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Volvagia posted:Can I get some mixing tips on this? This is like a two year old track that I found in the depths of my old computer; I feel like it could be pretty good if produced properly but right now sounds way too busy and the mix is pretty bleh. It's compltely lacking any bottom end definition / punch. There's no discernable melody and too much roomy reverb on the hats / percussion. Make the percussion elements stand out from the other parts, higher in the mix. In this sort of song they should be well defined and crisp otherwise they get lost in the mud of synths splashing everywhere. The song sounds like it's having an epileptic fit if that's the sound you were going for? You could work on it and get a musical theme going that evolved and progressed naturally and doesn't sound like it's forced to go in a certain direction just for the sake of it. Sorry if that sounds harsh but it's what I think anyway. As for tips, try not to boost EQ's too much as you will lose definition and space in the mix, the less compression you force onto things the better too. It doesn't sound like you have any at all, but if you have any compressers (especially multi-band) running on any of the channels just turn it off and bring the faders to the bottom and work your way up gradually for each part. Your kick really needs to be a lot more defined. Try layering it with other samples to get that really punchy sound. A good 909 / 808 sample for the low end can do wonders. come closer im a goon fucked around with this message at 14:40 on May 17, 2010 |
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May 17, 2010 14:34
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unSavory posted:Electronic/Club/DJ Music thread, I need advice. I started this track yesterday, have about 2 minutes worth of solid material, and got the mix sounding awesome. Seriously better than anything I've produced to date. Here it is: I wouldn't give a poo poo to be honest, it's not really that similar. Anyone that says you're biting can get hosed.
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May 17, 2010 14:44
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Can anyone give me any pointers to making "fat" sounding basses? I'm using Cubsae 5 and everthing I've gone up with sounds thin and weedy. Specifically, I'm looking for two sounds - a fat, heavy, but quite clean sounding bass similar to that heard in Squarepusher's Red Hot Car, and also a buzzing, squelchy sort of sound, if that makes sense to anyone. Are there any VSTis that are particularly good for bass sounds? Also, I'm looking for recommendations for a good free Softsynth for a beginner. I'm not getting along well with Prologue for a number of reasons.
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May 17, 2010 15:05
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come closer im a goon posted:It's compltely lacking any bottom end definition / punch. There's no discernable melody and too much roomy reverb on the hats / percussion. Make the percussion elements stand out from the other parts, higher in the mix. In this sort of song they should be well defined and crisp otherwise they get lost in the mud of synths splashing everywhere. No dude, its cool, thanks for the response. Yeah the song is supposed to be noisy / a total freakout, i'll work on getting the percussion to stand out. The lack of bottom end is also intentional, call it passe but I like the midrange heavy bloghouse sound. But yeah, the kick definitely needs work.
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May 17, 2010 15:41
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chippy posted:Can anyone give me any pointers to making "fat" sounding basses? I'm using Cubsae 5 and everthing I've gone up with sounds thin and weedy. Specifically, I'm looking for two sounds - a fat, heavy, but quite clean sounding bass similar to that heard in Squarepusher's Red Hot Car, and also a buzzing, squelchy sort of sound, if that makes sense to anyone. Are there any VSTis that are particularly good for bass sounds? Also, I'm looking for recommendations for a good free Softsynth for a beginner. I'm not getting along well with Prologue for a number of reasons. Use Sine wave for the bottom end and then put another synth, i.e a square or saw to get the more defined squelch on top of it and EQ the low end of that synth or HPF it . If you put a square or saw too low down it loses all of it's defining characteristics that make it sound coooool
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May 18, 2010 08:00
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Thanks. So, the sine wave should be played by a separate instrument altogether? Should it be an octave down from the one playing the square wave or whatever?
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May 18, 2010 09:21
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Ace of Bass - Cruel Summer Remix based on what I posted earlier. Has sort of a creepy, 80s vibe. 
