Advice on Multiple Volume Settings - Linux-audio-user

Eric Steinberg

19 Aug 19 Aug

2:50 p.m.

Usually I set up my gain structure the same way that I would with a hardware signal chain- everything that's static is at about 80%, then the last fader in the chain is what I use for a volume control. But 50% is fine too- it's just that 80% sort of visually corresponds to where "unity" is on most hardware faders. On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 8:38 AM, Kenneth Jacker <khj(a)cs.appstate.edu> wrote:

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I want to ask the "experts" on this mailing list a question I've had for years. It involves "best practices" for the multiple volume settings available on most computer systems ... Say I am playing an audio stream from 'last.fm'. The way I see it, there are *four* different possible volume settings: "line" (e.g., PCM) volume, application (e.g., Rhythmbox, TVTime, ...) volume, mixer "master" volume, and speaker volume. I would guess that the last (speaker) volume should be set (dynamically when needed) to whatever is currently most appropriate for the listener. But what about the other three? Should they all be set at 50%? If not, what other values should be used? Can anyone give some guidelines? Thanks for your comments! -- Prof Kenneth H Jacker khj(a)cs.appstate.edu Computer Science Dept www.cs.appstate.edu/~khj Appalachian State Univ Boone, NC 28608 USA _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user

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Mark Knecht

19 Aug 19 Aug

3:28 p.m.

On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 8:38 AM, Kenneth Jacker<khj(a)cs.appstate.edu> wrote:

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I want to ask the "experts" on this mailing list a question I've had for years. It involves "best practices" for the multiple volume settings available on most computer systems ... Say I am playing an audio stream from 'last.fm'. The way I see it, there are *four* different possible volume settings: "line" (e.g., PCM) volume, application (e.g., Rhythmbox, TVTime, ...) volume, mixer "master" volume, and speaker volume. I would guess that the last (speaker) volume should be set (dynamically when needed) to whatever is currently most appropriate for the listener. But what about the other three? Should they all be set at 50%? If not, what other values should be used? Can anyone give some guidelines? Thanks for your comments! -- Prof Kenneth H Jacker khj(a)cs.appstate.edu Computer Science Dept www.cs.appstate.edu/~khj Appalachian State Univ Boone, NC 28608 USA _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user

Simple - Keep every 'early' volume control in the chain as high as you can without creating clipping or distortion at that stage. This keeps signal to noise as good as you can for this audio data. Set your last volume control to a level you want to listen to. (Depends on the size of the power amp and efficiency of your speakers. Typically for me doing this right requires some understanding of how much overhead any given stage can tolerate. If I have VU's then I might strive for some level averaging anywhere from 0 to -6. If I don't have VUs then I'll do this by ear or maybe use some equipment (software or hardware) to measure system response if I think it's important. Most of the time it isn't so I'll try pushing a stage hard with loud material until I think I hear some problems and then I'll back off by some amount. If you do ti this way it's important to NOT set the later stages loud as the distorion I hear might be from a later stage and not the one I'm adjusting. Hope this helps, Mark

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Patrick Shirkey

11:48 p.m.

On 08/20/2009 09:45 AM, Bearcat M. Şandor wrote:

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On Wed, 2009-08-19 at 10:28 -0700, Mark Knecht wrote:

On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 8:38 AM, Kenneth Jacker<khj(a)cs.appstate.edu> wrote:

I want to ask the "experts" on this mailing list a question I've had for years. It involves "best practices" for the multiple volume settings available on most computer systems ... Say I am playing an audio stream from 'last.fm'. The way I see it, there are *four* different possible volume settings: "line" (e.g., PCM) volume, application (e.g., Rhythmbox, TVTime, ...) volume, mixer "master" volume, and speaker volume. I would guess that the last (speaker) volume should be set (dynamically when needed) to whatever is currently most appropriate for the listener. But what about the other three? Should they all be set at 50%? If not, what other values should be used? Can anyone give some guidelines? Thanks for your comments! -- Prof Kenneth H Jacker khj(a)cs.appstate.edu Computer Science Dept www.cs.appstate.edu/~khj Appalachian State Univ Boone, NC 28608 USA _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user

One of my pet peeves (and i'm sure for many of you as well) is the "loudness wars", that is the setting of levels close to digital 0 in the recording studio. If i set my pcm and other volumes to 100% in the alsa mixer am i in fact doing the same thing at home?

You are making it more likely. It depends how many signals and vu controllers are in the chain. Generally it's better to turn the speakers up manually than alsamixer or application volume. However sometimes you may need to adjust anywhere along the chain. I find it varies dramatically with youtube and vlc and sometimes I have to crank things up to max with the TV remote. Other times I have to push the mixer up to max and other times it's just a case of the application settings being too low. Either way I find I am constantly adjusting the levels to meet the situation. I enjoy that process though so maybe I subconsciously make it harder for myself than it needs to be just to gets some extra kicks in my day... Patrick Shirkey Boost Hardware Ltd

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Bearcat M. Sandor _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user(a)lists.linuxaudio.org http://lists.linuxaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-audio-user

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hollunder＠gmx.at

9:09 a.m.

On Thu, 20 Aug 2009 10:01:27 +0200 Arnold Krille <arnold(a)arnoldarts.de> wrote:

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Hi, On Thursday 20 August 2009 01:45:32 Bearcat M. Şandor wrote:

One of my pet peeves (and i'm sure for many of you as well) is the "loudness wars", that is the setting of levels close to digital 0 in the recording studio. If i set my pcm and other volumes to 100% in the alsa mixer am i in fact doing the same thing at home?

No, you are not. This is about generic volume in listening environment, not about mastering the volume of a piece of music. You actually want to set all the volumes apart from the last one to a high value. Otherwise if the first level is down and you have to turn up the later ones to hear something, you amplify the noise more then needed. If all volumes are up and you only turn the last one down, the noise introduced by all previous gain-stages is reduced too. Some times its not practical to control the over-all-listening-volume at the last stage (which would be the knob at the back of the active monitors), but the main control should be one of the last volume-controls in the chain. Have fun, Arnold

I think the interesting part in here is whether it matters if all controls are set to maximum _in_software_. Are there parts in the software audio chain where it should or shouldn't be at 100%? The individual chains are different but it should be possible to know if it's a good idea for the individual parts, like alsa, PA, applications, ... Philipp

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