Noise before even starting

samsome123 · 04-15-2012, 05:28 AM

hello,

i make a new track, arm the record button, and then monitor without anything connected!

i get a noise level when i max it all out as shown in the pic..

can i remove that somehow? is my laptop making that noise or what?

ivansc · 04-15-2012, 07:00 AM

looks like your noise floor IS pertty low - I am reading -42dB which seems unlikely, but it may just be the way I am interpreting your screenshot.
Are you still on that built-in soundcard?

bigwoody · 04-15-2012, 07:18 AM

Internal soundcards are really noisy. You might be able to get rid of some by opening up your soundcard preferences (on windows double click the little speaker icon), and then look under Options/Properties and select recording. You will get some controls in there that you could tweak.

Like ivan says, your best bet is to find an external interface (USB or Firewire).

samsome123 · 04-15-2012, 07:19 AM

well, i'm still on build in soundcard!

good soundcards remove it? completely?

danfuerth · 04-15-2012, 07:38 AM

Ya I gave up and got an external interface. I have a 4x4 USB and an Edirol FA101 10/10 firwire ( laptop has a TI based firwire bus card)

You can fool around in windows control panel/audio devices and chose your mic settings but you got tweek the volume a bit.

Also when you right click on the speaker icon lower bottom of your screen click "open volume control" choose your mic settings then click options and check the Record section

samsome123 · 04-15-2012, 07:43 AM

thanks a lot guys!

ivansc · 04-15-2012, 02:53 PM

And realistically, there is a signal to noise number quoted with even the best and most esoteric gear.

You wont ever get rid of ALL of the noise floor, but two things here -

IF it is low enough you wont hear it anyway after everything else is on top (unless you plan on doing quiet solo instrument recordings all teh time)

You will find that spending 500% more will eventually only reduce your noise floor by 0.00000000000000000000000001% (grin)

And you STILL wont hear it.

Music involves audio so listen with your ears not your eyes.

IF you can hear the noise all the time it is worth bothering doing something about it....