Stereo Tool

Hi Hans, wouldn't it be possible to use builld numbers in your download?
Maybe just use the date or something.

Update!

Luke, I've added the date (20090307) to the title of the About box...

Further changes:
- Trumpet problem "more or less" resolved. Most of the time the trumpets sound a lot better now, with (as far as I've seen until now) no effect on other sounds.
- Changed the FM Loud presets a bit: They are now a bit softer but sound a lot better.

Garfield, can you give some feedback about the trumpets?

Update 20090308:
- Loudness handles loud "S" sounds much better than before. The rest of the sound was pushed down far too much in previous versions. In this version, loud highs are reduced a bit (about 1 dB).
- Loudness slider can now be set up to "4.00" instead of "3.00".

Hello hans , i have yet the problem, but it's strange because with this song ,i have distortion too on breakaway live

Ok, I thought it sounded a lot better now but apparently it doesn't really... The fact that different programs give the same problem makes sense: Trumpet sounds are very difficult to make louder without introducing artifacts. (Well, at least the ones in this song are). If you view them in a wave editor you'll see what I mean (most constant sounds remain continuously at the same level. But these trumpets contain huge spikes, up to 3-4 times their base level.)

I'll make another change: If trumpets are present, I'll make them a bit softer. That should sound better.

(Actually, I was already making them softer, but afterwards I made them louder again to compensate for that. I'll remove the compensation, so in case there are sounds like these trumpets they'll be made softer.

Update 20090309
- Further improved the handling of "S" sounds. The resulting sound is much more stable now, but some sounds have more artifacts than before (I'm actually boosting the sounds before entering the Loudness filter if I know that they will be reduced too much). The output is also a bit louder due to this.
- Replaced the "HARD LIMIT" clipping algorithm by one that causes less distortion and pumping. The output is also slightly (about 0.1 dB) louder.

Hans,

The Hard Limit is sounding allot better now! Also the high's are great!

Great work!

/Martijn

Update 20090311

- Highs: The artifacts that were caused by the improved processing of high frequencies should be removed now. The highs may push the other sounds down a bit more again. (It seems that increasing the value of the "limit output" slider in the multiband compressor panel improves this a bit. I'll look into this later. If it doesn't help, I'll re-introduce the Final Pre Limiter from version 3.40 for very loud high frequencies only.) The highs are also a bit louder and cleaner.
- Besides the FM Loud (Europe/US) presets, now also the FM Hot (Europe/US) presets have been updated for the new processing. (For Europe I will reduce the highs a bit in the next version). This setting doesn't sound too good - but some commercial stations sound like this too, and it's really really really (yes really!) loud.

Update 20090315

- Small overall quality improvement (sound is cleaner).
- Slightly improved the handling of "S" sounds.
- Highs should sound cleaner (less "ringing" artifacts), this might in some cases introduce a minimal amount of extra distortion.

Update 20090320:

Some sounds with strong mid frequencies (especially strings etc.) caused annoying high frequency cracking/clicking sounds. This is now greatly reduced. The output level using the same settings is about 0.2 dB softer than in the previous version 20090315, but because the quality is improved you can use higher Loudness values now.

Note: The CPU load in this versions is higher than before, because I have added a number of extra filtering steps (only at High quality). I'll try to reduce it later.