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Topic: Burning CD-R for car stereo (Read 7659 times) previous topic - next topic
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Burning CD-R for car stereo

Hi there folks,

I'm new to the forum. I've got a few problems which hopefully you can help me solve. I'm not that techy with computers and I don't get all the fancy terms used, just know enough for a day-to-day basis. Please try and make your answers relatively simple.

I've got an AC/DC discography which I want to burn on seperate CD-Rs. My car stereo is similar to a stand-alone CD player, so it will only accept audio cds.

I use Burrrn to burn my flac music files at a speed of 8x. Now my main problems are the following:
1. I don't understand what ReplayGain is or what its settings do. Can you please explain the ReplayGain settings and how I should adjust them?
2. Should I even use ReplayGain at all?
3. The volume of the music is significantly low when played on the CD player, really have to crank it up a good amount.

I'm basically looking to achieve a high quality burn and high compatibility for my audio CD (with the available media and hardware I have). I want an increase in the volume of my music without losing sound quality.

I've gone through a lot of frustration and a lot of CDs (now useless) trying to achieve the proper results. Please, if you have any suggestions / advice on the topic of burning audio CDs, do let me know. Hopefully, the members here can help me end my frustration and I may finally be able to enjoy some good quality music.

Thanks in advance folks, looking forward to your answers.

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #1 –
ReplayGain is explained in the wiki.

Do you mind reaching for your volume knob after you start playing a CD and you realize that it is mastered much louder or softer than the last one you played? If you don't care, don't use ReplayGain. It's possible you do care, but not for this particular kind of music, in the car, on separate CDs.

Burrrn's ReplayGain feature scans and pre-processes the audio, using the Wavegain software, before burning it to disc. It estimates the perceived loudness and scales the audio, on either a per-track or per-album basis to a defined target which is about the level at which CDs tended to be mastered at in the late '80s. This level is a bit quieter than we're used to now—read up on loudness war and dynamic range compression.

In the main Burrrn window you set whether you want per-track or per-album adjustments (make all the tracks be the same volume, or make all the albums be the same volume while letting the tracks vary by however much they're supposed to). Album gain is probably what you want if all the tracks on the CD come from the same disc.

In the ReplayGain tab of the Settings window, you can set these things:
  • Additional gain (e.g. to boost the volume by a fixed amount, if the standard target volume is too low for you).
  • Whether to use a 6dB hard limiter (softens the loudest sounds a bit so they don't clip, if the gain adjustments result in a volume boost instead of a volume cut).
  • Whether to add dither: quiet, tape hiss-like noise to help mask the tiny but unpleasant effects of digital volume changes, and preserve in the noise those parts of the signal that would've otherwise disappeared in a volume drop.
  • Whether to use noise shaping, and what type (essentially an option to make the dither noise less noticeable).

If you use ReplayGain at all, I recommend just using Album Gain. Since you seem to be annoyed with the volume drop, try 6dB additional gain, no limiter, no dither. The reason for no limiter is because unless AC/DC has some ambient tracks or really quietly mastered CDs, all the tracks will have had their volume dropped by that amount or more, so there's no risk of clipping by boosting it back up by that amount. The reason for no dither is because there really aren't any "quiet parts" to AC/DC's music, and all the car noise will drown out anything quiet anyway, be it dither or the quantization noise that dither is intended to mask.

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #2 –
Hi there mjb2006,

Thanks for your thorough reply. The point where you mentioned dither rings a bell actually. You see, whenever I play the CD, after a while my the insides of my ears would start feeling sort of uncomfortable and irritated.

I noticed (on other occasions) when I'm using my headphones that there would be a very slight hissing noise in the background just before the song starts (so that's actually dither then!). I never payed much attention to that, thinking it was some feature. Using the headphones again today, I was able to listen to the same AC/DC songs for a few hours and feel perfectly comfortable. Thanks for pointing that out!

I'll add 6db of additional gain as well as dither. How much noise shaping would you suggest? Feeling sure it'll turn out well. Thanks for your help!

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #3 –
The noise caused by dither is at the least significant bit (~90dB below a full-scale signal).  If all you were listening to was dither (no other signal present) you have to be turned up very very very loud to hear it.

I think your problems are coming from someplace else.

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #4 –
Hmmm I see... still I'm sure I've found a solution to the very low volume. Will add 6db of additional gain and see how that works. Just to note, the volume was low even before I used ReplayGain, it was even lower after using ReplayGain. So will adding 6db really make a significant increase in volume??

Hey also, would there be anyone here who knows about car sound systems? I think the 2 aftermarket speakers I'm running in the front need to be run off an amplifier... I'm not sure. In my opinion, they sound OK, but could be better. Headunit puts out around 15 - 17 WRMS, speakers are rated at 30 RMS... should I be looking for an amplifier?

