[niels]

Have a B100 DA, and although I always tell people that ask about gain that it is insignificant it actually annoys me also....
I have lots of music on the harddrive, and dont know how this works really, because I cant get "smart gain" (even level on songs, especially useful on "random play") on the Squeezebox to work. But, I see that a file that has a gain of -10,5db plays louder than a -8,5db file. Some music is very low in level, and I just dont think it sounds good then. I know, ridiculous maybe..., but I guess the famous discussion about WAV sounding better than flac for instance is because WAV has more gain in the file.....
Anyway, on my cable box receiver I use analog audio out, and I guess this is around 2 volts, and it puts my volume normally around 09.00 on the Bryston. If I change to digital out from the box I get very low volume, and end up around 11.00 on the volume. And there is no way to adjust gain here.....
It seems silly if you hear a good song and then you have the volume at 14.00 and you begin to wonder if you bought a 5 watt amplifier....
Never really thought abut this, but I guess I just assumed that a digital stream out was a constant, but its not.
I would just like a general explanation as to how this works.

[Phil A]

I believe the std. gain is 0.75v

[Phil A]

This basically describes the problem I believe you are referencing: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

There have been many articles about it.  There was an article in Mix magazine a few years back where many of the top recording engineers addressed the problem.  I might have even posted it here (if you do a search of 'Mix' it might show up).

[Phil A]

Here is the Mix Magazine article:

http://mixonline.com/mag/audio_big_squeeze/

[Phil A]

Here's the actual specs:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SPDIF

[niels]

Only read the first link, but its definetely not the loudness war I am referring to. I am referring to the gain in the source, it determines the output of the D/A, and then again, the amplifier. I can adjust music files by ReplayGain I guess, but I cannot adjust the digital output of my Cable TV dekoder, its just low...
For instance, I downloaded a 24/96kHz "Lush Life" sample from the Audiophile Jazz Proloque Part 3 mentioned on this site. It provides a free sample of hi rez music. This file is then converted to flac because the iaff wouldnt play here. It has plenty volume, at 09.00 on the volume control its already at "my" level. I seriously doubt this file is a member of the loudness gang. This file sounds fantastic, and as said, has plenty gain.
I even ran the file in Audacity, to see how it was recorded, and there it performed just fine, no clipping or compression.

[niels]

Here is the file on "Lush Life" :


And to compare, Kylie Minoque, "Cant get it out of my head" :

[niels]

And, just to show that internet radio can do well, this is a shot from a 160 kbps internet radio transmission of an Emmylou Harris concert recorded 1975 in Birmingham, absolute peaks at -8,-10db, and average volume -24 to -26db. Nice.

[niels]

Sorry, dobbel post

[Phil A]

Some things are definitely recorded louder.  I am ripping stuff to a USB hard drive both for my Zune and for the home system and when I play them on the Zune in the car (I have not listened at home yet - hopefully in a few weeks I'll be done with the recording), some things are much louder.  In the old days when I put stuff on cassette, I was always very careful recording the levels and noticed back then there are recording that are just louder.  Dolby has technology (I think it is called Dolby Volume) I believe mainly designed for commercials on TV.  Those can get annoying too.

[denjo]

Anyway, on my cable box receiver I use analog audio out, and I guess this is around 2 volts, and it puts my volume normally around 09.00 on the Bryston. If I change to digital out from the box I get very low volume, and end up around 11.00 on the volume. And there is no way to adjust gain here.....

Hi niels

You described exactly what I am experiencing to a Tee! Like you, I use the analog out of my Cable TV - it sounds better than the digital out to the B100 DAC which as you say needs to be cranked up to beyond 12:00 for comparable levels. The differential volume can be quite annoying especially when you toggle between one source and another. With internet radio, I find that my volume is already quite loud with the B100 at about 8:30. For some strange reason, my analog tuner needs the B100 volume to be cranked up to about 10:00. I have to mentally remember the various settings when I switch from one source to another, otherwise the roof might come down!

Best Regards
Dennis

[niels]

Yes, so the digital output of a device is predetermined, like the cable TV box, which has very low output. I thought that all digital outputs had a certain level, but no.
That a music file has volume gain in its id tags I know about yes, and I will return with recipe to fix these tags.
Some amplifiers have adjustable analog inputs so that you can adjust the input sensitivity, this way all sources will have equal volume, so I guess this would have been a nice feature for digital inputs also.