Put All Audio Questions Here

I decided to make a Q&A thread about any audio problems that you might come up with. I or some other resident audiophile will try to answer your question in a timely manner. Anything from gamerips to LAME development will get answerd in one way or another. This thread's purpose is to help people rip/encode audio with the best advice and help them troubleshoot any problem's they're having.

I'll get the ball rolling here:
Q#1: I got a pair of Koss KSC75 headphones after my Sony MDR-Q55SL phones crapped out. They have good bass, but the treble is muted (meaning it's there but it doesn't sound loud). I can use the equalizer and bass/treble settings on Windows, but with my Sony D-NE710 there is no such setting. Is there any cheap ($15 or less) device that I can get that will boost the treble of my CD/Mp3 player?

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Originally Posted by www.sega.co.jp

Q#1: I got a pair of Koss KSC75 headphones after my Sony MDR-Q55SL phones crapped out. They have good bass, but the treble is muted (meaning it's there but it doesn't sound loud). I can use the equalizer and bass/treble settings on Windows, but with my Sony D-NE710 there is no such setting. Is there any cheap ($15 or less) device that I can get that will boost the treble of my CD/Mp3 player?

Ok the first part of your question confuses me.
Is it your crapped out Sony MDR-Q55SL or the Koss KSC75 earphone that's giving you sound problems?

Another thing, is the earphone doing this with any source its plugged into? Or only on your computer?

If its just the computer try going to: START > Control Panel > Sounds and Audio Devices > under 'volume' tab click 'advance' next to 'speaker settings' > under the 'speaker' tab use the drop-down list and select 'stereo headphones.' and hit ok.

That should fix the problem!

As for boosting treble with a external device, I can't help you there though I'm sure someone else will.

Most amazing jew boots

Originally Posted by Kairyu

Ok the first part of your question confuses me.
Is it your crapped out Sony MDR-Q55SL or the Koss KSC75 earphone that's giving you sound problems?

Another thing, is the earphone doing this with any source its plugged into? Or only on your computer?

If its just the computer try going to: START > Control Panel > Sounds and Audio Devices > under 'volume' tab click 'advance' next to 'speaker settings' > under the 'speaker' tab use the drop-down list and select 'stereo headphones.' and hit ok.

That should fix the problem!

As for boosting treble with a external device, I can't help you there though I'm sure someone else will.

The Sony phones are dead and the Koss one's are currently giving me crap with the treble. Sound on the PC is fine because I can tweak the treble, but my Sony CD/Mp3 player can't.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Hmm well it does appear to have a 60 ohm impedance.. But that's not enough to really make the earphone sound "quiet" in general while unamped.
Personally, it sounds to me like you bought a bad pair. Take them back and get it replaced if you can. I know they're not bad, infact they're very good for their price .

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Kairyu

Hmm well it does appear to have a 60 ohm impedance.. But that's not enough to really make the earphone sound "quiet" in general while unamped.
Personally, it sounds to me like you bought a bad pair. Take them back and get it replaced if you can. I know they're not bad, infact they're very good for their price .

It's actually part of the phones. If you read reviews by websites, most of them say the high notes are muted.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Ohh, I see. Then its more 'preference of sound' than a actual problem with the earphone. You made the problem sound like you could only hear the bass coming out of the earphone =p.

Well yes, the treble is a little weak. But what can you expect for a 15 dollar earphone? Technically the busted sony earphones might've sounded better to you with its louder sound (that had a 24 ohm impedance btw, which can be enough to affect the response of the sound.)

Anyway, the only thing you can do is turn up the volume (which I wouldn't recommend) or get a better earphone. There is also getting a portable amp but it would be silly to buy a 30 to 100 dollar amp for a 15 dollar earphone.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by Kairyu

Ohh, I see. Then its more 'preference of sound' than a actual problem with the earphone. You made the problem sound like you could only hear the bass coming out of the earphone =p.

Well yes, the treble is a little weak. But what can you expect for a 15 dollar earphone? Technically the busted sony earphones might've sounded better to you with its louder sound (that had a 24 ohm impedance btw, which can be enough to affect the response of the sound.)

Anyway, the only thing you can do is turn up the volume (which I wouldn't recommend) or get a better earphone. There is also getting a portable amp but it would be silly to buy a 30 to 100 dollar amp for a 15 dollar earphone.

