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Topic: Replaygain in Foobar 2000 (Read 5999 times) previous topic - next topic
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Replaygain in Foobar 2000

I am completely new to replaygain.

As far as i have understood, Foobar simply stores replaygain information (in tags?), instead of actually changing the sound level of the file like mp3gain does (?).

Is this correct?

Does Foobar store the information in the tags of the files, or in it's own database? If it store the information in tags, could these tags cause problems in other players?

And finally, how do i remove the replaygain from the files? Is there a simple "remove replaygain tag" command somewhere?

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #1 –
Quote
Foobar simply stores replaygain information (in tags?), instead of actually changing the sound level of the file like mp3gain does (?).


Yes

Quote
Does Foobar store the information in the tags of the files, or in it's own database?


Tags

Quote
If it store the information in tags, could these tags cause problems in other players?


I dont think they would.. but possibly

Quote
And finally, how do i remove the replaygain from the files? Is there a simple "remove replaygain tag" command somewhere?


Just right click the song(s) and choose Replaygain/Remove replaygain info from files

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #2 –
Quote
Quote
Foobar simply stores replaygain information (in tags?), instead of actually changing the sound level of the file like mp3gain does (?).


Yes

Depends on the file type.
With mpc files it is stored in the header for example.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #6 –
It stores the information in tags AND its database.

If the file doesn't support the needed tags, then its only written to the DB.

I have never heard about problems with other players. Only incompatibility known is foobar-RG + mp3Gain. If you use both together, problems may arise(which you can avoid, search the forums, if you want more info on that subject).

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #7 –
Foobar using the tag information and changes the level on the fly.
It's also possible to change the music file itself and provide undo information in the tags. This way you'll have all the music on the same level in e.g. mp3 players. Those don't support replay gain (yet, as far as I know).
The question is if you realy want the orrigional file altered instead of just storing the replaygain info in the tags (or header).

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #8 –
For mp3s, there is a lot of sense to getting mp3gain to alter the actual audio to whichever RG version you want (track or album - I much prefer album), and also to store the correct track and album data for the altered audio, plus the undo data, in a tag in the mp3.

That way, you can always reverse the operation; you can still choose track or album gain in foobar; and you hear your mp3s ReplayGained whichever player you use (including portable).

Cheers,
David.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #9 –
BEWARE!

I just tried to replaygain with F2k. Everything OK beside a "small" inconvenient: my ID3v2 tags have been gracefully REPLACED with APE2 tags.

This happens if you have the ID3v2 component installed. Apparently this component is able to READ (but personally I've not been able to get any ID3v2 info, not at least right-clicking on a track and selecting "Show file info", but that can be my fault, maybe I've not understood where to get ID3v2 info from the ID3v2 component) but it will REMOVE ID3v2 everytime metadata is changed and WITHOUT ANY WARNING:

I really don't like this behaviour. I also really don't like that there is no info in this component distribution zip file explaining what it REALLY does when one would expect it being able to handle ID3v2, not ereasing them.

I understand ID3v2 is not loved by F2k community, and they can probably be technically right, but erasing my tags without a warning... no, I REALLY DON'T LIKE THAT.

If I'd applied F2K replaygain to my whole collection of more than 10000 tracks with the ID3v2 component installed... maybe I will had seeked for a lawyer advice...

ANYWAY: if you don't have id3v2 component installed, you can safely replaygain from F2k, although, to be safer, I will continue to do it using mp3gain.

Best regards.

Sergio
Sergio
M-Audio Delta AP + Revox B150 + (JBL 4301B | Sennheiser Amperior | Sennheiser HD598)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #10 –
Sergio: if you dont like it, disable it. Foobar only did exactly that, what was set in its preferences in "standard inputs".

Also, there really isn't a reason for such a harsh warning, since its not only configurable, but can also simply be "repaired" by writing the ape-tags back to id3v2.