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May 18, 2010 10:08
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Combat Pretzel posted:What are some good sample libraries in regards to drums/percussions? I started out not so long ago, mostly focusing on getting a hang on the synth, but the samples with Ableton kinda suck and they break the whole arrangement IMO.
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May 18, 2010 12:23
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chippy posted:Can anyone give me any pointers to making "fat" sounding basses? I'm using Cubsae 5 and everthing I've gone up with sounds thin and weedy. Specifically, I'm looking for two sounds - a fat, heavy, but quite clean sounding bass similar to that heard in Squarepusher's Red Hot Car, and also a buzzing, squelchy sort of sound, if that makes sense to anyone. Are there any VSTis that are particularly good for bass sounds? Also, I'm looking for recommendations for a good free Softsynth for a beginner. I'm not getting along well with Prologue for a number of reasons. Have a sub-bass oscillator, typically a sine wave an octave lower (like come closer said) can be a good way to get your bass super-heavy, although you might need to be listening on a good system to get the full effect. Other things you can do to easily fatten up a clean bass sound are to detune two oscillators slightly (by about 7-8 cents) and try adding a little bit of chorus. To get a good buzzy/squelchy bass, try a little distortion + (especially) a resonant lowpass filter, where you're modulating the cutoff frequency and/or resonance with either an envelope or an LFO (that is, e.g., have the filter envelope open more slowly than the main volume envelope, so that the filter will swell and sizzle). As for good/free softsynths for beginners, Triangle II is really nice for basses (though it's monophonic, it doesn't do chords), Synth 1 is a really solid general purpose synth, VST4FREE is a worthwhile website to check out in general.
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May 18, 2010 16:54
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This is one of those so far where everything just falls into place naturally, only like 2 hours of work so far but god drat I like this
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May 18, 2010 21:59
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mezzir posted:This is one of those so far where everything just falls into place naturally, only like 2 hours of work so far but god drat I like this Good to know I'm not the only one who likes that song. It's so embarrassingly cheesy, but  Nice work 
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May 18, 2010 22:29
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chippy posted:Can anyone give me any pointers to making "fat" sounding basses? I'm using Cubsae 5 and everthing I've gone up with sounds thin and weedy. Specifically, I'm looking for two sounds - a fat, heavy, but quite clean sounding bass similar to that heard in Squarepusher's Red Hot Car, and also a buzzing, squelchy sort of sound, if that makes sense to anyone. Are there any VSTis that are particularly good for bass sounds? Also, I'm looking for recommendations for a good free Softsynth for a beginner. I'm not getting along well with Prologue for a number of reasons. In addition to what everyone else has said, use octaves. Don't just have it play one note - stack it until you're satisfied. That can make a small sound seem huge. The synth in My Red Hot Car sounds like an overdriven square wave. For a synth, I can't recommend Albino enough. I use it for almost every synth sound.
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May 18, 2010 23:13
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 I think it needs to be mixed again but it's mostly there
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May 19, 2010 02:21
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chippy posted:Thanks. So, the sine wave should be played by a separate instrument altogether? Should it be an octave down from the one playing the square wave or whatever? Well some VST's have the option of having multiple channels devoted to a single shape, so you could layer them together like that. I like to devote a single VST to each though, that way it's not being compromised. And yeah, I would have the sine about an octave lower, depends what sound you're going for really. Just layer layer layer until you get the sound you're after. Lowbo posted:For a synth, I can't recommend Albino enough. I use it for almost every synth sound.    word to that
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May 20, 2010 04:32
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This is an amazing thread. Thanks so much for the knowledge! I some questions about audio interfaces/external soundcards I'm considering getting some kind of audio interface, or a usb sound card, to get better monitoring from my laptop. Right now I'm using a pair of headphones (not bad, but nothing special) to mix with. Eventually I want to get some kind of studio monitor, but the price of those makes that a long way away, and if all I have is my laptop's integrated sound card anyway, they almost worth using- I'd need some kind of interface to make the monitors worth it, right? The problem is I'm not really sure what I need, or even what I'm looking for, spec wise. I'm not using any external gear, and while the ability to do so might be nice, I don't really have any plans to (and wouldn't mind upgrading to something that could record when it became an issue). Other than recording outside inputs, does the quality of the sound card have any effect on the quality of music I make? Would a softsynth sound better if it was programmed/played/recorded on a system with a higher quality card (not just because the card was better? If so, what tells me how well the card would do so? If that isn't the case, I was thinking something like this http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00030099O/ If for music production I need something recording specific, I was looking at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000IXNE3E/ I don't have firewire, and I'm on a laptop so PCI seems out. Do either of those make sense for what I'm trying to do? Is there something better out there? Thanks for the help!
