Hi,

I have just tried WaveGain v1.0.4, and it's giving me some strange results, like a proposed gain change of -9.4 dB. So I say OK do it anyway, and then the resulting WAV file is really quiet.

Does anyone know of a Win32 command-line tool that will report the maximum dB level of a WAV file?

Thanks,
Jonny

Is the resulting WAV file really quiet, or was it that the original WAV was really loud?

WaveGain adjusts files to the replaygain default level of 89 db SPL, so if your gain was -9.4, your WAV file was 98.4 db.

I don't know if the original WAV is regarded as loud or not. It's like a lot of other WAV's that I have. There's no distortion when I play it back, and a peak level indicator that I use while playing audio files shows a maximum level of -0.45 dB for the whole of the WAV file. I wanted to use this WAV as a standard by which to set the level of other WAV's that I make. So I was looking for a tool which would analyze this WAV and allow me to set the level of other WAV's accordingly, rather than having to do them all manually.

I could email you a program I wrote a little while ago which does exactly what you want. Drop it into the folder containing your wave files & run it. It will yield a report indicating rms and peak levels for each wave file in the folder.

The rms levels are a good indication of perceived loudness level. I have arbitrarily set it so that the 0dB reference level is about the level that I like. You may want to choose a different figure, either up or down a couple of dB. Of course, this also depends on the type of music, so don't expect to set every song to the same level.

The peak level indicates the headroom, but is not a good indicator of perceived loudness.

Cheers,
Alan

a 3.5 dB volume reduction cuts the volume by half, so a ~10dB volume reduction halves the volume 3 times. This IS a dramatic reduction in volume, but frankly a track reporting -9.something is way too damn loud to begin with. I have some old 80s CDs with 89dB already as the average. You need to halve the volume on some of these new albums 4 times over just to get them to sound the same as an older, properly mastered one!