- Lyx

edit: btw: before you ask, foobar does prefer ape over id3v2 because ape is a better solution(but not as good supported as id3v2 in other players).
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #11 –
If you have already used mp3gain on your files, they will already be altered at the bitstream level, rather than by setting a tag. In fact, mp3gain stores its backup information in a APEv2 tag. For some reason, it doesn't bother to duplicate the rest of the metadata in that tag. As Foobar2000 prefers the first tag it finds of (ape|id3v2|lyrics3|id3v1) it will see the mostly bare APEv2 tag and ignore the ID3v2 tag. (Gee, maybe mp3gain should be fixed to copy data over. Or, Foobar2000 can be changed to scan until it has retrieved all legal footer tags.)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #12 –
Quote
Sergio: if you dont like it, disable it

Hy, Lyx!

Yes, I've already deleted (is that what you mean for "disable"?) the ID3v2 component. I very well understand that if I don't like a thing I can not use it. 

What I disliked was not the behaviour, but the fact that it was not documented.

About the fact of "reverting" from APE to ID3v2, can this be done within F2k? How?
If not, can you please point me to the correct tool to accomplish that? I will really like to revert the 3 albums I screwed-up with the ID3v2 component...

About the ID3v2 vs. APE2 tags... I don't want re-open an issue which has already very much debated here. Let me only state that from MY point of view, as a "user", ID3v2 are much better due to the support they have in the ripper/encoder/tagger/library/player "chain" I use.

Cheers

Sergio
Sergio
M-Audio Delta AP + Revox B150 + (JBL 4301B | Sennheiser Amperior | Sennheiser HD598)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #13 –
please read my post again - especially the part about where in foobars preferences to change this option.

- Lyx

edit: of course the option to write id3v2 instead is only available, if you have the id3v2 plugin installed.

edit2: i'm not sure, but i suppose as soon as you change tagwriting to "id3v2 and id3v1" foobar should automatically copy the apev2 tags back to id3v2 when you load them into the playlist - you may need to use the "reload info from files" command, not sure.
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #14 –
Quote
If you have already used mp3gain on your files, they will already be altered at the bitstream level, rather than by setting a tag. In fact, mp3gain stores its backup information in a APEv2 tag. For some reason, it doesn't bother to duplicate the rest of the metadata in that tag. As Foobar2000 prefers the first tag it finds of (ape|id3v2|lyrics3|id3v1) it will see the mostly bare APEv2 tag and ignore the ID3v2 tag. (Gee, maybe mp3gain should be fixed to copy data over. Or, Foobar2000 can be changed to scan until it has retrieved all legal footer tags.)

No, I don't APPLY the replaygain with mp3gain, I only SCAN my files with it, then I let my player apply the correction on the fly, so they ar not altered at the bitstream level.

I think the reason why it doesn't duplicate the ID3v2 information in the APEv2 tag is that it does what it tells and nothing more. Wise choice.

And, no, the ID3v2 tag was not just ignored by foobar2000, it was really removed.

Sergio
Sergio
M-Audio Delta AP + Revox B150 + (JBL 4301B | Sennheiser Amperior | Sennheiser HD598)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #15 –
Quote
please read my post again - especially the part about where in foobars preferences to change this option.

- Lyx

edit: of course the option to write id3v2 instead is only available, if you have the id3v2 plugin installed.

Sorry, I missed, that....

*BUT* I never checked the "Remove ID3v2" checkbox.... 

...will make more test...

Thanks!
Sergio
M-Audio Delta AP + Revox B150 + (JBL 4301B | Sennheiser Amperior | Sennheiser HD598)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #16 –
Quote
*BUT* I never checked the "Remove ID3v2" checkbox....   :blink:

" (other supported types will be stripped from files) "

Maybe take a closer look at the descriptions of the preferences-pages? ;)

also see my second edit of my prev. post.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #17 –
Urgh... I may be thick, but...

I re-installed ID3v2 component, set preferences to write ID3v2 only, started with freshly ID3v2 tagged test files, applied replaygain and the result is that:

Almost all ID3v2 info is gone: title, artist, album, track, TENC and TSSE are blanked, WCOM is preserved (strange!), 4 TXXX frames added, where I suppose replaygain info is stored.

Anyway if rightclick show file info in f2k i still get all the missing info, but not in Winamp.  Where f2k gets the info from??