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May 20, 2010 07:31
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JamesKPolk posted:I some questions about audio interfaces/external soundcards You really, really don't want the soundblaster. The EMu is for music at least. Essentially you need an audio interface for a few things. As you've noticed, they often include line and real mic inputs, which are universally going to be better than your normal computer soundcard. They also usually include pre-amps, so you can boost the signal coming in to them. This is essential if you want to record any kind of external instrument. As well as this though, they tend to include decent quality outputs, both for headphone and studio monitors. High end headphones can't be just plugged into a computer, they need a headphone amp and a 3/4" jack. Audio interfaces often include these features. They also offer processing incentives. If you use a MIDI keyboard and try to play a software instrument on your typical computer sound card you're probably going to get some awful latency. Audio interfaces and their associated drivers are designed to reduce this problem substantially. If you're serious about making music on your computer you will eventually need an audio interface of some sort, even if it is just a relatively cheap 1 or 2 input thing. But if you're managing with your inbuilt soundcard and ASIO4ALL right now, you can probably put it off for a while longer.
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May 20, 2010 10:43
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JK4kYKxVP0&feature=related Really good (13 part) video tutorial on Massive. It talks about making dubstep bass sounds, but it's a good tour of Massive in general and worth a look no matter what style you're interested in.
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May 20, 2010 21:50
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Vanmani posted:If you're serious about making music on your computer you will eventually need an audio interface of some sort, even if it is just a relatively cheap 1 or 2 input thing. But if you're managing with your inbuilt soundcard and ASIO4ALL right now, you can probably put it off for a while longer. Thanks for the help, and for pointing out that typo. I didn't even know about ASIO4ALL until reading your post, though that should help a bunch too. I'm installing it now
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May 20, 2010 22:26
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My first serious attempt at a trance song. It's not entirely finished but it's getting there. Comments? http://soundcloud.com/mcelwai1/we-the-night 9b817f5 fucked around with this message at 08:11 on May 23, 2010 |
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May 22, 2010 02:21
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The sound is good. I hope you're not expecting people to dance to it, though, what with the two-minute-long breakdown/buildup. I mean there's another breakdown a minute and a half through the main breakdown. This is anthem trance, here, you should focus less on sweet breakdowns and more on making the track interesting as a whole 
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May 22, 2010 11:27
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cowboy
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Anacostia posted:My first serious attempt at a trance song. It's not entirely finished but it's getting there. Comments? Pretty solid, breakdown needs to be more interesting, build up alot more and drop in with some oomph. The drop with the snare roll alone isn't enough. Other than that it's got a great progression, could definitely do with more interesting layers / effects going on.
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May 25, 2010 23:45
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I want to sound like: -Atom & His Package (Yamaha qy700 sequencer) -Fever Ray (TC-Helicon Live) -PixelH8 (and other chiptune artists) (Milky/Fami/Fasttracker?) -Reggie Watts (EHX Single Track Looper/Line 6 DL4 Modeler) -And this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wXOGcpcsQJ8&playnext_from=TL&videos=raZskrrCPHo] I have: -microKORG -KORG DS-10 -Nintendo DSi -KORG Electribe Drum Machine -Fernandez Nomad Travel Guitar -Small Amp -Macbook Pro 15" 2.2ghz Laptop running Snow Leopard I dont have: -A DAW -Audio Interface -External Mic/Speakers Can I make my dreams come true without dropping loads on new machinery? If not, what do I need? Also: are there any good basic songcrafting/composing tutorials available because working in a digital format is a little tough to get my head around at the moment. Thanks for any help/advises.
