Recording Enhancements Pack

[BayTaper]

Very interesting BayTaper. I also bougth my H140 mainly for recording live gigs and this information helps to get hi quality recordings.

Do you by any chance has any screenshots documenting your analysis?
Thx, Wolf.

Note the flat tops that are not occuring at 0 db. All the neg gain did was scale it down but left the clipping there (which is honestly exactly what I expected it to do). So, for me, once I confirm that, my thinking is that I'd never use the "negative" side of the gain structure because I'm only making things worse than they already are. And if I wasn't actually clipping, then I don't think I would ever want to lower the gain on-the-fly, when I can just do that in post with (arguably) a better algorithm than the H120 is using.

[attachment deleted by admin, too old]

[Wolf]

Thx again BayTaper. The image suggest that the gain reduction is applied after the ADC adquired the (already clipped) signal. I didn't expect that.
Will probably make some tests on my own with test signals and see what I can get.

Thx. Wolf.

[petur]

I just did a small test:

- disabled gain
- set gain to 0
- increase input signal until the peakmeters reach 0 dB and then give it a bit more
- decrease recording gain until peakmeters are below 0 dB

after step4 the waveform looked like this (scale in dB, gain set at -5 dB)

[Davide-NYC]

I think the difference was that BayTaper's input signal was strong enough to clip when the unit was set at 0db 'volume' and 0db 'gain'.
Petur, was your input signal strong enough?
I am willing to do some testing as well.
Let me know what you want done exactly.

[BayTaper]

Yeah, let there be no doubt, I was sending a signal that was clipping the hell out of the iRiver with the sole purpose to try to understand WTH negative gain was going to do with it. It pretty much did exactly what I was expecting it to, it lowered the gain of the clipped signal. Now, it seems like Petur did the exact same thing as me, so I'm a bit perplexed why his waveforms look so nice and round. But, not sure if Petur was really clipping hard enough to really tell, and in my waveform pic above, you can see I "zoomed" way into the waveform (down to the individual sample, you can see the "dots") to take a closer look.

[petur]

yes it was clipping when gain was set at 0 dB, but not much, only a few dB.

This was the signal when gain was set at 0 dB (just before gain was set negative)



My test only clipped a little bit, but this was about the hottest signal I managed to produce.

[BayTaper]

That's pretty interesting though. It's almost like it can pad it a little before it runs out of headroom. Strange. More tests might unlock some more clues...

[Llorean]

One thing you could do is make a recording of something that clips at 0 gain, then make another recording of the same thing at negative something, then at negative something further, and see if all three clip, and if they do, at the same point.

This should tell you if lowering into the negatives can or cannot prevent clipping (if it's at a different point in each one, then you may just need to lower it further in the negatives than it seems like, maybe a bug of some sort in the peakmeter / clip detection output).

[mlind]

Hi guys
I never tried the AGC patch, but anxiously awaits it beeing committed.

For all I know, it's a fact that there's NO WAY to by any digital means save a signal from clipping if it's clipping BEFORE the analog->digital conversion (ADC).... 

Could there be some built in steady digital gain raise AFTER the digital gain change?
What's the resolution before the dig. gain ch.? 16 bit? 20?
Is there a reduction stage from 20 bit to 16?
(As far as I know the H1x0 has a possibility to work with 20 bit sound in some stage.)

Maybe I should go to sleep...

[BayTaper]

For all I know, it's a fact that there's NO WAY to by any digital means save a signal from clipping if it's clipping BEFORE the analog->digital conversion (ADC).... 

My thoughts exactly, which is why I'm thinking negative gain makes no sense under any conditions, I just can't think of any reason why you'd use it?

[Techy_Bloke]

is there anyway of making just the recording screen text heaps massive instead of having it really small so its all easier to read

and also a bigger and labeled DB meter

and prehaps scrolling input waveform ??

ummm..yeah..use the REP....

what is REP and where can i find it??

i know that u can use the oscilliator to veiw waveform but not whislt recording ??

how can i make the recording screen txt bigger without effecting my theme text size ?

also how do i install Automatic Gain Control

[LurkAzusa]

See the first post on page one of this topic.  If you have an H1XX, use the build there.  For the H3XX use KOSH's experimental build on www.misticriver.net

[paulheu]

The iRiver H3x0 experimental build has just been updated with the latest patches (including latest RecEnhPatch)

[Mmmm]

is there anyway of making just the recording screen text heaps massive instead of having it really small so its all easier to read

and also a bigger and labeled DB meter

and prehaps scrolling input waveform ??

ummm..yeah..use the REP....

what is REP and where can i find it??

i know that u can use the oscilliator to veiw waveform but not whislt recording ??

how can i make the recording screen txt bigger without effecting my theme text size ?

also how do i install Automatic Gain Control

REP stands for Recording Enhancements Pack which is (supposedly) what this thread is all about.
As LurkAzusa says, all details are in post#1.

Unfortunately there is not much room left on the screen for use of a bigger font (if you are using an H1xx). The REP will use whichever font you have set as long as it will fit on the screen (10 pixels high is the largest for H1xx I'm afraid) Otherwise it will use the system font (8 pixels high), which is what you see without the REP. I find CourB08 a good font, but then It depends on your theme.

On the recording screen there is a Histogram view which scrolls, telling you what the input levels are and AGC is also part of the REP. So I think that is everything you asked about except the labelled peakmeter values but I think you can work them out for yourself without labels eh? 

[BayTaper]

Alright, I know that the development is done for free by some of you guys, so I always hesitate to offer up feature requests because I am truly grateful and humbled by what you've already done. That said, you know what would be insanely cool from at least a "wow" factor perspective? A real-time graphic frequency/spectrum analyzer. Maybe 8-10 frequency slots from bass to treble all with peak indicators and peak holding. It'd probably have to use the screen on the bottem where the already-cool historical level and balance plotting is happening, but something like this would just look slick -- in fact, I'm not sure I've ever seen a portable recorder show something like that. Not sure, but the historical plot might be more useful and I'm betting this would grind some serious CPU cycles, but thought it was worth mentioning...