I have a few MP3s that need some gains and a bigger wav display on SSL. My question is is anyone using this program with success? If so, Does it give you the right amount of gain for your MP3s? What do you have your Target Normal Volume (db) set too? And does it give you a bigger Visual display when you load it back into SSL?

Any help would be greatly appreciative!

yes, mp3gain is a very useful tool. i use it with a 94db target normal volume (mp3gain will sometimes say clipping detected, but when you play it back it sounds fine). and, yes the wave display will be bigger in SSL once you either (a) rebuild the overview for that song (drag the song to the build overview button) or (b) just load the song in SSL, the overview will be updated as it is played.

a lot of people use it. i set the target gain to 95.

Do you guys use Max-Amplitute gain? or Regular Gain? or Album Gain?

I use track gain at 91db. I used to use it at 95db but some trks actually do audibly clip (be careful), and all I care about is all of my trks being the same volume.

i use it at 95db. Might redo my library at 92, but i haven't had any issues yet.

One wierd thing that I noticed last night is that mp3 gain might screw with id3 tags. After gaining a bunch of tracks before burning them to cd, the tags in nero for three of the songs were mixed up with each other. Like song A now showed as song B and song C showed as song B. Pretty lame:(

I must be doing something wrong with mp3 gain-

First of all, I kept getting an error message with my .wav files (recorded from soundforge). The error message suggested selecting the "no check for layer 1 or 2"- but i still kept getting error messages...

When I finally selected different (newly recorded) tracks into it- it made them sound horrible- all crackly... Now I can't find the origional file.

I don't speak computer so please break this down simple!

mp3gain, as the name implies, works only with mp3 files, it wont work with .wav files.

ok. (so thats why the files that i was able to run w/ mp3gain sounded like shit?)

this is (another) stupid question- i didn't seem to have the option to save from soundforge into an mp3.

i also couldn't figure out how to get a track from itunes into mp3gain.

how do i do take a wav and convert to mp3 to use mp3 gain?

hehe :)

you can use some free apps, for example CD extractor (CD ex). thats the one i use.

but there are many others... iTunes i think.

BTW, you can save into mp3 using Sound Forge, but you will need to purchase the mp3 tool plugin for Sound Forge, if im not wrong...

Google for "razorlame" and the lame.dll/lame.exe, both together will enable you to convert your wav files into good sounding mp3s.

I paid for soundforge audio studio 7.0 and I installed everything it came with... I could save into a number of different extensions but mp3 wasn't one of them...

So far, I am using itunes to convert to mp3. But I couldn't figure out how to get my itunes tracks into mp3gain to adjust them. Can I?

nik, if i encode with razorlame will it sound better than itunes?
thanks

Melissa you should just open up mp3 gain and drag and drop them in . Whats happening that you cant get them in there?

the files are wavs, not mp3s.

my mp3s are in itunes. (I'm going nuts) but i can't find them when I click on add file (my doucuments>my music>itunes library>??) to open them in mp3 gain or to drag/drop them...

When I open itunes they ARE there though.

This is a whole different issue but new files that I just recorded and encoded with itunes (and put in playlists) are not showing up when i open SSL- I have 'read itunes library' selected in the setup menu.

I'm sorry this is so basic but you have to start somewhere... I haven't seen answers to my problems on other threads.

Melissa, it depends on what encoder iTunes uses. There mainly two good encoders, one is the fHG encoder (frauenhofer) and the other is the lame encoder. Latter is for free, I doubt that the other one is free of charge. Lame has been extensively tested, esp. lame version 3.90.3 (dont let you fool by the version number, there is a newer one out, which is not recommended by the lame authors as it has not been tested enough).

You should esp. take care of what mp3 encoding settings you use. Its like a whole science incl. all its wars+fights about the settings. My personal settings are "--alt-preset standard", this simple settings have been tested and proven to be good. I would also go with variable bitrate, which makes sure you dont wast space on your harddisk and makes sure that the quality is constant during one track. Any advanced encoder uses variable bitrate nowadays (ogg...).

vbr is the way to go and lame is the best out there.

Melissa, select the Advanced tab under the preferences menu and you should see the directory where iTunes is saving your files.

