Synthesizer Sound Clipping

• Jul 13, 2017 - 00:34

Hello everyone,

I've been using MuseScore for a while now, and I've had some problems with the sound. After a fresh install, I noticed that the playback sound was much quieter than any other program on my computer; I'd have to increase the Windows volume quite a bit. Then I learned that you can increase the volume in the Synthesizer in MuseScore, which I promptly did. This was fine until the playback got to louder parts of a song (any song with any arrangement of instruments), at which point the sound began to crackle quite heavily on the louder notes. I took a look at the synthesizer again while a song was playing and I noticed that the glowing part volume bar that measures output was constantly at the very top. I assume the sound may be getting cut off somehow but I have no idea how to fix it. I've tried it with different soundfonts, but that didn't change anything. So I either have really quite playback or dubstep. Max volume that I can do on the synthesizer is about half (-40 dB) without it starting to crackle. I know next to nothing about sound stuff, so anyone got any ideas?

If it helps, I'm running MuseScore 2.1 on Windows 10.


Comments

If you pump up the volume in Synthesizer too much, clipping at the louder parts is to be expcted, and indeed -40db has be set as default for a reason

In reply to by tao123

Not setting the volume above a certain level is not something MuseScore specific. Take any random mp3, maximise your OS volume, your speaker volume and play it back (or if using VLC you can even pull up the VLC volume to 125%); clipping is nearly guaranteed.

You're basically asking to reduce the volume difference between ppp and fff so that you might hear the silent parts louder and the louder parts more quiet. In effect compressing the dynamic range.

The synthesizer in MuseScore has some compressor functionality, so you might get "better" results by playing with those settings.

Do you still have an unanswered question? Please log in first to post your question.