How reliable is the mixer?

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myhatbroke

myhatbroke

Cocktacular Member
I use cubase to record.After I record I begin to mix but the master level is always peeking and it pisses me off! So I try different things, sometimes there is too much low end on some guitars, turn down the kick, and stuff like that. But I finally achieve it to not peek and I export the mix, it's so low compared to any regular song. SO that's why I'm asking how reliable that mixer is? I usually ignore the fact that it's peeking and kinda go by instinct. THe mix comes out louder and sometimes if I'm lucky it sounds pretty good. BUt my last mix wasn't like that. So what do I do? Is the db meter accurate? And if so, how do I make the mix come out louder?
 
anyone ever talk in here? I hardly come by here so I don't know how long it takes to get a reply.
 
I will bite here.

The peaks are probably from rando spikes, which essentially rob headroom. What is happening is that the average volume of your mix is fairly low, and the peaks are causing the clipping. This can normally be fixed with mild compression. You can also export your mix then normal it to about -16 DB and set your progra to use compression to smack the peaks back down. You could also put a hard limitter on your main channel in cubase that essentially just stops the peaks. The only problem with the hard limitting is that with it there you can ramp the volume way up on everything, but then it starts to sound like hell.


Hope it helps.

Oh btw, short answer : Yes the mixer is working.


Simon
 
Sounds like you are recording way too hot and you are running out of headroom. Your peaks should be no higher than around -18 dBFS on the digital meter of your soundcard mixer when recording your tracks. Dont worry about making it loud on the mix down, just get your levels right and everything can be made louder when you master the track
 
....Well, recording too hot I'm not sure. How do I know if it's too hot? My preamp stays in the green and maybe hits yellow here and there. And the digital meter stays in the green the whole time. And I also don't know what
-18dBFS mean :confused:
 
Your recording software should have a Meter in it that tells you what the DB levels are in your software, what I do when setting up a project is I set this Meter to -18db....In my recording software (Mackie Traction) it automaticly sets the levels to 0db when I start a new project which is way to hot so I just moove the slider down to -18db and start recording....

You do this so you have a Lot more headroom before clipping which gives you much cleaner sounding recordings....

When I first started recording I just recorded at 0db and allways wondered why my recording allways sounded noisy and a bit too loud and it was because I recorded way to hot.....

Also the Preamps on my Mixer are usually no higher than 2 or 3 (When recording drums) as I get less noise this way and can allways boost the levels without introduceing very much extra noise in mixing and Mastering.....


Cheers
 
Minion said:
Your recording software should have a Meter in it that tells you what the DB levels are in your software, what I do when setting up a project is I set this Meter to -18db....In my recording software (Mackie Traction) it automaticly sets the levels to 0db when I start a new project which is way to hot so I just moove the slider down to -18db and start recording....

You do this so you have a Lot more headroom before clipping which gives you much cleaner sounding recordings....

When I first started recording I just recorded at 0db and allways wondered why my recording allways sounded noisy and a bit too loud and it was because I recorded way to hot.....

Also the Preamps on my Mixer are usually no higher than 2 or 3 (When recording drums) as I get less noise this way and can allways boost the levels without introduceing very much extra noise in mixing and Mastering.....


Cheers
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well the levels in the software doesn't affect the recording with my interface. Or im not sure i understood???
 
Ohh, are you trying to turn down the record level with the faders in Cubase?

The faders I assume have no effect on the input signal when recording, only the output (i dunno for sure in Cubase, this is how it is in Pro Tools). If you are getting too hot of a signal, turn down the preamp.

Also, if your master fader is peaking, turn down your mix. You are running too hot. Your unmastered mix WILL NOT be as loud as a commercial song.
 
Ok so I've been pulling me hair out over this. Everytime I mix a song, I ignore the meter and let it peek so it can come out at a good volume. It does, the peek isn't noticeable. But I tried doing it the correct way. My guitars were at around -6dB and the loudest instrument was at around -1 or 0 dB. The Master Level was brought up to 1.5 before peeking. When I exported it and compared it to other songs, it sounds fairly lower.

What should I do to have the levels higher without peeking it?
 
First, stop ignoring your meters, they're there for good reason.
Don't expect to make your recordings as hot as the too loud recordings that are being released these days. You would be competing in a race that you have neither the gear nor the experience to compete in, towards a goal that no one should be trying to reach, including the major labels. Do a search on the volume wars to read up on this bad trend.
You can get reasonable levels on your mixes without killing the dynamics by first taming the peaks at the track level. If you wait to do that at the mastering stage, or even at the mix bus, you'll be making the whole mix suffer. Once all the tracks have good dynamics without excessive peaks, then you can mix at a reasonable level without overs. Then either send it out for mastering if it's an important project, or use something like Endorphin, an L2 or L3, or any of the other mastering comp/limiter plugins out there to squeeze out a few extra dbs. But don't get carried away, those dbs come at a price, and you will damage your mix if you try to get it too loud.
 