Melisa- If you register soundforge 7 you can save to mp3:)

Ya, I own SF 7. I can save a wave as an MP3. Remembering back, I always hit register later when it would start and one time the program got all shitty with me and demanded that I register it in order to save a file I was working on.

thanks. my mistake was obvious when I looked around...

Does anyone know if Mp3 Gain will set all tracks at thsi db, even if they are higher or lower? I tried on Mac Mp3 Gain and some were loud, some were not..not consistant. Also, should I try "Avoid clipping" and "radio mode"?

mp3gain is not perfect, but most of the times the results are pretty good. There is always the option to either manually change the volumes of certain tracks.

Avoid clipping is a good idea if you are definitly after the best of the best audio quality. But then... why would you go with mp3 ;) Anyway, if this option is selected, tracks which are low in volume, but have a peak like a vinyl noise click wont be amplified. So, I wouldnt use it.

Radio mode is something different, it has something to do with the way how mp3gain handles different tracks. Whether to apply the same gain factor on all tracks or to use independet gain factors for each track.

I just used this on all my mp3's, now the waveforms are a little different, is there anyway to force serato to build wavforms?

The only way I know of would be to put all tracks into one crate, switch SSL into auto play mode in internal mode with the fastest pitch to save time... Save half of the time: split your library into to two pieces, let both decks running at the same time in auto mode.

Oh, uhm, no wait. Thats a waste of time. Detach the SSL unit and hold the CTRL key while clicking on "build overviews", that should force SSL to rebuild your entire library's overviews.

Nice one

i would export it as a wav, then use audiograbber/EAC with lame and use --alt extereme or whatever your pref is for mp3 encoding, sometimes the default encoder leaves something to be desired.

i dont like how mp3gain cuts the waveforms by peak normalizing..

doesn't this take out from quality?? seems like i'm missing 'depth' in my tracks after gaining everything to the standard 89db.

the waveforms come out in SSL as rectangles pretty much, and near the center.. not too stretched out to the sides, if you know what i mean.

am i using this program wrong? or is that how it works?

i'm scared of the songs sounding okay on my home speakers, bt then going out to some club speakers, and having the files sound like crappy mp3s. ya know.

think suggested is set to 95 or 95% not 89, could be wrong, i do now what you mean, but i normalize during encoding/recording

Not a good idea, as this reencodes the file, which adds therefore reduces the quality. mp3gain is able to undo any changes which it applies to each track.

vega, if you are really concerned about it, go the safe way and select avoid clipping. That wont take any "depth" out of your files (not saying that "avoid clipping" necessarily kills depth...).

so your saying i should use the mp3 encoder built into itunes/audition(think it's FnG) in audition. I assumed if i exported wav then ran it thru lame with higher vbr settings, it would be FAR better then programs default encoder(just going on everything i've read_

I have no way of disabling "Album mode" or "radio mode">I have chosen "Radio Mode" ..I hope this is best?
I have audio clip off and 95 db..
OK settings?

I think Album mode is the wrong one, not sure though, read the manuals and FAQs provided with mp3gain.
I would turn on audio clipping, combined with 95dB it should be fine. If you turn off audio clipping there is no chance to make sure that songs really get amplified loud enough to the target dB loudness. If you turn it on, you should use a lower target dB loudness.

I tried audio clipping, but seemed it sounded not so good.
Maybe it was me?

Maybe its different audio material we are using, I assume we spin and play different stuff.

i use it and love it, i set my target db to 89, that's a lot lower than most of you guys use but i want to make sure that there is no clipping

Ive another question about this. Say if you increase an mp3that is already at 90 to 93, then up to 95. If you undo changes will it revert back to the original 90 or to 93?
In other words does it undo all changes made with mp3gain or just the last change?

Pretty sure it erases everthing. It doesnt actually change the mp3, it just adds a file to the mp3 that ups the level at which its played. when you remove that file, your left with the original.

Yup your right, tried it on an mp3 and it goes back to the original level.

:)

Where did you read that fairy? Can you please guide me to a source which says what you just described? AFAIK mp3gain writes everything directly into the mp3-file, it changes all frames... and writes the undo data into the tags.

nik did you just call me a fairy?

Hehe, no, I think thats a lack of my english skills, I think I meant a fairy tale, is that correct? :)

No diss, but mp3gain writes all the data into the mp3file itself not to an external file.