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #5 –
Please tell us more about your AC/DC discography.  Where did it come from?  AC/DC was remastered about 10 years ago with dynamic range compression and the titles are all very loud.  Burning copies with RG will make them quieter, but not much quieter than the AC/DC titles prior to the Sony remastering.  Have you tried playing any CDs manufactured in the 1980s?  How do they sound?

Before telling you that dither is likely not your problem, I should have said that RG is likely not your problem.

Before resorting to buying an amplifier, are you sure that your system was installed properly (e.g. speakers connected properly) and you aren't possibly having problems with the settings (e.g. the front/rear fader is not adjusted properly)?

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #6 –
I downloaded my AC/DC discography. Being here in Saudi Arabia, there is no law against piracy. Now that's interesting, remastered! I was sure that the original albums of 30 years ago were not as good quality as modern albums due to, well, out-dated recording equipment I guess. There is a big difference in sound when comparing their old and new albums.

The speakers are 2-way coaxial (I'm on a budget, don't want to spend too much). I am quite sure they are connected properly. I have the fader set to default. Balance  is set to max for bass, and 0 for treble. The guys here in my little town in Saudi were just able to wire up the speakers. They hardly know anything about amplifiers and installing whole sound systems, was lucky to even find these JVC speakers available. Everything else is a chinese imitation. I told them to reverse the polarities to make sure they were wired up correctly. Didn't use the wires or connectors that came with the speakers though, just the factory ones which the factory speakers were connected to. Would that hinder the sound quality??

This is basically how I can describe the sound from these speakers: More bass and treble than the standard speakers, but slightly quieter and "tinny" and not as crisp and clear.

http://www.ryda.com.au/JVC-CS-V626-6-Car-S...rs-p/csv626.htm
 

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #7 –
Quote from: tHe_sTiG on
will adding 6db really make a significant increase in volume?

+6dB is about double the amplitude, and is perceived as about a 50% increase in volume.

I don't think Burrrn tells you what changes it makes. You could scan your files to see what volume changes are actually being prescribed by ReplayGain, so you know what volume change Burrrn was doing and how much room you have to boost the signal without clipping. Drag the files for one album at a time into foobar2000's playlist window, make sure they're selected, then right-click, ReplayGain > Scan selection as single album. It'll give you a confirmation window (unless you disabled that setting) so you don't have to write tags to your files if you don't want to. There's no harm in writing the tags, though; they won't be used by Burrrn and they won't affect playback of the files unless you specifically configure a player to use them.

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #8 –
Hi guys,

I've burned one of the remastered AC/DC albums on a CD, tried it out in the car. Definetely an improvement over previous times! Louder sound, crisper than before and no more ear-aches!  Just 1 or 2 db up and it'll be perfect!

Burrrn shows a log that continuously updates throughout burning. It stated: "Recommended ReplayGain: -3db" (around that). I set the additional gain to 6db... does that mean I'm actually getting only 3db increase?

Thanks for your help guys!

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #9 –
Quote
I noticed (on other occasions) when I'm using my headphones that there would be a very slight hissing noise in the background just before the song starts...
Probably noise from the original analog tape!   

I'd avoid ReplayGain on the audio CDs  (although, I do use it with Winamp on my computer).  I'm sure the original CDs have plenty of volume, and the volume between songs on a particular album should already be well-matched. 

I think most people (like me) use ReplayGain when playing a bunch of random songs from random artists/albums on a portable player or computer.  All of the songs on a commercial CD should already be matched to each other, so you don't have to adjust the volume between songs.

...If you think about how ReplayGain works, it has to reduce the volume of most songs, especially the loud songs...  Many quiet-sounding songs have maximized (0dBFS) peaks.  Since the quiet songs can't be increased without clipping (distortion), the only way to match volume between songs is to reduce the loud songs. 

You can tweak ReplayGain so that it doesn't reduce volume so much, but then you are making different compromises (making ReplayGain do-nothing on most songs, compressing dynamic range, or introducing distortion, etc.)

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #11 –
If the CDs are indeed mastered properly and to the correct volume, then why is the volume very low when I play it in my CD player?? That's what prompted me to think that either:
  • There was something wrong with my burning method
  • The 2 aftermarket speakers in the front need an amplifier
If an amplifier is indeed needed, I'm not prepared to fork out a huge amount of money for that at the moment. That'll happen later on when I have the budget for it and 2 more premium speakers.

For the time being, the ReplayGain's indirect way of "volume-increasing" is doing the job  Could you guys let me know of any other good program which is meant to increase the volume without reducing sound quality??

Burning CD-R for car stereo

Reply #12 –
I'd say that new equipment is toned to because of new music being so loud, so when a person plays older music with good dynamic range they will not be able to achieve full volume.  The same thing happened playing older music through my iPhone into my car radio.  I was not able to achieve listening volume with old music, but new compressed music I could ramp up loud just fine.  I'd say if it's for car use just get the remastered albums.  There's no sense in lots of dynamic range in a noisy environment like a car.