What am I doing wrong??

EDIT:  FALSE!  Winamp too reads the info, MP3/Tag Studio and dbPoweramp don't.
  time to sleep...  tomorrow I'll dig a bit more...

EDIT 2: SOLVED! I had to check "Write ISO-8859-1 instead of UTF-16" in the ID3v2 tag support prefernces.  Hmmmm... shouldn't that be the default?
I can sleep a little bit more happy! 

Cheers.

Sergio
Sergio
M-Audio Delta AP + Revox B150 + (JBL 4301B | Sennheiser Amperior | Sennheiser HD598)

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #18 –
Sounds like more tools that don't support Unicode. If you need the tags to be readable in more applications, but don't care about foreign characters, feel free to disable Unicode writing in the ID3v2 tag support preferences.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #19 –
I listen to my music album by album, so there is no reason for me to use replaygain simply to adjust sound level. The only reason i  want to use replaygain is to avoid clipping (which i'm not completely sure what is).

Does the replaygain in Foobar 2000 avoid clipping? (i thought the change had to be done before decoding?). If it does, is there a way i can apply max no-clip gain in Foobar like in mp3gain? (and is it true that it is completely lossless to use mp3gain? even though it changes the file?)

Is clipping an issue with lossless files as well? Do i need to apply replaygain to them?

Is there a (lossless?) way i can apply replaygain to my AACs and oggs by changing the files (like mp3gain) so the change will be played back in any player?

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #20 –
Quote
I listen to my music album by album, so there is no reason for me to use replaygain simply to adjust sound level. The only reason i  want to use replaygain is to avoid clipping (which i'm not completely sure what is).

Does the replaygain in Foobar 2000 avoid clipping? (i thought the change had to be done before decoding?). If it does, is there a way i can apply max no-clip gain in Foobar like in mp3gain? (and is it true that it is completely lossless to use mp3gain? even though it changes the file?)

Is clipping an issue with lossless files as well? Do i need to apply replaygain to them?

Is there a (lossless?) way i can apply replaygain to my AACs and oggs by changing the files (like mp3gain) so the change will be played back in any player?

Although AFAIK, the genral and main purpose of Replaygain is to get different tracks or albums to the same perceptive sound level one of the welcome side effects is that it will also prevent clipping in a lot of cases.

I guess the bets approach for you to find out the ideal setting, would be to simply scan to the standard replaygain level.  See if you still find tracks that clip.  And then everytime you encounter a clipping track, lower the replaygain preamp (playback settings, not scanning) by another half db.

Do this everytime you encounter any track that clips and at some point you should have reached a value where none of the tracks clip.  From my own experience this will probably between minus a half or -1 db.

Mow simply leave the preamp at this setting, or rereplaygain your files to the newly determined level.  I'd recommend to go with the preamp otion though.

Quote
Is clipping an issue with lossless files as well? Do i need to apply replaygain to them?


Clipping is only  a problem with lossless files in case the source material clips already as well.  With some modern CD's sometimes not that unlikely anymore.  Lossless as it's name implies is lossless and therefore will also not affect the gain or peak levels in any way.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #21 –
Quote
I listen to my music album by album, so there is no reason for me to use replaygain simply to adjust sound level.


Why not use album gain mode then?

Quote
Does the replaygain in Foobar 2000 avoid clipping? (i thought the change had to be done before decoding?).


Foobar2000 decodes to floats, which cannot clip. But before sending the data to your soundcard they must be converted to 16/24/32 bits, and this is where clipping can happen. The ReplayGain scanner also checks for the maximum level (i.e. whether it clips and how much) and that information can be used to attenutate if needed.

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #22 –
Quote
Is there a (lossless?) way i can apply replaygain to my AACs and oggs by changing the files (like mp3gain) so the change will be played back in any player?

No. At the very least with AAC it's possible, but someone needs to write the software first

Replaygain in Foobar 2000

Reply #23 –
in the previous 24h, i've explained replaygain&clipping to at least two people. Please do a forum search and you fill find all the necessary information.

- Lyx
I am arrogant and I can afford it because I deliver.