Please tell me how to use properly Mp3Gain, i have House,Deep house,Electro,Edm ...tracks,and i want them to be as close as possible the same volume,but without any loss of quality.Which options in Mp3Gain should i use ?
all my tracks are Mp3 320 kbps
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95 dB is louder than 89 dB, but neither is better, generally speaking. If you have tracks that will all go to 95 dB without clipping then that's great. I've always used the default 89 dB for my entire music collection, but that's because I have a lot of stuff that would clip if it were any louder than that. And that's taking into consideration that my collection contains rock, pop, rap, electronic, and everything in between. If you can get away with 95 dB, great, if not then there's nothing wrong with 89 dB either. That's why the amp has a volume control on it.
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Best advice I can give is make copies of some tracks to experiment with, so that you're not modifying your originals in a way you may not want to. Even though it is possible to go back and undo the changes, it makes experimenting easier if you're just using copies you can throw away. Takes less time to simply delete the experimental batch of files than it does to restore the originals to their original state, and that way there's no risk, either.
For that particular batch of files you can see that even unmodified they already contain clipping. The lowest volume there is 94.1 dB, so if I were working with only those files and didn't care how they matched the rest of my collection I would probably just use that 94.1 dB as my reference. That one track would be left alone and then the rest of the files could be matched to that quietest track, while retaining as much overall volume as possible. If you're going to do your entire collection it wouldn't hurt to analyze it all to find the track with the lowest volume and use that as your reference.
You can make this as easy or as complicated as you like. If you're going to be listening on something like an iPhone and headphones, which means you have to live with the restrictions of how loud that device can go, then you are better off retaining as much original volume as you can get away with. If, however, you're going to be listening through some kind of amplifer/stereo system that has a volume knob you can turn up as much as you want then how much volume you retain in the file becomes less important. If you can turn up the listening device enough to get the volume you want to hear, then there's nothing wrong with the default of 89.0 dB. If your device's amplification is a restriction, and you hit the device's maximum before you hear it as loud as you want to hear it, you may want to preserve more volume in the files.
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thank you so much,that is really good advice ! and just please tell me what about advanced options,should i leave it as it is ? and in options... Dont clip when doing track gain ?
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Volume changes are in steps of 1.5dB. So yes, you can get from 101dB down to 89dB.
If your volume is precisely 101, then you can go down to 99.5, 98, 96.5, 95, etc.
You cannot go from 101 to, say, precisely 100.9.
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No, not several times. The volume change can be any of 1.5dB. I was just listing the various exact volumes that all happen to be 1.5dB steps away from 101, in order.
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It's pretty safe to checkmark "Do not use temp files" if you ask me. It makes processing faster, as it doesn't do a file copy for each and every file. And if you're using your own experimental copies then if something goes wrong it doesn't matter anyway. Usually the only time something will go wrong is if you have a corrupt file, anyway.
You never lose quality. All you are doing with this processing is changing a single number that describes how loud things are. You can change it a zillion times to a zillion different values and then change it back to the original value and your file will be bit-for-bit exactly the same as when you started. You would lose quality if you were decoding the audio data and making a completely new mp3 from scratch with that decoded data, but that is not what is happening here. All that is happening here is a simple change to a reference value. The actual audio data is not changed at all.
As for the 1.5 dB step thing, take your sample list of files in the screenshot you posted. The lowest value is 94.1 dB, so let's use that for this example.
So each track would have to be turned down by that many dB to match the reference track we've chosen. The first change of 3.8 isn't an exact multiple of 1.5 dB so this means it won't match the reference track exactly. We can only get it close because of that 1.5 dB change restriction. If you let mp3gain alter these tracks to a reference of 94.1 dB then I believe these are the changes you should see.
97.9 - 3.8 = 93.5 dB (4.5 dB subtracted, multiples of 1.5 dB only, remember)
98.1 - 4.0 = 93.7 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
98.1 - 4.0 = 93.7 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
97.8 - 3.7 = 94.8 dB (3.0 dB subtracted)
101.1 - 7.0 = 93.6 dB (7.5 dB subtracted)
95.9 - 1.8 = 94.4 dB (1.5 dB subtracted)
95.3 - 1.2 = 93.8 dB (1.5 dB subtracted)
94.1 - 0 = 94.1 (no change)
98.5 - 4.4 = 94.0 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
97.8 - 3.7 = 94.8 dB (3.0 dB subtracted)
As you can see, all the tracks would be brought as close as possible to your 94.1 dB reference point, but because we are working in 1.5 dB steps we can be +/- 0.75 dB away from the target. This small amount of difference (0.75 dB) has never seemed much to worry about. I never notice it, anyway.
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Please tell me how to use properly Mp3Gain, i have House,Deep house,Electro,Edm ...tracks,and i want them to be as close as possible the same volume,but without any loss of quality.Which options in Mp3Gain should i use ?
all my tracks are Mp3 320 kbps
There's not much to it. Just use track gain.
ok,but default db is set to 89, im reading people put it to 95 db,whats better ?
and what about Advanced options ?