Hoefully I'll be able to buy a digital music player that can boost treble, afterall a CD/Mp3 player can't hold much of my music anyways.

FELIPE NO

Huh? An MP3/CD player can hold every piece of music ever created. It just gets tiresome carrying CD's everywhere you go.

How ya doing, buddy?

Gots a prob you audiophiles might be able to help me with.

I recently raided my old hard drice and found a bunch of old Icewind Dale speechfiles for characters. I figured they might be useful (and some are quite funny). and since they were .wav files, opening them seemed like it would be easy.

No such luck. Winamp, Itunes, Quicktime, and Audion all refuse to play the files and don't recognize them as WAVs. Any ideas? I'll post a sample when I get onto my home machine, since each file is quite small.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by ArrowHead

Huh? An MP3/CD player can hold every piece of music ever created. It just gets tiresome carrying CD's everywhere you go.

It can only hold 700MB of music per CD (12 discs with mp3s @ 128kbps). I have well over 10GB of music, so I have to use CD-RWs to listen to music (I don't want to waste my CD-Rs).

Originally Posted by orion_mk3

Gots a prob you audiophiles might be able to help me with.

I recently raided my old hard drice and found a bunch of old Icewind Dale speechfiles for characters. I figured they might be useful (and some are quite funny). and since they were .wav files, opening them seemed like it would be easy.

No such luck. Winamp, Itunes, Quicktime, and Audion all refuse to play the files and don't recognize them as WAVs. Any ideas? I'll post a sample when I get onto my home machine, since each file is quite small.

They could be from a wav format your previous machine's Windows installation supported, but the current does not. It's most likely an ADPCM file or something like that. If you give me one of those samples I could analyze the file and see what format it's in.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Here's one of the troublesome WAVs. Any info you can wring out of them will be greatly appriciated.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by orion_mk3

Here's one of the troublesome WAVs. Any info you can wring out of them will be greatly appriciated.

According to Game Audio Player, your file is not a wav file, but a ACM file. Use Game Audio Player to playback and convert your ACM file into a wav file. When you run the program, click on the playlist icon (to the right of the Play, Stop, and Track/seeking buttons). Then press Alt+F to scan an individual file or Alt+X to scan an entire directory.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by www.sega.co.jp

According to Game Audio Player, your file is not a wav file, but a ACM file. Use Game Audio Player to playback and convert your ACM file into a wav file. When you run the program, click on the playlist icon (to the right of the Play, Stop, and Track/seeking buttons). Then press Alt+F to scan an individual file or Alt+X to scan an entire directory.

An ACM, eh? Figures. I was converting all the Icewind Dale music on my HD from ACM to WAV when I found the files in the first place!

Thanks for the info though. I wonder why it's got the .wav tag (which it had in the game directory) rather than .acm? Oh well.

EDIT: You don't happen to know of an app for OSX that can do the job, do you? It would save me a step and a half or so

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by orion_mk3

An ACM, eh? Figures. I was converting all the Icewind Dale music on my HD from ACM to WAV when I found the files in the first place!

Thanks for the info though. I wonder why it's got the .wav tag (which it had in the game directory) rather than .acm? Oh well.

EDIT: You don't happen to know of an app for OSX that can do the job, do you? It would save me a step and a half or so

Unfortunately I don't, but even having a convoluted long process is better than nothing.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I've noticed that some sets of MINIGSF and GSF soundtracks are at a low volume when played. So when I go to use Winamp to encode it to WAV or MP3, the volume is still horribly low.

How can I fix this? All of the Sonic Advance sets have this problem as well as some of the Mega Man Battle Network sets.

How ya doing, buddy?

