Please explain the 'leveling' concept and its implications.

[KetchupKid]

MMan: I am behind you all the way ... if I can be of any help, let me know.

[MMan]

Thanks, If I find the time to do it, I will shoot you a draft b4 posting for your comments. So no one is confused, I understand that volume leveling is not Monkey's main mission, but I love everything else about it. Having that piece be understandable to the average user would make it that even further ahead of anything else out there.

[KetchupKid]

MMan: reach me at hugakoala@gmail.com

[boxster15]

Thanks for the information. But just to clarify: I have an iPod which I now use to store and play all of my CDs. I scanned them in using M-Monkey, but I had (apparently incorrectly) had the "Level Track Volume" box checked in the Rip CD window. I noticed that they are all much lower in overall volume than I think they should be. What is you suggested solution? Re-rip them all with the "Level Track Volume" unselected, or is there a way to "fix" what I already have? Thanks for you help in advance.

[MMan]

Unfortunately, if you had Level Track Volume checked on the rip, what was done was imbedded in the music file itself and is irreversible. To fix, you would have to rerip. An easier, but far less optimal "fix" just to get them louder at the cost of some probably noticable loss of fidelity would be to re level the track volume with a higher target volume say 94db. You can try this, but these would be some far from optimal archival copies of the CDs.

If your collection was rock/pop and is fairly recent, the initial Volume Leveling during the rip probably didn't do much in terms of damage to the files, because they were all likely lowered in volume so the headroom didn't get squeezed, they jsut seem quiter when played back. If you try to make them louder using the voume (gain) control on the player you my introiduce some distortion to get them to the equivilent apparent volume before the Volume Leveling.

I personally think that there should be a warning box that pops up any time you check Level Track Volume when ripping that says what you have selected will premenantly alter the music.

[boxster15]

MMan, thanks for the response. That was pretty much the conclusion I had come to, but I wanted to get some confirmation. I have rock, classical, jazz, etc. so I can re-rip - that's the easy part. But I had also edited each song to include album cover, lyrics, composer, etc. All the little details that I thought would be a "neat" idea at the time. I not looking forward to duplicating that effort. But thanks. Perhaps the MediaMonkey manual could explain this feature more clearly and also the pros and cons of the various options.

[MMan]

FYI, I've had to re-rip portions of my library and if you are careful with the filenames, you could rip them to some other location with the identical filenames. Then you could copy and replace to the current location outside of Monkey. Once that is done, these tracks should show up in the Files to Edit > Unsycronized Tags section of the explorer window. If you select Tools > Advanced Tag Management > Syncronize Tags, the info that you had for the tracks in the Monkey DB will be copied into the tags for the tracks. For some this might be easier than re updating the properties of the re-ripped tracks. It all depends on how much detail you have entered. Good Luck.

[Bex]

My Advanced Duplicate Script, link in signature, can copy/paste metadata (tags, Album Art, playstat, etc) between a set of tracks. Very handy when you rerip albums.

[MMan]

I'll have to try it for that purpose, that could be very handy

[kjaem24]

If you are using MP3Gain than this whole conversation would be rather pointless. It analyzes and levels your volumes but also gives you the option of removing the leveling if you decide to later. It's as easy as that.

[MusicBringer]

...I'm going to try and put all this on a wiki page. .

Did this get followed through?
I cannot see a Wiki page explaining the 'leveling' concept and its implications..

[chrisjj]

> PS. You're the first one to complain about the volume offset being shown instead of the actual volume level.

Which just goes to show how much work the average user has to go through to discover the truth that this display is wrong.

[chrisjj]

I don't think there's a right way or a wrong way to display the information.

Regardless of whether the value is a measure of volume or statement of adjustment, there is a right way and a wrong way. The right way is to have a label and value that accords. The wrong way is as MM currently does it - a label "Track Volume" on a value that is not a track volume but a gain. I believe this fault is the cause of much of the user confusion with the leveling (sic) feature.

[chrisjj]

If you are using MP3Gain than this whole conversation would be rather pointless. It analyzes and levels your volumes but also gives you the option of removing the leveling if you decide to later. It's as easy as that.

I see no option to remove the levelling. There is only the option of adjusting to a new volume.

[rusty]

You think 'Track Gain' and 'Album Gain' would be better? My worry is that most users wouldn't even know to associate that with volume leveling.