Audio level woes

[Ansigod]

Hey fellow MURCers - I need your infinite wisdom. To start, here's my specs:

Marvel G400-TV
P3-500
128mb PC100 ram
SoundBlaster PCI128

I'm having mucho problems with the audio settings for capturing video from a VCR. I got all my stuff hooked up right but my recorded audio levels are WAY too low. The picture is great, but the audio is barely there. Any help out there for good audio level settings?

[Fred H]

Bypass the BOB. It definitely helps.
Look out with LineIN to LineOUT interference (the one of them have to be turned down, with the volume controll)
Sometimes the BOB even switches faulty audio which influences the video too.

[Ansigod]

Thanks Fred - I'll give that a shot for sure. Oops - this RCA plug doesn't fit too well in the 1/8" minijack :P Hm, I think I have a stereo-RCA-to-mini Y cable somewhere here and some female-female couplers too. We'll see how this works.

BTW, my Volume Control levels have bars for "Wave," "Auxiliary," and "TV Tuner." The Tuner control doesn't seem to do anything at all. Is this used for anything?

[fluggo99]

"TV Tuner" is more than likely an internal connection to your sound card. If you had a TV Tuner card in your system, you would connect it directly to your sound card that way. But the G400 doesn't work that way, so it probably doesn't do a blasted thing and you should mute it. I doubt Auxiliary does anything either.

If you haven't done this already, go into the Volume Controls, choose Options->Properties, and in the list box at the bottom place a checkmark next to every item. When you click OK, you'll see every playback volume control you have. Might want to play with them some more if that's the case. The input from your source would be under Line-In.

[Ansigod]

Thanks Fluggo99. I never thought of that - I used to have a Millenium G200 and a Rainbow Runner partnership (and a V2 card) in my machine before I got the Marvel G400. That's quite probably it.

I sure wish I'd realized that the RR G-series worked with the other G400 cards (I would have gotten a G400max or something with dual CRT support). But this LSX Transcoder is pretty good for the bundle.

[Ansigod]

PS. "Auxiliary" is what the machine had decided to label "Line In" as. That's what my BoB is connected to.

[fluggo99]

Yeah-- some cards are weird that way.

Anywho, as far as your original problem, there are the Recording controls, accessible thru Options->Properties, Adjust volume for: Recording. That'll change how your card records the digital audio; it doesn't affect what you hear while you're recording it, though.

Like I said to someone on another thread, you might want to take some time out and do audio-only editing to get a feel for how your sound card works. Not all sound cards were created equal Did it for four years before trying to edit video, and from the number of audio-related problems listed on this forum, I think it made a world of difference.

[Ansigod]

heh, actually I'm just getting into video editing. Before very recently I used this machine primarily for CD mastering (red book) and graphics design. Heck, I'm pretty proficient in digital recording (I only buy vinyl LPs, record them and burn CDs of them to listen to in the car). This is a big part of what's got me so irked about this stupid audio problem while video capturing.

I tried bypassing the BoB and going for direct input but still, the audio was a bit low. I'm starting to wonder if it's a Matrox Remote problem...

In the meantime I've found a slight temporary (I hope!) fix - I've taken to opening the AVI file in SoundForge and playing with the audio just like I'm accustomed to doing. I just wish I could get a good capture the first time around...

[fluggo99]

Hmmm... Matrox Remote uses your sound card's volume levels same as any other program... Perhaps you should leave the Windows mixer open as you start up PC-VCR and see what it fools with in your controls. (The Windows mixer is automatically updated whenever another program fiddles with the settings.)

I hate it when programs mess with my volume controls! RealPlayer gave me headaches over that.

[SteveR]

Does your VCR have a volume control (on the remote maybe)? This could be affecting the levels on the audio ouput from the VCR, in which case turning the VCR volume up should fix the problem.

[Ansigod]

I'll try that Fluggo. See if anything changes. However, inside the PC-VCR remote settings I have the capture levels set pretty high and it still captures low. Argh. The Recording levels are set high for my Aux line-in too (outside of the prog). I'll try some more settings soon to see if the Remote alters my Volume Control for the worse.

SteveR, my lame-ass VCR doesn't have any kind of volume control (mechanical or electronic). It outputs audio just fine to a standard television though. Man, this is really frustrating.

[paulw]

I have just installed a Vibra 128 PCI and noticed simalar problems. I found that the usuall Windozs mixer would not work and I had to install the Creative mixer that came on the driver CD. This has an extra window for a recording mixer and a seperate one for play back. If you have that mixer installed have a look in that area.

[Fred H]

If the bypassing of the BOB doesn't help, you can use your stereo amplifier (why not) to get even 100 W hi qual audio out to the VCR or inversely to capture.
I just working to construct a break box to switch bw. the VCR and my stereo amplifier.
Some soldering work is needed. I plan to post a diagram and photo, but not before the midle of june

[This message has been edited by Fred H (edited 24 May 2000).]

[mikiem]

Hi

Somehwere in all the docs for the marvel g400 they specify using the audio line out jack as well as the speaker out jack, the latter with a note that the bob requires a slightly amplified signal.

In either case, the main volume setting, & the one for wave files both control the output levels going to a recording vcr for example.

What I found was that using the line out jack I got good quality sound, but at very low recording levels. The speaker out jack on the other hand, gave me decent levels, but lower quality that tended to clip quite a bit -- this shouldn't be the case with a better sound card.

The ideal solution seems to be a cheap Radioshack audio mixer, which boosts levels from the line out jack just enough, though I still have to set the main & wave file volume settings near the max when recording to my vcr. Of course, one of the reasons it's ideal is I've got one sitting here, but at any rate, wanted to suggest a mixer (which are cheap and plentiful) as an alternative.

mikie

[Ansigod]

Okay, this is a bit convoluted, but it pretty much works...

I found out how to get a listenable audio level duing a capture. I have the record/playback levels set WAY high (they're linked, apparently) and I keep the master volume at the standard mid-point (see image linked).
http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~bpmccal/volume.jpg

This gets me a decent captured file, but while the capturing is in-process the sound output to my receiver is REDICULOUSLY HIGH! My EQ meter is way in the red at all bands and the sound is clipped and nasty. I generally turn off my receiver while capturing as this cannot be good for the devices involved. Probably not too good for my sound card either....

The thing about it is, though, the captured sound isn't all crummy and clipped and distorted like the output to my speakers is during the capture. Probably the fault of the linked Aux levels (they're probably doubling the output - 1x input + 1x amplified output = bad for devices).

Anybody experiencing these probs, please check this configuration out and see if you can reproduce the results I have.

[This message has been edited by Ansigod (edited 24 May 2000).]