Rendering will not add any extra compression. Rendering will simply convert the file from 24 bit, 48k hz to 16 bit 44.1 k hz. You will need to do this if you want to burn the file to cd. I recently had a problem with a converted file previewing at high pitch after rendering, but it was due to my sound card being set to 48khz to match input from ADATs. Preview was fine after reseting audio card to proper settings.

If you are experiencing compression from resampling, then you are experiencing bad dither...

every time you resample you are running a dither algorithm, perhaps you could try doing the resampling in sound forge, I have always found its two channel audio capabilities to be quite impressive, if you own the waves plugins, load the waves dither algorithm, and then try again, perhaps that might make a difference...

Normalization is not compression. Dither has nothing to do with resampling. And, WHY, if the tracks were all done in Vegas, do you need to transfer them digitally and why do you need CD Architect or SoundForge? What has this world come to!? Why can't you just bring in the tracks into Vegas, put a dither plugin on the master (set to 16-bit) set the project to 16-bit/44.1kHz and burn away!? What other stuff is there to do? Why change gains and all that when it's already mastered? What you guys smoking? Obivously I'm missing something here...

>>Why can't you just bring in the tracks into Vegas, put a dither plugin on the master (set to 16-bit) set the project to 16-bit/44.1kHz and burn away!?<<

Agreed. All of my final mixes are done at 24/44.1 in Vegas. I burn ref discs by doing the above and I send the 24 bit file to the mastering engineer. If I'm doing my own mastering (which I rarely do), I apply whatever final compression and tweaks that are needed at 24 bit and insert the dither as the very last thing. I'll typically render a 16 bit file just for archiving but its really not mandatory.

drbam

Yes, using the project setting and master bus in Vegas is a perfectly good solution, though you'll want to make sure you pump up the resample quality in project props.

Should you wish for more manual control, I'd recommend rendering a 24/48 (or 24/96) mix, then...

1) Resample in Forge at the highest quality (with AA filter) to 44.1kHz
2) Use the Bit-Depth converter with desired dither and noise shaping settings to convert to 16-bit.
3) Save as 44.1/16 .wav (should be instantaneous in Forge 7.0+)
4) Assemble and/or burn in your burning app of choice.

J.

Dither has everything to do with resampling, Normalization is like hard limiting, you could put a dither plugin on the master bus, but some programs have better algorithms for the way they process audio.

and what sonic suggests should give you the desired results

wow dither and normalization must have new meanings now!?!? can you explain for us newbees please!? I thought dither was the addition of oise to lessen any artifacts when reducing bit-range, like from 24-bit to 16-bit, acting as a error correction device so that lower level signals will be audible below the lowest bit. And as for normalization, I always thought it was just the process of changing the gain so that the peak is at a particular level (ussually 0dBfs). If compression is being introduced is it not technically 'normalisation' but what people have grown to accept as RMS or Automatic Normalisation, which is another thing intirely!? Resampling is, or I thought so anyways, the process of going from one frequency-rate to another, like 48kHz to 44.1kHz and because of all the interpolation and filtering ussually going on that is why the change in sound. How dow dither relate to this? I'm curious, perhaps it's all just new trendy lingo bullshit, but even so I'd like to know what you think it means...

digitalelf

now that you have Vegas, you can create your CD in a different way, without CD architect.

1. output your final mix files (from Sound Forge or whatever) in 24/48 or whatever format you have.
In Vegas:
2. start a new project, and give it Audio properties 16/44.1 stereo (but in fact this doesn't matter)
3. locate the files with Vegas Explorer, select them, right click and choose Add to Media Pool.
4. in Media Pool, select the files (in the right order), right click the group and choose Add as CD Track. This will place them on the timeline as CD tracks, automatically inserting 2 second gaps.
5. hit Alt-3 to show the mixer.
6. in the Mixer, click on the Master FX icon, which will open the Plug-In Chooser - Master.
7. Select the Dither plug-in, Add, OK
8. In the Audio Plug-in window, Dither: select 16-bit, triangular, Equal loudness contour (or whatever you prefer).
(you should also disable the default track FX at this point, but it's not critical unless you have a very slow PC)
9. put blank CD in drive
10. Choose Tools, Burn CD, Disc-at-once Audio CD (or just click on the toolbar icon for this)
11. In Burn Disc-at-One Audio CD dialog:
- select drive and speed,
- select Burn CDs;
- un-check Render temporary image before burning (unless you have added plug-ins that will require render time, or your media is not a Wav file)
- click OK
12. CD is burned. You're done.

