Stereo Tool

Hello,

I'm looking for a preset wich would be the the best for a background audio.
I gues it be should something pretty hard processed - with not too much dynamic range left.... can u guys recomend something?

Thanks!

What is "background audio"?

Do you mean something that you listen to in the background while you do other things, or are you talking about a backing audio track for video production / TV?

Hi, sorry I was not specific enough.

As a bacground audio I ment something playing while you do other things.
Like for instance background audio in a store while you're shopping...

Thank you and BR

Now for the next question:

Are you meaning for yourself through headphones, or for customers through ceiling-mount speakers?

Damn I'm hard to understand...

I meant playling through ceilling mount speakers.

Well, in my opinion, and I could be wrong, as this is outside of my normal area, but in my opinion, I don't think that, as a customer, I'd be happy with a really loud sound while I'm shopping, in most instances. If it was a Metal / Punk / Grunge / Goth setting, even possibly Hip Hop / RnB, maybe, but for general shopping, I don't think I'd have it too loud.

At a former job, we had ceiling speakers and streamed muzak. It wasn't real loud, from what I remember, although that's been over 15 years ago now. What I distinctly remember was how irritating things got from October through December, with the incessant "Monster Mash" in October, and all the cheery-joy-joy-while-I-had-to-work-and-deal-with-often-rude-customers in November and December.

So, unless someone that knows more and/or knows better has an opinion, I'd check into the generic presets and not worry about the "web" presets, as the "web" presets are louder (although I suppose you could decrease the volume via a volume knob).

Something else is that it will depend on the quality / design of the speaker. If you just have a single-driver "full range", you'd probably want to adjust the highpass up and the lowpass down, probably to 80-100 HPF and 12-14K LPF. If you have better speakers, particularly if they have larger woofers with better surrounds, then probably 50-60 HPF / 16-18K LPF.

Thanks Brian for your input.

Well the idea is that this audio will be played in background - as quiet as it can be - just so you can hear it.
Actual absolute volume of the prcessed material is not an issue because we can always reduce or add it at the amp stage.
That way I was thinking - the more quiet audio - the more we should reduce dynamic range of the played material, so that most important parts of the audio will cut through - ergo much compression ... but then again I can be wrong.

Any ideas - which presets would be generaly pointing in this direction?

Definitely try some of the web presets, they use a clipping stage at the end which removes some louder transients. Just pick one of the presets on the top of the list; nearly all of them will give you a very constant audio level.

So just try out the presets from:
Bojcha - R-Type
down to
Wiele - Hard Solution 0.80

And pick the one that sounds best to you.

If you want even less dynamics left try the same presets from the FM section, they are typically louder than their web counterparts. You can turn the 'FM' section off to get a better sound.

I got to thinking about this while drifting off to sleep, and yeah, I agree that, if you are a registered user, the web presets would probably compress more.

That said though, I might be able to work something without using loudness...

...and the suggestions that Hans gave you are biased towards his newest development, which may or may not be better, depending on the type of computer being used for processing. The newer filters have a higher CPU load requirement for equivalent number of bands in multiband. The presets below Hard Solution use the older multiband, and generally use less CPU.

True, but the old MB also tends to increase volume differences in some cases, where the new one usually decreases them. And it sounds better