I am about to start ripping over 1100 cd's and want to be clear on volume options before I start.

I will rip all the cd's to Lame encoded 3.97 -vbr-new (-v2) mp3's for playback through iTunes and on an iPod. I am looking for volume stabilization from track to track, meaning, I hit shuffle through all my albums, walk away, and don't have to peel in running to change volume or strain to hear some songs.

iTunes has Sound Check, which I have tried and it doesn't work at all.

Would I use a volume normalizer, replay gain, etc. and if so at what settings?

Should I go ahead an rip them and then use something afterwards? I am going to rip using dBpoweramp because I can get the cover art embedded into the file that way.

Thank you so much!

I suggest going with mp3gain and making every song have the same volume. That way, when you adjust the volume for the first song, all others will be at the same level. In fact, that is what I have done to my lossy libraries (both mp3 and AAC). I have normalized every song volume level to 89db. This requires that I turn my audio equipment up more to hear the songs but all clipping has been removed. You would be surprised to learn how many songs/albums are released with clipping and abnormally loud volumes.

Out of curiosity; why are you using Lame 3.97 and not 3.98?

Instead of gaining every song to the same volume, I'd suggest gaining every album to the same volume. If you always shuffle everything it probably wouldn't matter, but if you ever listen to an album straight through you might be jarred by odd volumes, especially on live albums where crowd noise or songs that span tracks can drastically change volume.

I'll second the iTunes issues. I turned off Sound Check after I almost blew my ears out while listening to a live album. I'd forgotten that Sound Check doesn't gain for a full album.

1. Rip your CDs using EAC or dbPowerAmp w/o ReplayGain or MP3Gain.
2. User foobar2000 to scan/calculate ReplayGain (track or album) for all your tracks.
3. Use actions in Mp3tag 2.41 and the RG2SC Function to Convert the ReplayGain values to iTunes SoundCheck Values.*
4. Import your MP3s into iTunes and turn SoundCheck back on.

* There was a thread that described how to do this and had the actions available for download, but I cannot seem to find it... for now, check out these threads:

Tunes Sound Check, Quick question

Convert replaygain to iTunes/iPod volume?, Can this be done & does it make sense?

I just purchased the registered version of dBpoweramp (because EAC can't embed cover art) and it is using 3.97. They have a Beta that is using 3.98, but I figure I should wait for the real release, yes?

Probably something for a PM or another thread, but is there really that much difference for what I'm doing?

I wonder why someone would do that because wouldn't you want to not alter the file?

I'm sorry, I'm so confused with ReplayGain / Volume Normalizer. I don't know why this is stumping me to get. I have read forums and Wiki for hours.

Ok.
If I Multi-Encode MP3 and Apple Lossless or FLAC, with just Replay Gain, there will be a tag written somewhere in ?both? files. If I use WinAmp or something that supports Replay Gain it will work and each track (I use shuffle A LOT so would I use track or album or both?) will be played at the same level.

However, if I have a lot of random MP3 files that were not encoded with Replay Gain and they come up in shuffle, they will sound quieter.

If I Multi-Encode MP3 and Apple Lossless or FLAC, with just Volume Normalizer, will both the MP3 AND the Lossless file be altered or just the MP3? I think, if I understand correctly this would be the way to go if I'm using Itunes, but then again, if I have other random MP3 files I've received from friends, etc., this might not work either.

Or maybe Itunes Soundcheck will over write everything. All I know is that when I check that little box (Soundcheck) in iTunes, I'm constantly having to adjust the volume knob up and down and it drives me bonkers. At the same time if I make everything the same level will I hear hissing or distortion because the audio is being forced, i.e. classical music?

Thanks for your patience and any clarification.

I'm sorry, I thought, from your original question, that you wanted to rip your music with dbPowerAmp, and then figure out a way to use volume normalization in iTunes without using iTunes to calculate the SoundCheck values (as it doesn't work as well as ReplayGain).

ReplayGain and SoundCheck are essentially supposed to do the same thing. Both add meta data to the ID3 tag for the purpose of normalizing the volume during playback; they don't actually change the audio data in the file. ReplayGain is not supported by iTunes, but IMHO does a better job of normalizing volume than SoundCheck . SoundCheck is not supported outside of iTunes, hence this entire process to use the ReplayGain values inside of iTunes.