95 dB is louder than 89 dB, but neither is better, generally speaking. If you have tracks that will all go to 95 dB without clipping then that's great. I've always used the default 89 dB for my entire music collection, but that's because I have a lot of stuff that would clip if it were any louder than that. And that's taking into consideration that my collection contains rock, pop, rap, electronic, and everything in between. If you can get away with 95 dB, great, if not then there's nothing wrong with 89 dB either. That's why the amp has a volume control on it.
ok,but take a look at this,this songs are at min 95 db to max 101 db,so what should i do ?
Best advice I can give is make copies of some tracks to experiment with, so that you're not modifying your originals in a way you may not want to. Even though it is possible to go back and undo the changes, it makes experimenting easier if you're just using copies you can throw away. Takes less time to simply delete the experimental batch of files than it does to restore the originals to their original state, and that way there's no risk, either.
For that particular batch of files you can see that even unmodified they already contain clipping. The lowest volume there is 94.1 dB, so if I were working with only those files and didn't care how they matched the rest of my collection I would probably just use that 94.1 dB as my reference. That one track would be left alone and then the rest of the files could be matched to that quietest track, while retaining as much overall volume as possible. If you're going to do your entire collection it wouldn't hurt to analyze it all to find the track with the lowest volume and use that as your reference.
You can make this as easy or as complicated as you like. If you're going to be listening on something like an iPhone and headphones, which means you have to live with the restrictions of how loud that device can go, then you are better off retaining as much original volume as you can get away with. If, however, you're going to be listening through some kind of amplifer/stereo system that has a volume knob you can turn up as much as you want then how much volume you retain in the file becomes less important. If you can turn up the listening device enough to get the volume you want to hear, then there's nothing wrong with the default of 89.0 dB. If your device's amplification is a restriction, and you hit the device's maximum before you hear it as loud as you want to hear it, you may want to preserve more volume in the files.
thank you so much,that is really good advice ! and just please tell me what about advanced options,should i leave it as it is ? and in options... Dont clip when doing track gain ?
and yes,i have been reading that it cant reduce volume for more than 1.5 db ? so if one song is 101 db it can never get to 89 db,right ?
Volume changes are in steps of 1.5dB. So yes, you can get from 101dB down to 89dB.
If your volume is precisely 101, then you can go down to 99.5, 98, 96.5, 95, etc.
You cannot go from 101 to, say, precisely 100.9.
so your saying i have to normalize the same track several times to get 89 db ? but then i will lose quality for sure
No, not several times. The volume change can be any of 1.5dB. I was just listing the various exact volumes that all happen to be 1.5dB steps away from 101, in order.
It's pretty safe to checkmark "Do not use temp files" if you ask me. It makes processing faster, as it doesn't do a file copy for each and every file. And if you're using your own experimental copies then if something goes wrong it doesn't matter anyway. Usually the only time something will go wrong is if you have a corrupt file, anyway.
You never lose quality. All you are doing with this processing is changing a single number that describes how loud things are. You can change it a zillion times to a zillion different values and then change it back to the original value and your file will be bit-for-bit exactly the same as when you started. You would lose quality if you were decoding the audio data and making a completely new mp3 from scratch with that decoded data, but that is not what is happening here. All that is happening here is a simple change to a reference value. The actual audio data is not changed at all.
As for the 1.5 dB step thing, take your sample list of files in the screenshot you posted. The lowest value is 94.1 dB, so let's use that for this example.
Original volumes:
97.9
98.1
98.1
97.8
101.1
95.9
95.3
94.1
98.5
97.8
Subract reference value of 94.1 to get necessary change to hit reference value:
97.9 - 94.1 = 3.8
98.1 - 94.1 = 4.0
98.1 - 94.1 = 4.0
97.8 - 94.1 = 3.7
101.1 - 94.1 = 7.0
95.9 - 94.1 = 1.8
95.3 - 94.1 = 1.2
94.1 - 94.1 = 0
98.5 - 94.1 = 4.4
97.8 - 94.1 = 3.7
So each track would have to be turned down by that many dB to match the reference track we've chosen. The first change of 3.8 isn't an exact multiple of 1.5 dB so this means it won't match the reference track exactly. We can only get it close because of that 1.5 dB change restriction. If you let mp3gain alter these tracks to a reference of 94.1 dB then I believe these are the changes you should see.
97.9 - 3.8 = 93.5 dB (4.5 dB subtracted, multiples of 1.5 dB only, remember)
98.1 - 4.0 = 93.7 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
98.1 - 4.0 = 93.7 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
97.8 - 3.7 = 94.8 dB (3.0 dB subtracted)
101.1 - 7.0 = 93.6 dB (7.5 dB subtracted)
95.9 - 1.8 = 94.4 dB (1.5 dB subtracted)
95.3 - 1.2 = 93.8 dB (1.5 dB subtracted)
94.1 - 0 = 94.1 (no change)
98.5 - 4.4 = 94.0 dB (4.5 dB subtracted)
97.8 - 3.7 = 94.8 dB (3.0 dB subtracted)
As you can see, all the tracks would be brought as close as possible to your 94.1 dB reference point, but because we are working in 1.5 dB steps we can be +/- 0.75 dB away from the target. This small amount of difference (0.75 dB) has never seemed much to worry about. I never notice it, anyway.
thank you so much,you really know how to explain things,i really appreciate it ! im going to start normalizing my music now :)