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May 26, 2010 01:51
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come closer im a goon posted:Pretty solid, breakdown needs to be more interesting, build up alot more and drop in with some oomph. The drop with the snare roll alone isn't enough. Other than that it's got a great progression, could definitely do with more interesting layers / effects going on. Thanks! I'll definitely work on the breakdown some more. For this sort of trance it's obviously the most important part. A question that's sort of relevant to the track I posted above. In this song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPDSiL1nH0k#t=2m00s) (deadmau5 - hey baby), the bass is pretty much sustained on one note, at least as far as i can tell, but for some reason it seems like there's more going on, like the bass is playing more notes even though it seems like it isn't. Obviously Joel Zimmerman is a fantastic producer so I don't expect someone to be able to tell me how to exactly recreate the sound, but could someone give me an idea what's going on here?
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May 27, 2010 01:32
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The most obvious thing is he's moving up and down octaves to accent certain notes. Doesn't change the key but provides some interest.
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May 27, 2010 05:48
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c1 c3 c#1 c1 ... c1 c3c3c3c3 c2 a#1 c2 d#2 bla bla it's just random ornamental dickery
wayfinder fucked around with this message at 06:11 on May 27, 2010 |
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May 27, 2010 06:08
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Sidechained to the kick and get that pulsating effect by running a oscillator on the main amplitude, it also has some subtle layers rolling in and out over the bass line and like everyone said, just dicking around with octaves. Oh and some pitch bend every now and again keeps things intersting. I can't stand electro house, but to each their own. come closer im a goon fucked around with this message at 06:44 on May 27, 2010 |
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May 27, 2010 06:41
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finally workin on new stuff a little bit of a different sound 
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May 27, 2010 15:51
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trill rear end posted:finally workin on new stuff yo, this is cool
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May 27, 2010 23:10
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How's the bass level on this track? This one needs a lot of work in the middle section but overall I'm pretty happy with how it's turning out. Next purchase: some actually decent monitoring speakers. http://soundcloud.com/jmersere/witches Also trill yours is cool. Sounds kind of empty but in a cool way.
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May 27, 2010 23:41
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Doodlebat posted:I want to sound like: You need a DAW and an audio interface. You need the audio interface (inputs!) to get your instruments recording into the DAW. You can find cheap 2 channel audio interfaces for around the $100-$200 region (check the cheap audio interface thread). Reaper is a cheaper DAW <$100. It's not the best, but it's got all the features you need.
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May 28, 2010 01:37
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Soooo there's a new version of Reason coming out. I still haven't bothered with Record but new modules are always exciting. New poo poo: -Some weird Dr. Rex expansion -Pitch corrector/voice synthesizer (Autotune?) -Song structure "blocks" added to the sequencer -An awesome Akai-style drum machine pad thing Oh and live sampling... Can't tell the difference between the Reason and Record versions but I'm excited to say the least. http://www.propellerheads.se/reason5/
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May 28, 2010 18:10
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SpecialAgentCooper posted:Soooo there's a new version of Reason coming out. I still haven't bothered with Record but new modules are always exciting. New poo poo: It looks totally exciting and the best part is that upgrading is free. The live sampling stuff is kind of what I was expecting Record to be. I can't wait to try it out. I may start a Propellerhead megathread unless somebody beats me to it.
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May 28, 2010 18:35
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Vanmani posted:You need a DAW and an audio interface. You need the audio interface (inputs!) to get your instruments recording into the DAW. Once ive got Reaper does it come with the vst's i need to simulate the equipment i mentioned or do i need to download them from elswhere?