I was suggesting that you don't calculate any normalization values while encoding, then, after encoding, I suggested you dump all your into foobar2000, select all, right click and under the menu select ReplayGain --> Scan Per-File Track Gain. foobar2000 will scan all the files, when it's done it will pop up a window with all the value and ask you to apply them; click apply. You now have ReplayGain Track Gain tags in all your files; I believe this will normalize volume for foobar2000 and WinAmp.

Next, I was suggesting that you use somewhat advanced features in a program called MP3Tag v2.41 to convert the ReplayGain values you just added with foobar2000 into SoundCheck values for use by iTunes. This does not overwrite the ReplayGain values, it merely adds another tag that iTunes can read. This can be done through creating an "Action" that calls the $rg2sc function to convert the ReplayGain values to SoundCheck values and write them where iTunes can find them. Actions are essentially scripts.

To create the Action you need to convert ReplayGain Track Gain to SoundCheck do the following:

1. Open MP3Tag v2.41
2. Select the MP3 Files to which you would like to add SoundCheck Values
3. From the menu, select Convert --> Actions
4. Click the New button (It has a star on it)
5. Name your action group (e.g. RG Track to SC)
6. Select the New button again (It still has a star on it)
7. Select Format Value from the dropdown menu
8. Under Field type "COMMENT ITUNNORM" (w/o the quotes)
9. Under Format String type "$rg2sc(%REPLAYGAIN_TRACK_GAIN%)" (w/o the quotes)
10. Click Okay until you're back to the Actions menu
11. Select the Action you just created
12. Run the action on your files

You only need to create the Action the first time. Subsequently, you can just run the action you already created on more files. PM me if you get lost!

If you are using the Multi-Encoder it can have individual DSP Effects per encoder, so for FLAC you could use the effect 'ReplayGain' to calculate the reoplaygain value and store in FLAC tags, for mp3 you can use the effect Volume Normalize (with replaygain selected) to apply that to the mp3 files.

Ah, I see it, got it, thanks so much.

I appreciate everyone's patience here.

It seems I can use dBpoweramp to complete the first part of dbAmp's suggestion, (for the files that I'm ripping, the other mp3s from friends I have to use foobar) and then continue with the conversion of replaygain values into Sound Check values to be read by iTunes

-OR-

I can use Volume Normalizer while ripping to MP3 and turn Sound Check values off in iTunes.

Did I get it?

I wonder why not to use adaptive, as I read (anyone have the link between the types?) it was like "Radio Level".

I just found iVolume, does this do the same thing or is it not as effective?

iVolume

The problem with "albumgaining" all albums down to 89dB is that *MANY* songs will be like 84dB to 86dB... that is, even lower than the target 89dB. For some albums this could also reduce dynamic range (heard someone saying it here, although not sure about this). Also, I would like to point out that I have not been able to hear clipping, and latest I've heard is that this was not audible (with current lossy encoders).

Are you saying that iVolume does the "albumgaining" or the previous post strategy does it? With over 100gigs of MP3s, I'm looking for more of shuffle attributes than album attributes.

Also, can you (or anyone) explain Clipping to me? I've heard it so many times and never have gotten the gist of it.

I recommend using MP3Gain.

I am talking about strategies like MP3Gain and ReplayGain (also referred as SoundCheck), not sure what iVolume means. Album Gain is different from Track Gain, because you will keep the album nuances, that is, if one song is intentionally quieter than others, you will keep that, whereas TrackGain will not be like that, but all tracks at the same level: That is what the radio listening is like.

Clipping is when the "sound" crosses ahead a supposed-to-stop limit, whatever trespasses that limit, it is technically distortion. There are numbers and that limit is 100dB (equals to 0). Bringing the song down -11dB (which is a ReplayGain value) will make the song to have volume of 89dB.

Sorry the confused info. Perhaps following the links provided below will explain much better.

This is wrong.

You might want to study up on what a decibel is, how it is calculated and how it is used in relation to replaygain. Your notion about the subject is confused.

If you haven't already, have a look here: http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=Clipping

Two useful threads on this topic (which helped me a lot) were:

1) The distinction between clipping at source (via the use of limiting etc at the mastering stage) versus clipping at "user-end" via lossy decoding, and
2) A useful explanation of clipping via decoding ("user-end").

C.