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33
Vinyl / Re: Which is the best suggested tool to rip Vinyl in LOSSLESS quality
Last post by DVDdoug -
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and later on trying to remaster the recording to have a better sounding experience...

...should I apply any noise removal or other effect or export it straightforward?
There is special software for removing vinyl clicks & pops but I'm on Windows so I can't suggest anything.

Audacity has 4 tools ("effects"):

 - Regular Noise Reduction uses a "fingerprint" of noise-only and it's for reducing constant background noise (like bum or hiss).   If the noise is bad, "the cure can be worse than the disease" so you'll have to try it.

 - Click Removal is automatic.

 - Repair is manual.  You have to find and zoom-in on the defect.

 - You can also zoom-in and manually re-draw the waveform.

I find a lot of older records to be a bit "dull sounding" (rolled-off highs).    So, I'll often use a little EQ to boost the highs.

When you're done you can run the Amplify or Normalize effect to "maximize" for 0dB (or near 0dB) peaks.


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When I say settings, I was referring to Sample Rate & Bit Depth...

 ...Do you suggest me to go 24/44 or 16/44?
We think the analog-to-digital converter in your turntable is 16-bits, and that's generally better than human hearing and way better than vinyl.   You don't magically improve quality by up-sampling.  It would be like copying DVD or VHS to Blu-Ray.

By default, Audacity converts everything to 32-bit floating point which is better/easier for processing.    You can export to whatever format you want.


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...I read somewhere that 24/44 was suggested in order to reduce noise.
The "real noise" comes from the analog record.

There is something called quantization noise and it's worse at lower bit-depths.    But under normal listening conditions you can't hear it at 16-bits or higher.  You CAN hear it at 8-bits.


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Should I set any of those to Dither or should I set Dither as None?
As a practical matter it won't make any difference. 

You're "supposed to dither" when you down-sample.    You're not down-sampling so you can set it to 'none".

Dither is added noise that's supposed to sound better than quantization noise, but you can't normally hear either one (at 16-bits or higher).    And you already have analog record noise that's worse so it's "self dithered" and it doesn't make sense to add a tiny-bit more noise.


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I am planning to export in WAV format.
The possible downside to WAV is that metadata/tags (embedded album/artist/title/artwork, etc.) is not well-standardized for WAV.   All of the other popular formats are better for metadata.     If you want lossless, FLAC is lossless compression, it's better for metadata, and your files are almost half the size.   But of course, you player needs to support FLAC (not a problem if you are using a software player on your computer).    Apple ALAC is also lossless compression.


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should I expect a difference between L & R channels, or since I am recording from analog to digital both channels should be very similar in terms of frequencies?
Yes, left & right are different.   Assuming music - Usually the main vocals (and the bass) are in the "phantom center" (identical in both channels).   The other sounds are panned left-to-right across the virtual soundstage to simulate/approximate the arrangement of the band/orchestra.
34
Opus / Re: Harmonic coding issues of Opus(from THD-N test)
Last post by a.ok.in -
An actual harmonic coding issue of Opus (Celt) is trying to encode all the bands when bits are not enough. At low bitrates this causes several hissing noise and artifacts. I think it's better to reduce bandwidth like other codecs rather than allow this to happen.
36
Vinyl / Re: Which is the best suggested tool to rip Vinyl in LOSSLESS quality
Last post by a.ok.in -
Quote from: Marin30 on
Also 1 more additional question: when ripping from Vinyl in STEREO, should I expect a difference between L & R channels, or since I am recording from analog to digital both channels should be very similar in terms of frequencies?

Left & Right will be similar but not equal. That's the thing with stereo (and sometimes multichannel), except if the channels are from significantly different sources. Is better to view waveform instead of spectrum to analyze the stereo. Analog/Digital conversion has nothing to do with that.
39
3rd Party Plugins - (fb2k) / Re: OpenMPT Module Decoder
Last post by MarkP -
A small request:

Could you make the View menu entry text be 'OpenMPT Control' instead of 'OpenMPT control', so it matches the case style of the other menu items.

Maybe I am pedantic (I probably am) but I always fix it with a hex editor each time an update is released.