My boss recently purchased an iRiver hard drive player, and is loading up on music from a couple different sites. He's noticed, however, that track volumes change dramatically from track to track, even when downloaded from the same site and off the same original album.
Is there any way to equalize track volume over the span of his entire directory so he doesn't have to keep adjusting each time a new song begins, either on the hard drive of his computer or directly on an MP3 player?
(N.B. I'm likely going to have this same issue soon when he gives me my player for Christmas, whether its the iRiver he has now or the iPod that he's considering for me since I don't listen to FM radio)
Posted by Goody Scrivener (Member # 6742) on :
bumping now that I have my MP3 player Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
iTunes has equalizer capabilities which the iPod can use. I'd investigate the music jukebox software you use to control the playlists for your device; you might search for "equalizer" in the support section of its site.
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
I'm thinking about getting one for my husband. I keep reading about them and it makes my head hurt. What kind should I buy? I'm think about 256 MB with an expandable memory, which should be enough for him. Any suggestions? Ooh, Walmart is going to be getting a Rio 1.5 gig MP3 player for only $150. I don't think he'd download more than 375 songs.
Seriously, can you tell I have no idea what any of this means?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Heh .
If you want usability, its the iPod hands down. It routinely trounces other players in terms of people feeling comfortable with its UI in reviews and such.
What I'd suggest is asking some people about their music players (other than on hatrack, people whose music players you can physically handle). Ask them what problems they have -- does it take too long to do anything, in particular. Then handle the mp3 player and see what it feels like to do those operations, and think how much you'd do them. Make sure you try out an ipod or ipod mini .
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Okay, a) that assumes I know people with MP3 players and b) that I'd actually talk to them! What are you nuts? You talk to people? In real life? Weirdo.
Posted by raventh1 (Member # 3750) on :
The option if you aren't using iTunes is usually named "Normalize".
Posted by Goody Scrivener (Member # 6742) on :
I received a Dell DJ20 player for Christmas. 20 gig hard drive (and I currently have almost 5 gig saved on my computer's hard drive that hasn't yet been copied over, pending figuring out this volume thing). I like the controls much better than boss' iRiver. I haven't been hands-on with an iPod so I can't compare with the touchwheel thing they have on that.
Final price on mine, including a jamjacket (molded silicone sleeve), extended warranty and shipping, was $279 - less than a comparably sized iPod, I believe, although I could be wrong there. I've got a ton of expansion room (and most of my CD collection is already copied to my hard drive... don't even know why I keep physical discs anymore LOL) and this unit is comfortable and easy to use.
Now I'm off to look for these equalize or normalize functions!
Posted by narrativium (Member # 3230) on :
Goody, you should go to Dell DJ Site. It's a forum for DJ users. (It's not affiliated with Dell, as far as I know. And they're perfectly friendly, as long as you don't mention the iPod. )
Posted by Lime (Member # 1707) on :
As I understand it, usually the files are normalized when they are originally converted from source. I don't know if iTunes or the iPod support post-process normalization, but then the iPod's also got a bunch of post-process stuff that changes the tone and quality of the music - so why not?
Someone who has an iPod will have to correct me on that. I don't get to play with Vána's iPod mini that often.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
*opens up iTunes*
*looks at equalizer*
Yep, works.
I can even change the settings so it equalizes better for different kinds of music -- about 25 presets such as latin, acoustic, etc, and I can create my own.
edit to make clear: I can alter this for each of my songs, or the whole library, or whatever, and it can be done after importation (in fact, I don't see an option to alter it during importation).
[ December 27, 2004, 02:30 PM: Message edited by: fugu13 ]
Posted by Lime (Member # 1707) on :
Now that is very cool. Yet another reason for me to pine after an iPod of my own. Thanks for the confirmation, fugu!
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
I'm not an expert . . . I've resisted the urge to get an mp3 player because they are so expensive, and their batteries have such a short life and are so expensive to replace. But this week I discovered that my new pocket pc phone will play mp3 (and pretty much any other format except iTunes). w00000!
The only problem is I have iTunes on my desktop computer because of the whole Pepsi promotion, when I got about three dozen free songs. What I have to do to import the songs is burn them to a CD and then transfer them over. Lame.
So as soon as I can, I'm going out to buy a memory expansion card and some CDRWs.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Ic -- the format it won't handle is secured AAC, iTunes can handle songs in just about any format itself.
Posted by twinky (Member # 693) on :
"Importation?"
Posted by Icarus (Member # 3162) on :
fugu, right, but I'm talking about porting songs I downloaded from iTunes into my PocketPC. It really doesn't do me much good that iTunes can play mp3s . . . that's not the direction I'm going.
As I said, there is a solution. It's just a bit of a pain.
Posted by Elizabeth (Member # 5218) on :
Question: Why buy MP3 players when there are already downloading formats that are far superior? (SHN, FLAC, Bittorrent, etc)
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
SHN and FLAC both take up considerable space, and Bittorrent isn't an audio format.
WMA and AAC (really MP4 Audio) are both superior at similar file sizes, though.
Posted by Elizabeth (Member # 5218) on :
But won't they develop a player for these types of files soon?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
The iPod plays AAC, and there are several players that play WMA. Calling them MP3 players is more and more colloquial usage.
Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :
You are looking for an MP3 normalizer. There is a free one that I used about a year ago, but I can't find it anymore...
Posted by DarkWizard (Member # 6186) on :
Windows Media Player will also normalize the volume when it looks for media files.
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