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crunchy distorted sound? Ack.
Hi, I have a "free" account currently which I gather you do not support, as you might the "pro" accounts. However, I'm testing Soundcloud to see if I want a pro account and I'd like to figure out this problem.
I've posted a file called "Might Be Robots" to my account, and the bass at the start is just crunched and distorted, as is much of the rest of the song. It's not like this on the file when I play it from my computer or even when I download the original from Soundcloud. I've uploaded three versions to see if it was in the encoding. The first is a 48k 24-bit AIF file. The other two are MP3 files. They all sound pretty bad, but oddly the 128k MP3 sounds the closest to the original file. That is, at 128 that bass sounds a bit crunchy even on my hard drive, but at least it's close. The original AIF version on Soundcloud sounds awful -- worse than the 128k MP3 even. Can you tell me what's going on with this and how to fix it?
The files:
http://soundcloud.com/dance-robot-dance
Thanks
Brian
I've posted a file called "Might Be Robots" to my account, and the bass at the start is just crunched and distorted, as is much of the rest of the song. It's not like this on the file when I play it from my computer or even when I download the original from Soundcloud. I've uploaded three versions to see if it was in the encoding. The first is a 48k 24-bit AIF file. The other two are MP3 files. They all sound pretty bad, but oddly the 128k MP3 sounds the closest to the original file. That is, at 128 that bass sounds a bit crunchy even on my hard drive, but at least it's close. The original AIF version on Soundcloud sounds awful -- worse than the 128k MP3 even. Can you tell me what's going on with this and how to fix it?
The files:
http://soundcloud.com/dance-robot-dance
Thanks
Brian
I’m confused
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My (unqualified) guess is that Soundbooth is doing the normalization and a bit of compression/easy-mode mastering, on the files prior to encoding them. This could change the shape of the bass just enough to avoid the artifacts that we're hearing.
I've tried all combinations of source material encodings from 48khz 32bit floating point to 44.1khz 16bit little endian but it all boiled down to our MP3 encoder.
The best I can do for you is to make a custom encoding with the lower quality settings, which should make your MP3 tracks sound better than our higher quality settings.
If you remove the tracks you don't wish to host up on SoundCloud, I'll re-encode the remaining ones in your profile, and give you back your credits for the removed tracks.
Hope this works out for you. I'll post here when the encodings are finished so you can give them a listen.
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this solves the problem
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Inappropriate?Hey Brian,
I'm looking into your transcoding problems and indeed it seems strange. We're using a high quality MP3 encoding, and when we pipe your original AIFF through the high quality encoding, we get the crunchy sound. When we lower the quality of the MP3 encoding, the crunchiness goes away... but then we get more of the traditional MP3 artifacts.
What tool did you use to encode the MP3s you uploaded (the 320 and 128 kbps files)? It sounds like the 320 version is a bit louder than your original and that effect may be shaping the sound in a way to prevent the crunchy artifacts.
I’m persistent
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Inappropriate?Hi Sean
I used Adobe's Soundbooth CS3 for both of the MP3s. I noticed that the same thing happens in Bandcamp's encoding as well, by the way.
Would any variations in the original help or hurt things? That is, 44.1k rather than 48? 32-bit or 16-bit rather than 24? WAV vs AIF? What seems to get the best results?
In addition, I've created two variations with more of an analogish bass rather than that digital wave (though I like the original better). I'm curious as to whether this will make any difference. Will these count against my 5 uploads to test them? -
Inappropriate?My (unqualified) guess is that Soundbooth is doing the normalization and a bit of compression/easy-mode mastering, on the files prior to encoding them. This could change the shape of the bass just enough to avoid the artifacts that we're hearing.
I've tried all combinations of source material encodings from 48khz 32bit floating point to 44.1khz 16bit little endian but it all boiled down to our MP3 encoder.
The best I can do for you is to make a custom encoding with the lower quality settings, which should make your MP3 tracks sound better than our higher quality settings.
If you remove the tracks you don't wish to host up on SoundCloud, I'll re-encode the remaining ones in your profile, and give you back your credits for the removed tracks.
Hope this works out for you. I'll post here when the encodings are finished so you can give them a listen.
The company says
this solves the problem
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Inappropriate?Okee dokee.
By this afternoon sometime, I'll have removed the offending file as well as the test MP3s and post a new clean AIF. Then you do whatever magic you want on it. See if you know this: when I export the file out of Ableton, I have the choice to normalize it as it renders. Do you think this will make any difference, or generally speaking is it a good idea? I've always defaulted 'yes' but maybe I shouldn't.
Anyway, I'll post here when I've sent the new one.1 Comment Add a comment
This solves the problem
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on the normalization question: working with digital sound, one should always minimize the amount of processing on the audio as each pass has an impact on audio quality. thus you should always turn off normalization when you can. -
Inappropriate?Just got your second post. I'm not at the good-sounding computer and this laptop's speakers are, well, you know. I'll update when I get to the studio. Thanks for the effort. Stay tuned.
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Inappropriate?Hey Sean
I posted a new version of that tune which sounds good. It's a 24-bit 48k AIF file. I discovered upon examining the original patch in Operator (Ableton) that the square waves and the saw waves that I used to make the bass were exTREMely rich in harmonics. Like Sq32 and Sw32 rich. So I knocked them all down to 4, boosted the filter frequency and voila.
If you don't mind, try the regular high quality encoding on the file and see how that sounds. Right now it's nice, however, so I'm happy. I'd just like to hear the difference, or hear from you that all is well.
Count me pleased. I'll be paying my nine euros monthly. Thanks.
I’m pleased and harmonically stable.
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This reply was removed on 01/07/09.
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