping is clipping, whatever you choose as YOUR final peak level.


Loudness is achieved by extreme compression and/or limiting. If digital
clipping occurs, that is a *technical error* - not inherently part of
the hyper-compression process. And the same 'loudness' could be achieved
without any clipping.


The question is where limiting ends and clipping begins, and where that
exact line is actually is a philosophical question and not a technical one.


NOPE, clipping is the same regardless of the chosen peak level. When a
sine wave looks like a square wave, (ie completely flat tops) it is
clipped, even if the max level is normalised to -60dBFS !!!!!!!!!!!
I can EASILY do that, as can you if you want, and all the BS in the
world about whether it is clipped or peak limited does NOT change the sound.

Trevor.



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Mike Rivers writes:
[...]
The real solution, and it's sort of there but nobody implements it, is
to encode some information about the loudness of the track and have
the playback system adjust the level using that information and your
listening preferences.


Didn't (or doesn't) Dolby have a system / standard that does just that
for the movie/pro audio market?
--
Randy Yates
Digital Signal Labs
http://www.digitalsignallabs.com
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wrote:

My issue with peak normalization(which is what
you describe above is called), is that a song
with a lower peak-to-average ratio, peak normalized
alongside a song with a higher peak-to-average,
WILL SOUND LOUDER than the one with the higher
peak to average.


Maybe. Maybe not. It's a case of apples and oranges. The question
is what the average level is.

OTOH: If I use my ears to loudness-normalize 3-4
songs of different genres or production eras
(stuff from the 1970s, 1990s, and last month),
the final result is that they will all sound
equally loud to my ears, but some of them
my not peak at 0dB full scale - when I look
at the meters during playback. And in my
mind there's NOTHING WRONG with that; as long
as they all sound about as loud as each other
and sound GOOD.


This because the peak level has little to do with perceived loudness.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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Randy Yates wrote:
Mike Rivers writes:
[...]
The real solution, and it's sort of there but nobody implements it, is
to encode some information about the loudness of the track and have
the playback system adjust the level using that information and your
listening preferences.


Didn't (or doesn't) Dolby have a system / standard that does just that
for the movie/pro audio market?


Yes, that would be the DIALNORM field in the Dolby AC-3 bitstream.

The MP3 files have a similar thing, but of course it's heavily abused
and invariably set to maximum.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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In article , Trevor wrote:
Rubbish, peak limiting that causes flat tops IS clipping. YOU simply
don't understand what they have done, or the difference between
compression and limiting it seems.


How much of a flat top is needed for it to be clipping? One sample?
Many samples? At what point does limiting end and clipping begin?

On the other hand, let's say I have a drum hit that is only three samples
long and it's the only loud thing on the track. I run it through a
limiter... maybe it's just a pair of back to back diodes, and I chop it
down 20 dB. It sounds fine. Did I clip it, or did I limit it?
--scott

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On 13/10/2015 2:25 a.m., Scott Dorsey wrote:
geoff wrote:
No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed, though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.

The problem is that in the digital world, clipping is whatever you define
it as. I tend to set metering so three consecutive FS samples light the
over light, and so that is clipping.



I draw the line at 2, though 3 seems to be the commonly accepted criteria.

geoff
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On 13/10/2015 3:23 a.m., Trevor wrote:
On 13/10/2015 12:25 AM, Scott Dorsey wrote:
geoff wrote:
No CD that I've purchased in the last decade exhibit clipping that I've
noticed, though a few are over-compressed to hell (not many
fortunately). And some I've been prompted to actually check ! Not much
'current' pop though I concede.


The problem is that in the digital world, clipping is whatever you
define
it as. I tend to set metering so three consecutive FS samples light the
over light, and so that is clipping.


No, you first have to normalise the gain back to 0dBFS for that to
work since many CD's are first *severely clipped* then normalised to
about -0.3dBFS, so your clip lights will never come on. BUT the flat
tops remain regardless!


