help with recording

[dextah]

hello all..

i have the following setup:

eps sampler
mackie 1604
yamaha md tracker

cpu w/soundforge
wavelab
audiophille soundcard
piece of crap audix monitors 50 watt

eps into makie inputs
mackie outs in to soundcard
audio out of soundcard goin into monitors



when i record into wavelab and eq with soundforge my levels sound good, but when i burn to cd the levels are very low...granted they won't be at commercial cd level but they are a lot lower then i want...i have buddies who do all thier "mastering at home"...and get much better results.....still not commercial cd level..like if commercial cd level is 10...they're acheiving 7...
is my setup wrong or what....i have mackie levels right under the red, but then that's way too much for the soundcard so i adjust until the soundcard levels are cool...alas low output....any ideas? thanks

 

[Sonic Misfit]

Since you have Wavelab, the following should give you better levels.

Pull up the Wav file in Wavelab, click on Edit and Select All. Go to the area to change levels. Select change gain. You will be prompted to check for the highest gain peak. Select that option. This will tell you what your gain is, normally a negative number. Use this number to adjust you gain setting to bring it up to around 1.5. (in my experience, zero is not real usable in Wavelab.)

This should change your gain, but you will need to spotcheck to make sure that the highest gain was not determined by some errant peaks. If there are some bad peaks causing problems, you can use WaveLab to lower the gain in the peak areas.

This is by no means "MASTERING" that takes a lot more work and gear. But it should increase your levels on the CD.

The other thing to watch is if you are using EZ CD Creamator. Whatever you do, don't use the Normalization in this program, or any of the other effects. They will cause some strange artifacts and also mess up your levels. Again, this is my experience, yours may be totally different.

 

[dextah]

cool....would it be easier to record the waves at 1.5 or record around -4.5 and just boost the levels.

thanks