Robert D said:
First, stop ignoring your meters, they're there for good reason.
Don't expect to make your recordings as hot as the too loud recordings that are being released these days. You would be competing in a race that you have neither the gear nor the experience to compete in, towards a goal that no one should be trying to reach, including the major labels. Do a search on the volume wars to read up on this bad trend.
You can get reasonable levels on your mixes without killing the dynamics by first taming the peaks at the track level. If you wait to do that at the mastering stage, or even at the mix bus, you'll be making the whole mix suffer. Once all the tracks have good dynamics without excessive peaks, then you can mix at a reasonable level without overs. Then either send it out for mastering if it's an important project, or use something like Endorphin, an L2 or L3, or any of the other mastering comp/limiter plugins out there to squeeze out a few extra dbs. But don't get carried away, those dbs come at a price, and you will damage your mix if you try to get it too loud.
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so how do major labels get so much volume out of it?
 
use compression! that should help trim the peaks so you can bring up the overall levels without having so much clipping. when you turn up the master fader and it clips, its almost the same as using a limiter (although much worse sounding) since what it's doing is trimming off the tops of the peaks. if you can control the peaks during the mix you can raise it louder overall, and the volume can be raised a bit more in the mastering stage.
 
zed32 said:
use compression! that should help trim the peaks so you can bring up the overall levels without having so much clipping. when you turn up the master fader and it clips, its almost the same as using a limiter (although much worse sounding) since what it's doing is trimming off the tops of the peaks. if you can control the peaks during the mix you can raise it louder overall, and the volume can be raised a bit more in the mastering stage.
Click to expand...
so if it peeks a bit, its ok?
 
well, not really.

if you use compression on some of the tracks that have really high peaks, you can bring their level up in the mix without having the main volume clip, since the compression tames out the really high peaks on that track. so if you do it that way, you can get your overall mix level higher without having it peak at all. generally you don't want any digital clipping to happen on your mix.

what i do sometimes is play the mix all the way through and get the main fader down to where it doesn't peak. then render that to a stereo track. at this point the mix is not gonna be very loud. but then you can use a master limiter on that stereo track to bring the overall level of the track up and it won't peak. that's pretty much the simplest way to get your volume up. but try not to limit it too hard or else you will get that "pumping" sound that most modern hard rock songs on the radio have.

sometimes this process will require you to go back and adjust your mix a bit, because it tends to bring out certain qualities in the mix that might not have been as obvious before the limiting. so you can just adjust your mix then render a new track again and keep trying.

of course it's not gonna sound like a pro mastering job and it's not gonna sound like a major label recording, but at least you'll have a louder, slightly polished turd.

just try and experiment with using compression during the mixing stage and see what you can come up with. i basically learned how to use it through trial and error. and i still can't use it all too well.
 
zed32 said:
check these out, if your host supports VST plugins these are pretty damn good. and free. can't beat that.

http://www.kjaerhusaudio.com/classic-series.php


but then again with you it's Go Big or Go Home right? so might i recommend this, which would probably be your preferred choice:

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/UAD1eExpert/

you can purchase some pretty damn good compressor/limiter plugs for the UAD.
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JESUS! Ill just go with the free one. How Do I install it on Cubase?
 
just download the plugin, and move the .dll file to Cubase's VST folder. then restart cubase and it should showup there with the rest of the VST plugins. i just saved it to the Dynamics folder where the other compressors are. classic master limiter is pretty nice.

here's another decent limiter. bare bones interface, but works nicely for certain things.

http://yohng.com/w1limit.html
 
zed32 said:
use compression! that should help trim the peaks so you can bring up the overall levels without having so much clipping. when you turn up the master fader and it clips, its almost the same as using a limiter (although much worse sounding) since what it's doing is trimming off the tops of the peaks. if you can control the peaks during the mix you can raise it louder overall, and the volume can be raised a bit more in the mastering stage.
Click to expand...

If the issue is fast spikey looking peaks, then a compressor is the wrong tool, too slow. You want to use a peak limiter. Compression should be used for sound shaping, not taming fast transients, IMHO. Again, don't wait till the stereo mix to start managing this, and just throw a mastering limiter at it. If you do that, everytime that mastering limiter has to clamp down on those transients, it's clamping down on the whole mix, not just the offending track.
 
Robert D said:
If the issue is fast spikey looking peaks, then a compressor is the wrong tool, too slow. You want to use a peak limiter. Compression should be used for sound shaping, not taming fast transients, IMHO. Again, don't wait till the stereo mix to start managing this, and just throw a mastering limiter at it. If you do that, everytime that mastering limiter has to clamp down on those transients, it's clamping down on the whole mix, not just the offending track.
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ok i mixed it to where it only peaked ONCE and it was a suttle snare peak. Then I added the limiter.That limiter is awesome! It can push the mix so much and not peak at all. After like maybe 5 dB it starts to sound weird but thanks dude this plug in helped alot. :D
 
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