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May 28, 2010 20:39
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Dicky B posted:I may start a Propellerhead megathread unless somebody beats me to it. Do it, I would post the poo poo out of it. Tradin' refills and the like.
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May 29, 2010 15:55
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Doodlebat posted:Once ive got Reaper does it come with the vst's i need to simulate the equipment i mentioned or do i need to download them from elswhere? http://www.vst4free.com/ http://www.kvraudio.com/get.php will give you plenty to get you started
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May 30, 2010 23:31
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Quick question that I think this thread will have an easier time answering than than the tech support subforum. I've got a pair of beats and I'm getting barely any reproduction at the 32 64 and 125 range unless I cut out all other channels. Is this a limitation of the headphones how well they can reproduce a lot of tracks, or does this have to do with the quality of the recording? Playing back 320kbs tracks in iTunes leads to a similar deal unless I use the bass boost EQ preset, but even then it is not as deep as I would like. Also this thread is awesome and props to the people that actually post their tunes in here.
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Jun 1, 2010 18:53
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That could be a lot of things, do you use a proper soundcard or just the one built into your computer? Have you tried another set of headphones with your computer? Do you have the same problem if you use the headphones on other devices, like an mp3 player for instance? It could be that the bass starts rolling off above 125 on those cans, which is fairly common on consumer level headphones, so you won't get a solid reproduction below that. If that's the case you'd probably be better off with some reference quality headphones. In fact, I'd look at that if you're in any way serious anyway, as a good set of cans will definitely be worth the investment in the long term. Otherwise, your sound card might not be up to scratch, especially if you just use your built in one. Some are fine for general use but I've used some with absolutely woeful sound quality in the past, and some are just rubbish at driving headphones all together. You might have to shell out for a new card, which might not be a bad idea if you haven't got one anyway. Beyond that you might be experiencing masking. That generally happens when you have harmonically similar material playing at the same time, especially with complex sounds - that is anything with more harmonics than a sine wave. Basically you tend to hear more of whatever sound has a more harmonically rich sound, and the simpler stuff, particularly low frequencies, doesn't get reproduced in your head as well. Consumer quality headphones can make this worse by muddying up the sound - the drivers don't move as fast so you lose detail in the reproduction. It's probably more to do with one of the previous two points though.
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Jun 2, 2010 11:31
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Have you tried with other tracks? That would tell you pretty quickly whether it's the headphones or the tracks in question.
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Jun 2, 2010 21:54
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Giant Robot Fight! posted:That could be a lot of things, do you use a proper soundcard or just the one built into your computer? Have you tried another set of headphones with your computer? Do you have the same problem if you use the headphones on other devices, like an mp3 player for instance? Thanks for the advice, and it is definitely computer related. I've been switching back and forth between a variety of genres and songs right now, playing one on the laptop and one on the iPod, and the iPod just sounds "crisper" I can pick out the highs better and the lows have more kick, although that might be because the iPod goes a hell of a lot louder. Yeah other tracks are have the same type of situation, but it stands out more on the laptop. I know it could sound cleaner coming across the iPod though. Is there some kind of system equalizer in windows vista? I've looked for one before, both in Control Panel and Google, but haven't found anything. I've used the one in iTunes both on and off to see if that was loving it up somehow, but I was right a while back when I realized leaving it off was masking a lot of low end things. http://reviews.cnet.com/headphones/beats-solo-by-dr/4505-7877_7-33855891.html This amuses me a lot since is exactly the opposite of the problem I'm having. Before anyone judges me, they were a gift and monster has replaced them twice no questions asked when I broke em, so, props to a rather lovely company I guess. I'll look into the soundcard situation, thanks for the info.
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Jun 3, 2010 00:29
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Here's a drum and bass song I made today. Still have quite a bit of work to do. Critique is very welcome.
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Jun 4, 2010 08:06
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