Add 'Compressor' features from EQ app into main Poweramp Player

[Aller2TeaM]

Hello, Max!

What do you think about add "Replay gain preamp values to the effects page (where the stereo expand, balance, tempo, volume settings?

That can make access to RG easier, for example when there's a several albums requiring different RG preamp values.

I know, that there's an EQ preamp slider on EQ page, but RG preamp works different.

[andrewilley]

Your shouldn't ever need to change the RG preamp setting on a per-song / per-album basis. RG always aims to achieve the same peak level for all properly encoded music, and you can use the pre-amp setting to indicate what you would like that standard target level to be.

Andre

[Aller2TeaM]

6 hours ago, andrewilley said:

Your shouldn't ever need to change the RG preamp setting on a per-song / per-album basis. RG always aims to achieve the same peak level for all properly encoded music, and you can use the pre-amp setting to indicate what you would like that standard target level to be.

Andre

That's the point. Not all "properly encoded" music using by the most of users. What you mean is how it should be, in this - we'll agree, but this is not what we really have now. Most of music isn't "properly encoded". And in this, I'm pretty sure, most of users would agreed with me.

Edited July 21, 2021 by Aller2TeaM

[andrewilley]

2 minutes ago, Aller2TeaM said:

 Most of music isn't "properly encoded".

What I meant is that if an audio file does contain ReplayGain data, then its accurate peak level is stored and will be played so the peak level matches with any other track which contains RG data. So you don't need to adjust the preamp for each RG-containing track, that's what the RG data does automatically.

However if a track does not have any RG data, then the maximum peak level is unknown anyway and so can't be adjusted for. In that case the RG preamp level won't be used, the non-RG preamp value (if set) will take over.

So rather than trying to tweak the EQ/preamp setting for every track, just embed proper RG data in the first place - which can be done very quickly and easily as a batch task in something like foobar2000.

Andre

[John Titor]

On 7/22/2021 at 4:57 AM, andrewilley said:

So rather than trying to tweak the EQ/preamp setting for every track, just embed proper RG data in the first place - which can be done very quickly and easily as a batch task in something like foobar2000.

Well I think they are requesting that Poweramp would act like foobar2000 and automatically add replaygain value to each tracks. Or maybe a normalise feature/ACG.

[andrewilley]

@John Titor Could be, but the original post did seem to be asking about manually adjusting the preamp gain per file, rather than creating the actual embedded ReplayGain data which really requires more of a file editing/management tool instead of a pure music player. Even foobar2000 doesn't auto-embed ReplayGain data into music files, you need to request to scan the file(s) manually first and then click to Update the tags.

As you say, all of this is quite different from Normalise/AGC/Compressor functionality, which can adjust the output gain 'on the fly' during playback. It would be nice to have the Compressor feature from the stand-alone EQ app ported over into the main player app at some point too.

Andre 

[Aller2TeaM]

2 hours ago, andrewilley said:

@John Titor Could be, but the original post did seem to be asking about manually adjusting the preamp gain per file, rather than creating the actual embedded ReplayGain data which really requires more of a file editing/management tool instead of a pure music player. Even foobar2000 doesn't auto-embed ReplayGain data into music files, you need to request to scan the file(s) manually first and then click to Update the tags.

As you say, all of this is quite different from Normalise/AGC/Compressor functionality, which can adjust the output gain 'on the fly' during playback. It would be nice to have the Compressor feature from the stand-alone EQ app ported over into the main player app at some point too.

Andre 

Actually no, what I mean is to add only a RG preamp "encoders/valcoders" like a volume, balance, tempo, etc. have.
Pretty similar feature presents in Poweramp EQ, in compressor settings.

Speaking of... wouldn't the Poweramp Equalizer's compressor looking incredibly good in Poweramp Player?

[andrewilley]

Ah, we might be talking at cross-purposes here.

ReplayGain is not something that an audio player creates, it's a very specific term for a few bytes of embedded metadata that were saved inside an audio file during its creation or editing. This data merely indicates the maximum peak audio level that exists anywhere within that file.

