Stereo Tool

I was attempting to send this to Bojcha via PM, but it keeps telling me that file formats are not supported...

Anyway, this is for the latest beta versions. I'm not sure exactly what I'm doing with all the new sliders and whether or not something is bad and needs to be changed, so just looking for feedback...

General sound follows the previous Supersonic 4.3 preset. I've dropped phase rotation because I don't have the software to do the measurements, so I don't know if it is hurting or helping. I also am taking the Phase Linear highpass, again because I don't have something to measure phase distortion, and from what I'm reading, PL is preferred vs. NPL.

In theory, this preset should be in the -7 to -5.5 RMS range...

ok .. i'll try

Bojcha, please if you have the time then help me with your opinion about my BASE RMS preset collection, too:
viewtopic.php?p=12938#p12938

Not based on any feedback, but this is beta 4.

I've reduced loudness and increased the volume increase in Final Limiter to reach what sounds like about the same total output. I also made changes to soft limit and clipping levels in multiband in order to give slightly more 1.5K - 5K presense. The AGC has also been slightly tweaked to keep the 3rd band from dropping as much to keep the highs consistent and allow multiband to handle the ultimate total output across the upper spectrum.

Beta 5

Incorporating the changes to ST since Beta 4.

Since that's been such a long time, I really have no idea of how to summarize the changes. The preset is not for broadcasting (FM or streaming), and does not have the declipper enabled, as my system just doesn't have the processing power for that.

Beyond that, there are slight changes to the multiband center frequencies, a slight band 1+2 link, some vocal protection, and a higher constant tone peak detection (offset to the higher mids in MB). There are other changes here and there. The overall RMS level should be the same or slightly lower.

Areas that are certainly not "bad", but may still need a bit of tweaking are the AGC up/down and percentages settings, and maybe a little tweak to Noise Gate. Those are fairly minor, but require a lot of listening time.

Again, credit due to Bojcha for the idea about the multiband center frequencies.

Beta 6

Since it was included in the built-in presets, I enabled Advanced Extreme Highs Protection. Hans did that, as I don't have it enabled normally to save some CPU usage.

Other changes:

- Some soft limit and clipping changes in multiband.
- Slight increase in singleband limiter to catch a few more peaks.
- Reduction in Final Limiter volume increase from 1.20 to 1.10. Hans disabled this in the built-in preset. I'm using it because of still not being quite satisfied with vocals, and it helps. The reduction should cause less peak-clipping and maybe a slight RMS decrease.
- Changes to dirty bass and mids.
- Slight reduction of deep bass boost.
- Reduced very low clipping frequencies from 150-250 to 100-200 in an effort to give slightly more presense from 180-300ish.

There's going to be another version after this, labeled as a Release Candidate (RC).

I may have gone too far with vocals, because I'm not liking Paint It Black now, but I was listening to the monster-compressor preset for a while, so my hearing may have adjusted to that sound which is more subdued. Soooo, I'm heading for bed and will listen again later...

RC1

The vocals were a bit better after taking some time away and whatever the change in the latest ST beta was involving dirty mids.

Not a whole lot of difference here from Beta 6. Mainly I added more upper-mids / highs and bumped the bass settings in Loudness back up a bit.

If anyone is testing this, try it out on tracks with a lot of highs or a lot of percussion. I just finished listening to Van Halen - 1984 (the whole album), and it seems ok to me, but others may not like the zing...

Sounds great , nice punchy bass, and treble is great

Woeha! Just in time Will update the preset in Stereo Tool tonight....... And probably release it directly afterwards .