CDs Mastered With the Volume too Low

That bottom waveform is stereo....

 

Nonsense. I crank up my amp on an unused aux input and hear the most perfect sounding Dark Side of the Moon you can imagine!

 

What I stated was not nonsense, it is a simple fact.
That a recording can sound good with 13 or so bits is nothing new. You have a higher noise floor - something closer to the quietest vinyl.

 

Sorry, this is the correct one (can't edit the old posting anymore)


As a reference, again the waveform of the 2018 BD:

 

This thread doesn't seem filled with "hatred", merely just listing albums that are quieter than most lol

I think that is something that may be missed for some so far here. For quiet volume, easy fix or not, the fact that it needs something extra to drive the volume qualifies it for the premise of the thread.

 

I have the two mono files as projects on audacity to seperate. did you normalize them to listen to.

 

The Pepper Mono's are pretty much the same way

 

Thank You!!!

 

No, technically, Leigh's 100% correct.

The lowest volume CD I ever owned was an 80s Australian pressing of the "Xanadu" soundtrack. It was so low that when I turned it up to a decent listening level I could hear quantization noise. I doubt dither was even used. I don't think the peaks ever registered any higher than -18 db.

If, on recording, you set your peaks to, say -6 db in 16-bit, you're just fine.

 

Using only 13 bits would result in a peak level of 12,5% for the entire CD. I don't think that I ever saw a CD like that. If the peak level is 50%, you are effectively using 15 bits.

 

The best sounding prerecorded Beatles cassettes that I have, with the best variable dynamics, are the quietest. Most are paper label early release/initial release offerings. I turn them up loud, they sound great, and they don’t hurt my ears or tire me out. Unlike the worst sounding Beatles music I have that’s overly compressed and overly loud. There’s no fixing that, even if you turn the volume down.

 

Use your volume knob, for forks sake.

 

I listed an example in a earlier page where I can't simply just use it on quiet CDs that are on my iPod without editing the audio first

 

The described problem has been around since the first Walkman portable CD player in 1984. Buyers were complaining the same thing in regards to the low volume produced CD's of the day not being able to be played loud enough. They sounded fine on a dedicated stereo system so a lot of us didn't care. The problem isn't the media, it's the choice of playback. Thankfully for the not a dedicated audio playback system crowd we have remasters that compensate for this. Too bad a lot of them sound really bad on an audiophile type system.

 

^It's in 24-bit so the volume is irrelevant. The noise floor is way too low for it to matter in this case.

 

Is there a version that isn’t quiet? Because I’d like to get a copy. Mine is so quiet, even with the track gains all the way up in iTunes, that I can barely listen to it on ear buds while on the go. I’ve been too lazy to edit the files themselves.

 

Technically, that's not a good idea unless you know for a fact that Nero uses dither. Many common consumer-grade software doesn't. It's better to use something that does indeed use dither.

 

Slightly better:

2009 CD


2017 CD (no mono version on the 2017 BD)

 

BTW, as a huge Wilson Pickett fan, I happen to have that "A Man And A Half" 2-CD set, and have had it since it came out in the early 90s. It sounds great, and there is nothing wrong with the levels. It was produced by Harry Weinger and mastered by Stephen Innocenzi.

I'm not saying you, but some people get so used to compressed/limited CD sound that it's what they expect to hear. And, if the music doesn't sound as jacked up, they believe something is wrong. If you're hearing noise when cranking this, remember that they are mid-60s recordings. "Mustang Sally" was recorded at Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

Any 100-watt amp should have no problem cranking this CD.

 

Totally agree.

 

I have read this before but do not understand dither or its significance. I guess I need to Google and read up. I used Audacity to lower the HD download Black Sabbath track Wicked World volume converted to wav file to make a CD-R along with tracks from another source. The volume match worked out well and the track sounds great to my ears. I have no idea if "dither" was involved or if I did everything the most technically appropriate way.

 

It was a joke, man. I’m on your side.

 

Indochine "le péril jaune" sounded rather anemic on its CD version.

 

you're missing the point...

BTW here's Mustang Sally from A Man and a Half , not much better

 

The Mono is on CD 4