I read somewhere that using EAC (esp. the Test + copy function) will wear your drives out much quicker than normal cd ripping programs. Someone said they ripped about 100 cds (on a new drive) then the drive crapped out. My question is, what's the life expectancy for cheap to mid-priced drives that use EAC on a daily basis (I rip about 5 cds a day)? Also will I notice a deterioration in the quality of my rips as the drives begin to wear out. Also, I've noticed in the past (When using other Cd extracting programs like EZCDDAX) that if I rip a large amount of cds in a short period of time they have audible flaws (such as pops/skips). Can this happen while using EAC and the CRC check reports no errors after I've ripped a few Cds. One more question I have is: Do you have any idea why I would tend to get a high number of SYNC. errors during cd extraction for the last track of each CD. It never occurs anywhere else, just the last track. When this happens I re rip the last track using Burst mode... no errors occur. Have any idea why I'm experiencing this problem? Thanks in advance.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by sofronitsky

I read somewhere that using EAC (esp. the Test + copy function) will wear your drives out much quicker than normal cd ripping programs. Someone said they ripped about 100 cds (on a new drive) then the drive crapped out. My question is, what's the life expectancy for cheap to mid-priced drives that use EAC on a daily basis (I rip about 5 cds a day)? Also will I notice a deterioration in the quality of my rips as the drives begin to wear out. Also, I've noticed in the past (When using other Cd extracting programs like EZCDDAX) that if I rip a large amount of cds in a short period of time they have audible flaws (such as pops/skips). Can this happen while using EAC and the CRC check reports no errors after I've ripped a few Cds. One more question I have is: Do you have any idea why I would tend to get a high number of SYNC. errors during cd extraction for the last track of each CD. It never occurs anywhere else, just the last track. When this happens I re rip the last track using Burst mode... no errors occur. Have any idea why I'm experiencing this problem? Thanks in advance.

EAC could cause wear by the excessive CD-ROM use that bad CDs can cause. The constant re-reading of the same sector can wear out the motors that look at different track position.
Tell me what CD-ROM drive you use and I could tell if your CD drive lacks important DAE related features. EAc tends to have some read errors near the end of a track, but for me that's only caused by Offset Correction. Your CD-ROM drive's make and model would be a big help in telling me what your drive can and cannot do.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Lady Miyomi

I've noticed that some sets of MINIGSF and GSF soundtracks are at a low volume when played. So when I go to use Winamp to encode it to WAV or MP3, the volume is still horribly low.

How can I fix this? All of the Sonic Advance sets have this problem as well as some of the Mega Man Battle Network sets.

Use foobar2000 and replaygain the files before diskwriting/encoding to WAV/MP3.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by www.sega.co.jp

EAC could cause wear by the excessive CD-ROM use that bad CDs can cause. The constant re-reading of the same sector can wear out the motors that look at different track position.
Tell me what CD-ROM drive you use and I could tell if your CD drive lacks important DAE related features. EAc tends to have some read errors near the end of a track, but for me that's only caused by Offset Correction. Your CD-ROM drive's make and model would be a big help in telling me what your drive can and cannot do.

I use two crappy Lite-On Drive
s: The DVDRW - SOHW-1693S and
The CDRW - SOHR - 5239V


Does the quality of the cd/DVD drive used for the extraction have any effect on the quality of the rip???

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Yes. But as long as the CD was in decent condition and not copy-protected, the differences between a rip from a good drive and from a lousy drive should be inaudible.

How ya doing, buddy?

Can you suggest some good mid-priced CDR Drives (Internal). I think I'm going to lose the Lite-On... I think it may crap out on me soon, and I can't stand the noise (it's as loud as a vacuum cleaner). Thanks again!

I was speaking idiomatically.

Well, that question would best be answered at the CDFreaks forum.

In my opinion, optical drives are such small investments that you might as well always go with the best available to you.

For instance, check out the Plextor PX-716A (DVD±R/RW/DL) and the Plextor 52/32/52A.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I'd in invesr in two drives, one for reading (DVD/CD-ROM) and one for writing (DVD+-RW or CD-RW). My Sony DDU-1613 has always served me well and has damn near perfect DAE (it's dirt cheap too).

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by ArrowHead

Use foobar2000 and replaygain the files before diskwriting/encoding to WAV/MP3.

What is replaygain and how do I use it? I haven't heard of the other program either.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by Lady Miyomi

I've noticed that some sets of MINIGSF and GSF soundtracks are at a low volume when played. So when I go to use Winamp to encode it to WAV or MP3, the volume is still horribly low.

Same here, I thought it was just normal that one of the soundtracks I ripped had a low volume... guess not.

I'll have to try out Arrowhead's suggestion sometime and see what comes out of it.

Jam it back in, in the dark.