How to normalize MP3s?
 

I'm trying to normalize all my MP3's before I move them onto my Creative Nomad Jukebox. Is there any good (free) software that will normalize multiple directories of music? RMS normalization is preferred.

I know that Nero will normalize before burning, but I'm not interested in burning them to cds. I was hoping that my transfer software would automatically do it, but it doesn't. Any help would be appreciated.

edit: Wow...I just re-read my subject line. I wasn't drunk, and engilsh is my first language. Honestly. I fixed it. :)

I used to use a program called GoldWave to normalize my mp3s. Then I stopped caring. It was free, but this was years ago, so I'm not sure if it's still around.

stupid question...wat does it mean to normalise an mp3? do u mean getting rid of any high frequecies etc???

What it does is this: It takes an MP3 and turns it into a WAV file. Then it sets the volume at a predefined level. Next the file is translated back to MP3. You actually lose a bit of sound quality by doing it.

But you should explain what the point of it is!!

Normalizing is basically taking all your mp3s or wavs and altering them so they are all the same volume. You ever been flipping through your mp3s and some are really loud and some are really quiet? This fixes it. And I've never heard of it decreasing the sound quality...

ANY time you convert a song into MP3 you lose some audio quality, as the converter will remove any sounds that are outside of certain limits( Example: what the human Ear cannot hear will be removed from the song ).

In other words, there is no "Undo" when converting to MP3, although you can convert the song back to the its original format. The song will not be identical to the original "unconverted" file as it was before it was ever a MP3.

well if the human ear can't hear it, I wouldn't say it's losing quality, I'd say it's loosing stuff it didn't need in the first place :)

Indeed, That is a large debate in some audio circles, some say it doesn't matter, some say those extra sounds do count.

Me, I don't really care one way or the other. :crazy:

Now that we've settled that....anyone know of a program that'll do it for me?

:)

MP3Gain is a great little tool for Windows

if you don't mind ripping to wav and then back you can use CDeX to normalize them when you rip to wav format. Just tick the Normalize checkbox and then recompress them at the same bitrate.

I second the vote for MP3Gain. It couldn't be simpler to use. You just tell it where your music is and the dB level you want them all to be at and let it do its thing. If you have a lot of music, though, it could take a while. If you have more than say, 400 mp3s to normalize, you'd be best off setting it to analyze overnight or for when you aren't going to be at your computer for a while.