Why Is It Important To Sample As Loud As Possible?

Hi overthere, I got 2 questions and someone might know the answer.

When I sample a loop or a sound of a bird, my brother tells me to sample it as loud as I can. Why is this? Isn’t it good enough to put it louder on the mix desk? Does a sound change when you resample it to maximum level?

Thanks in advance

I ain’t no specialist on the subject, but I know why I sample things loud.

Just try sampling it as quiet as possible and you’ll notice how static and noise and sh*t gets amplified along with your precious sample.
When you sample at highest volume you maximize the data you need compared to all the background interference and whatnot.

When it comes to digital recording it’s allways desirable to record as loud as possible to catch as much information as possible. The trick is to try to record at the same level as you plan to play the sample later. This is because you can try to keep the noise levels down during recording but if you record without caring about the surrounding noises they will be there aswell and also be louder when you rasie the levels afterwards. It’s allways better to “have to” lower the amp than “have to” raise it.

I don’t agree…

If you record digital you should record not to loud and not to soft.
Digital clipping is very bad!
And you can always put the volume up later.

And as loud as possible is something for analog recorders because of the noise.

sample at 16bit, but only use 1/256th of your headroom, then normalize to 100%, and it’s 8bit!

That is also true. A recording that peaks between -3 dB and -6 dB is ideal. I did not mean that one should aim to record everything around 0 dB. What I meant was that if a sound is going to play at around -12 dB then the best way is to try to record that sound at -12 dB in the beginning. The sound will then sound as much like the source as possible.

It’s all about keeping the signal to noise ratio as high as possible.

What about “render selection tot sample”? I always raise the volume before rendering, but I don’t know if this is necessary, it’s not really sampling or is it?

It’s indeed a way of sampling. In that case I guess it’s no problem since there is no outside noise inserted and it’s smart to do like you do and raise the volume before rendering since the render selection to sample lowers the amplitude of the outputted sample.

I think that if a sample is created with peaks between -6 and -3 dB from the beginning it will be a more true shadow of it’s original sound than if created with low amplitude and then boosted to between -6 and -3. At least that’s what I believe.

When resolution was low, like old cassetts or 8 or 12 bit digital it was advantegous to stay close to peak (avoiding clipping) but using 16 or even more so with 24 it’s less necessay. You have enough headroom and resolution to cover any kind of system noise. And internal DAW 32 bit - it’s a non issue. Avoiding clipping is still an issue…

Just my 2 cents.

Crank your pre-amp, then drop your soundcard line-in or mic-in (kill the boost) until you’re out of the red… at that point, if you’re still clipping, then turn down the preamp until you don’t clip when screaming into the mic/ pounding your guitar. This will assure that the sound coming into your computer has the least line noise possible, because you’ve effectively dropped the noise floor while still staying clear of clipping.

Your sound card/audio set up will suffer from an amount of background noise (generally a low level).
If you sample at a low level, you will turn up the noise when you increase the samples volume.

Also if you have a bunch of noisey samples all playing at the same time… . all that noise adds up in the mix (unless you are really lucky and all the noise by fluke cancels itself out)

And then… if you add certain effects to your sample, this can further exemplify the noise.

So, if you want to add noisey hiss, hum and digital artifacts to your sound, sampling quietly and cranking it up is deffinatly the way to go.

when you’re recording from an ANALOG external source like a synth or a mic through a preamp, you better record as loud as possible, without clipping of course … But i think renoise recorder indicates when your input is clipping anyway :P.

So recording not too loud to avoid clipping is not the way to go. Recording as loud as you can without clipping is the way to go. Digital clipping may be bad, but it’s what it is , digital. So either you clip either you don’t, and it’s generally easy to avoid it cause every decent recorder will tell you when you clip.

On the other hand it occurs very often to record not loud enough, and then if you raise it afterwards, you’re just raising your noise floor. You can use gate effects to pally that but this is more of a dirty fix, than a real solution.

Don’t underestimate this problem ! Recording on a consumer grade sound card (wich most of what we use is), in a consumer like environment, with AC power not isolated, preamp inside of your SC, etc… Can generate quite a bit of noise, and if you record several tracks, this may get even worse !

The problem is to calibrate the input. With a synth it’s ok cause you can easily get the maximum volume, and tune your gain accordingly. If you’re recording drums, it’s harder, cause drums peaks at very high SPL, and so can easily make your input clip ! Generally all live instruments have a VERY wide dynamic range, and that’s why if you do a lot of live recording, a decent analog compressor can be a good investment.

When you’re recording inside renoise, or from a digital source, you generally don’t care, except if you’re 80db down, where you can loose a bit of resolution.

This is on the technical side of things :D on the artistical side, a bit of noise can be trippy and enjoyable, depends on what music you’re doing

Could anyone please rephrase again? Maybe there’s still someone who doesn’t get it. :D

Not trying to dis anyone, I just find it funny.

In your signature, can you please explain what that thing inside the Renoise square is?? Is it a whale?

it’s a nose silly

Haha, you are right… “Smell the power”… far out :D

Also, it read RENOSE, not RENOISE ;D