Aggressive limiting that flat-tops the signal isn't necessarily
clipping,
it's just aggressive limiting.


Rubbish, peak limiting that causes flat tops IS clipping. YOU simply
don't understand what they have done, or the difference between
compression and limiting it seems.


I think this is the only thing where we really disagree. The rest of
your debate seems hair-splitting about definitions of terms.

I say that 'clipping' is only the result of a digital or analogue
*overload*, where the actual mathematical or electrical constraints of
the process are exceeded and nothing can exist above. Fuzz box !

'Limiting' is the *controlled* result of a digital or analogue process.
And yes, that can be extreme to the point of resembling clipping, but is
not the same thing.

Achieving, or adding to, limiting by clipping (sadly) is done,
presumably by those who are incompetent, lack understanding of the
implications, or have cynical intent.

geoff
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On 13/10/2015 3:52 a.m., Mike Rivers wrote:


The idea is that you don't have to adjust the playback volume when
switching from track to track. If you're driving in your car, working
out in the gym, or if you're DJ-ing in a dance club, it's one more
control you don't have to fiddle with.

If you're sitting in your easy chair in the living room, it's nice to
give your ears a little break now and then.




The automotive scenario being the 'driving factor' behind the crushing
that radio stations apply to the music. Kind of kills it for other
situations though.

geoff
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On 13/10/2015 2:05 a.m., JackA wrote:
http://www.keithhirsch.com/target-cds Jack


A truly bizarre website.

geoff


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a good way to differentiate clipping from limiting from compression is by
considering the attack and decay times relative to the features of the waveform

clipping is instantaneous gain changes
as soon as the waveform exceeds a threshold, the gain reduces
as soon as the waveform is below threshold, the gain increases
the attack and decay time are ZERO
back to back diodes do this
you can various ratios.. ie hard or soft clipping

limiting is a slower process
there is a finite attack and decay time that is longer than the time of a waveform cycle but is still very fast compared to the envelope usuall 1 to a few msec
again you can have various ratios


compression is even slower attack and decay time whose duration is
large compared to individual waveform cycles and can be several sylabbles or several seconds even

AGC is even slower typically operates over many seconds

those are the definitions I use, anyway...
Mark
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On 10/12/2015 11:22 AM, Randy Yates wrote:
The real solution, and it's sort of there but nobody implements it, is
to encode some information about the loudness of the track and have
the playback system adjust the level using that information and your
listening preferences.

Didn't (or doesn't) Dolby have a system / standard that does just that
for the movie/pro audio market?


I was thinking about Dialnorm, but it's a movie thing that nobody
calibrates the decoder correctly. I'm not aware of any home/consumer
system that implements it. I think that there may be some reluctance on
the part of consumers to have their playback system told to turn the
volume up on this song and turn it down on that one.

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On 13/10/2015 10:48 a.m., Mike Rivers wrote:
On 10/12/2015 11:22 AM, Randy Yates wrote:
The real solution, and it's sort of there but nobody implements it, is
to encode some information about the loudness of the track and have
the playback system adjust the level using that information and your
listening preferences.

Didn't (or doesn't) Dolby have a system / standard that does just that
for the movie/pro audio market?


I was thinking about Dialnorm, but it's a movie thing that nobody
calibrates the decoder correctly. I'm not aware of any home/consumer
system that implements it. I think that there may be some reluctance
on the part of consumers to have their playback system told to turn
the volume up on this song and turn it down on that one.


My car iPod Touch has a automatic replay level function based on (I
think) a peak-level parameter encoded into the file.

When it works on a particularly 'different level' track there seems to
be a second-long level adjustment at the commencement of a song, which
is a pain. But not as much of a pain as having to reach for the knob
(car stereo) nearly *every* song while driving when playing a random
mix of material.

geoff
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geoff:

Where is this leveling feature in the Touch's settings?
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