So for example 'Track A' might have a loud bit that hits 100% digital volume, while 'Track B' may be much more conservatively recorded and peak at -20dB below that maximum level. When a player replays those files, it tries to match the peak levels so they both sound similar to the ear - for example to make them both peak at -10dB it would reproduce Track A about 10dB quieter, and Track B would be played about 10dB louder. That value would be applied to the whole track, so the dynamic range isn't affected and the entire track is made louder or quieter.

The 'Replay Gain Preamp' setting which you mentioned in your original post simply adjusts the player's overall target loudness. The original ReplayGain spec default is to process all files so they peak at -14dB, but I think PA may use a slightly louder target value by default. You can adjust that overall target level up or down using the RG Preamp control if you wish.
 

There are lots of other more dynamic level adjustment systems - such as Normalisation, Automatic Gain Control (AGC), Compressors, etc - which work 'on the fly'. They effectively listen to the music while it plays and decide "this section is a bit quiet, I'll turn the volume up a bit", and later there might be a very loud section for which they need to lower the volume. They basically continually adjust the volume so the dynamic range (the gap between the loudest and quietest sounds) is reduced. This process changes the musical range from that in the original recording, so purists may not like it, but it does make audio easier to hear in noisy environments.

The main PA music player app does not currently offer any of these on-the-fly level adjustment features, although as I said earlier the stand-alone EQ module does have a Compressor.

Andre

[Aller2TeaM]

1 hour ago, andrewilley said:

Ah, we might be talking at cross-purposes here.

ReplayGain is not something that an audio player creates, it's a very specific term for a few bytes of embedded metadata that were saved inside an audio file during its creation or editing. This data merely indicates the maximum peak audio level that exists anywhere within that file.

So for example 'Track A' might have a loud bit that hits 100% digital volume, while 'Track B' may be much more conservatively recorded and peak at -20dB below that maximum level. When a player replays those files, it tries to match the peak levels so they both sound similar to the ear - for example to make them both peak at -10dB it would reproduce Track A about 10dB quieter, and Track B would be played about 10dB louder. That value would be applied to the whole track, so the dynamic range isn't affected and the entire track is made louder or quieter.

The 'Replay Gain Preamp' setting which you mentioned in your original post simply adjusts the player's overall target loudness. The original ReplayGain spec default is to process all files so they peak at -14dB, but I think PA may use a slightly louder target value by default. You can adjust that overall target level up or down using the RG Preamp control if you wish.
 

There are lots of other more dynamic level adjustment systems - such as Normalisation, Automatic Gain Control (AGC), Compressors, etc - which work 'on the fly'. They effectively listen to the music while it plays and decide "this section is a bit quiet, I'll turn the volume up a bit", and later there might be a very loud section for which they need to lower the volume. They basically continually adjust the volume so the dynamic range (the gap between the loudest and quietest sounds) is reduced. This process changes the musical range from that in the original recording, so purists may not like it, but it does make audio easier to hear in noisy environments.

The main PA music player app does not currently offer any of these on-the-fly level adjustment features, although as I said earlier the stand-alone EQ module does have a Compressor.

Andre

Correct. Hmm, probably, I needed to name this topic aka "To port compressor features from EQ to Player"?

[Mspy1]

I have lots of albums which have no dynamic compression and their true 24bit 96kHz audio format has been retained during mixing and mastering process. Due to them having no dynamic compression, they are very low on volume (most of the time) and I don't really have a strong amplifier to cope with that, I don't want to apply preamp as well. Thus, it would be awesome if porting Compressor features from Poweramp EQ to Poweramp happens anytime soon.

Edited September 25, 2021 by Mspy1

[andrewilley]

@Mspy1 I think a lot of people would like this in the main PA app too, rather than only being in the stand-alone EQ app. ReplayGain is useful to a point, but it's not dynamic and can't adjust the levels 'on the fly' during playback, which a lot of users have wanted for a long time.

Andre

[Mspy1]

4 hours ago, andrewilley said:

@Mspy1 I think a lot of people would like this in the main PA app too, rather than only being in the stand-alone EQ app. ReplayGain is useful to a point, but it's not dynamic and can't adjust the levels 'on the fly' during playback, which a lot of users have wanted for a long time.

Andre

Does the main developer working on such thing? Do you have any insight 😆?

[andrewilley]

I'm sure it will happen at some point, but I don't know how soon.

Andre