The points are: you don't need CD Architect anymore, and you don't need to create 16/44.1 wav files. Vegas will burn direct from 24/48 (resample/render on the fly), unless you have a slow machine of course. If in doubt, run "Test first, then burn CDs" in step 11.

If you need to set individual levels for the tracks before burning, add the tracks one at a time in step 4, but insert a new track on the timeline before adding each wav file as CD track. This will put each file in separate tracks (in stair-step fashion with each track following the previous one in time but on the next lower Vegas track). You can then adjust the trim volume of each track to get levels that match. You could also add individual "mastering" plug-ins to each track if necessary. But then you would have to "Render temporary image before burning" in step 11.

Nonetheless, you can skip rendering 16/44.1 wav files, unless you really need them for something else.

Does anybody else have suggestions to improve this workflow. I've only done a couple CDs, but this seems to be fairly efficient.

Douglas

"wow dither and normalization must have new meanings now!?!? can you explain for us newbees please!? I thought dither was the addition of oise to lessen any artifacts when reducing bit-range, like from 24-bit to 16-bit, acting as a error correction device so that lower level signals will be audible below the lowest bit."

I'd say that if you try to render something and it doesn't sound right, it might be due to artifacts or errors.

"Normalizing a peak to 0 dB is OK, but normalizing RMS to anything above -6 dB can compromise sound quality." - (sound forge help file). I guess every time I normalized I was normalizing RMS, and I applied dynamic compression, if you are normalizing peak, then compression is less of an issue. When you normalize the ultimate goal is to preserve the dynamic ratio's correct? is that not similar to compression, because it sure sound similar,

"if you want to burn a 24-bit audio file to an audio CD, dithering will produce a cleaner signal than a simple bit-depth conversion." -( also from the sound forge help file).

help files are often under appreciated...

you might be interested in "Principles of Digital Audio" by Ken C. Pohlmann

"When you normalize the ultimate goal is to preserve the dynamic ratio's correct? is that not similar to compression, because it sure sound similar,"

Actually, it's not similar to compression.

-jb

In fact, "preserving the dynamic ratio" and "compression" are almost completely antithetical to each other!

While you are at it look up compression I think that might help you better understand what you are talking about.

My only interest is making sure you are not misinformed like so many others seem to be - not that it's their fault. But it helps to have everyone learning from the same set of definitions. Help files will tell you the basics, which is just fine and highly recommended.

Thanks for the response to my questions!

The 10 songs I spoke of are in Vegas. Someone asked why digitally transfer them there? I originally recorded them on a Mackie HDR24/96 hard disc recorder. I do not use Mackie's dsp, instead, I use Sony's, Sonic Foundry's and Waves plugins! I digitally transferred these 10 files together as "one large file" into Vegas, as I stated. I am new to Vegas 5, my previous work was centered around Vegas 2.0 and Sound Forge 5.0 as the editor. This also is the first time I have recorded a project in 24bit/48khz!

I am supposed to send 6 CD's to two radio stations, 3 CDs each to be used on the air. They asked for CDs not DVDs, that is why I need to convert the files to 16bit/44.1khz.

I did not normalize any of the tracks! What I mentioned initially was the setting I chose: IN VEGAS was render to 16bit/44.1khz stereo PCM wave format, I believe. After rendering, the file was somehow maximized. When I chose the "render to" format, I did not see a menu to change the settings within the choices given. Hopefully you better understand my questions.

I am out of town for a job now, but I will be back to the studio in another week and will try the suggestions you have given me, again Thanks!

Why do you feel the need to convert anything at all ?

Stick your "whatever sample-rate and bit-depth" files into CDA5, and burn away- it converts automatically. Dither is a default plug on the CDA5 master, but you can remove it and use whichever other dither plug you feel like, like that in Waves L2, or whatever.

CDA5s normalisation and dither and bit-reduction add no compression at all to the mix. Select 'best' for SRC quality where appropriate.

geoff

....So what was the original question here... ?

.... Oh Yeah.....


....Never mind....