Well ... he did say "Audio levels" in the subject line.
If you know what broadcaster you are aiming at, the best ting is to ask them how they want their audio levels. Otherwise there's been a thread here recently debating what is standard and what is not. Do a search.
Tor

<there's been a thread here recently debating what is standard >

There should be no debate. www.atsc.org answers these questions very clearly. You can only read 2 white papers without subscribing to their fees, but well worth the time.

stupid stupid STUPID me! I read the title, the message talked about levels, i thought video levels. :)

When you play back your audio, you want to get as close to the 0db level without clipping. But.... if you are recording onto a device that has independant input volume control, then you need to watch those controls too. When I do DVD's, this is what I do (0db). I leave all the volume amplification up to the TV or amplifier.

A seperate mixer hooked up from your computer to playback device wouldn't be a bad idea. Then you could monitor what you computer is actuatly putting out through the sound card.

>When you play back your audio, you want to get as close to the 0db level without clipping.

One thing that is missing from Vegas is a small field in the level pane that shows you the maximum level of the entire clip. Its a PITA to have to play the entire clip to find it.

And then, of course, it would be nice to have another option to auto-adjust the level to normalize the maximum value to some specified level. Although it would be trivial simply to adjust the level manually, since the math isn't too difficult :-)

The normalize option in the edit menu doesn't cut it: (1) Way back in my early days of use I found I was still getting clipping after using it - I had some pops that remained in the red. So nowadays I don't even bother with it. (2) AFAIK, the normalize is pre-effect, but we need it to be post-effect.

The graphic dynamics filter will output its result withing specified limits. You could set it to very little effect and still have the outcome boosted (or reduced) automatically to below .1 dB. But to add a little compression is a good thing for most tracks in a video mix anyway. Try it, and play with the response time as well as the dBs, to fine-tune the effect.
Sound Forge will analyse any track for loudness without playing it, but that means you must render first.
Tor

why over on the Pro tools post forums does everyone say -9 to -12 db is the standard in post

-9 to -12......hmmmm......a variable number. Standard? Standards aren't variable. The reason they toss the numbers around, and it's more like -8 to -18, is because there used to be no standards organization that set the standard. In audio for CD, there is no standard. In audio for video, the ATSC set the standard. Hence my link in the above post. you can also read the article I referenced.