Red "over lights' all over PT mixer, but I hear no cracks or pops?? Red light fever

[Jules]

How much attention do you pay to the over lights??? I am always re setting them, its a bore...I watch out that the 'through plugin' levels never peak... I talking just the PT mixer here. Opinions / advice greatly apreciated as usual...I dont think I have heard a 'digital over' once despite all the warning lights.........

"max input" Jules

P.S. I do get it kinda snug to the endstops with soft limit on an Apogee converter! Is this bad? Do I get 50 lashed with a wet noodle?



[This message has been edited by Jules (edited February 10, 2000).]

[meshtheflesh]

I my memory serves me right, in the first 'sound quality' mega-thread, one of the digi guys (mike rockwell????) said that in the new mixer, there is like 30db of headroom built in like an analog console, so where you used to have to turn down each fader, now you can just turn down the clipping master. I have found this to be true in practice. Any one else remember this?

ps . this is more in regard to speers question, the individual track thing is stilla mystery to me.

[LarsRec]

I can't remember where I read it but I recall that Digi's red lights indicate a single clipped sample which is almost always inaudible.
I frequently transfer through an Apogee PSX-100 and it's set to indicate 4 clipped samples. If the material contains steep transients I can't hear 4 clipped samples either but if I look at the waveform at the sample level I find one of those little squiggles with a flat top.

If I'm transferring source material with no overs I just try to ignore the red lights and punch the F1 key whenever I get annoyed.

If I'm tracking to ProTools I get more superstitious and set levels to avoid them.

[mike connelly]

Honestly, the meters in PT just aren't that accurate - you can play the same bit of audio multiple times and get different readings on the meters. The meters have a particularly bad habit of only giving peaks when you have another window open and can't see them. (and no, this isn't a result of using plugins like reverb that may be slightly different each time)

Mike

[editor]

Hello Jules and the RLB's (red light boyz)

From PT version one the red lights have not meant diddly. A huge range of numbers have been the digital zero point in various versions of PT. I use the panasonic dat to reference where zero is.

e

[Arno Peeters]

Maybe it's a bit off topic here, but I had it happen on a AMIII, that if clipping would occur on say Audio 2, ALL meters would show reds. I thought it had to do with AMIII hardware, but it's still here with the 001...!

Did you ever see this happen ? On TDM ?

[Robert U]

I recorded some tracks in Logic and when transfering them to PT they started to show red at 0 db, a thing that never occured in the Logic interface....so I suppose that there must be some kind of headroom left.

------------------
Robert

[editor]

Arno,

It happens from AM 1 to PT 24/mix systems.......in digi's defense. There is no absolute zero level standard in the industry, think about it; how many dat machines and other digital gear measure zero at differing levels....-X=0 X can be a big variable. In CD manufacturing there is no digital zero standard, what clips at one plant is a bit low or hotter at another. Ever notice how the Maxim or L1 clip some convertors, especially older ones.....I warn clients that my CD's are hot and if they glitch on old style convertors, try it on a newer machine before buggin out.

;9 = my dog spot.

[DigiTechSupt]

You will get a red LED when there are three or more consecutive (sp?) samples at full code (the highest level before clipping) and/or the output is clipping (page 9 of the 888/24 installation guide). Full code as I understand it is within 98% of 0 db.

You are not necessarily clipping when you see the red lights but you are getting close. If in doubt use your ears and or take a look at the waveform to see if it is clipped.

Jon Connolly
Digidesign Product Specialist

[CCash]

Arno,

Hey brother. The AMIII bundle doesn't have a stereo mix fader, so to compensate, if your mix gets too hot, it'll just show up on all channels to let you know. Ever notice how you can have two tracks that won't hit red, then add another track, not even close to red, but all of a sudden all tracks "clip". The manual explains that compounding tracks react differently than using a Stereo bus. I dunno about the 001.