The hottest Audio engineering Substack posts right now

Steely Dan's live mixes often sound too bright and harsh because peaks in the 3–7 kHz range and sharp transients aren't tamed, which makes listening fatiguing compared to the smoother studio versions.
The concerts can feel sterile and low-energy because the players act like studio session musicians, and added horns or extra parts sometimes clutter songs instead of adding excitement.
Live sound depends heavily on mixing and arrangement choices — when engineers control the “pain” frequencies and craft warm, full mixes (as with ELO or Little Feat) a live show feels lively, while venue reverb and mic choices in classical performance create a very different, blended spectrum.

DACs and ADCs can have droopy frequency responses, especially delta-sigma ADCs, which can cause issues in applications like audio and communications. Understanding this is important for fixing any drop in quality.
To correct the droop, you can use digital filters to adjust the frequency response, either by adding new zeros with the zero-adding method or altering existing filters with the zero-shifting method.
It's essential to consider both input and output sides of the system separately when addressing droop issues to ensure accurate data transmission and playback.

Don't assume that all ICs perform the same, even if they look similar. Small changes in production can lead to big differences in quality.
Working with audio equipment requires attention to detail in filtering processes. It's essential to ensure that all components meet specific performance standards.
When using older components, always check for changes in manufacturing. Even slight variations can drastically affect audio quality, as seen with the NE5532 op-amps.

Mono and stereo mixes can sound very different from each other. Mono mixes might feel more powerful and live, while stereo mixes offer more depth and spatial detail in the music.
Collecting both mono and stereo versions of records can lead to exciting new experiences. Some songs might sound better in mono, while others shine in stereo.
When buying reissues of old records, it's important to check who remastered the album. Quality remastering can significantly enhance how the music sounds.

Home recording lets musicians easily capture sounds at any time, but it requires dealing with noise from the environment. Paying attention to subtle sounds can change how we hear our surroundings.
The backup alarm invented in 1963 is designed to be very loud and catch our attention. Its unpleasant sound is everywhere, yet we might stop noticing it due to its common presence.
This overwhelming noise environment can make us miss important alerts and warnings. It's a reminder to be aware of what we listen to and not tune out things that matter.

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Unplugging and avoiding constant updates can help maintain stability in digital tools.
Limiting options can sometimes lead to more creativity and productivity in the digital environment.
Making committed choices about tools and platforms can foster development and creativity.

Sound in games is made to work in real-time, which means it can't be exactly like in real life. Instead, game developers use simplified calculations to make it feel realistic without needing huge amounts of computer power.
To create sound effects in games, developers use Emitters to play sounds and Listeners to receive them. This setup helps in determining how loud a sound is based on the distance and direction from where it is coming.
Using Rooms and Portals helps organize sounds in the game environment. This makes it easier for the game to decide what sounds the player can hear and adjust them accordingly, leading to a more immersive experience.

Adding transmission zeroes to crossover filters can enhance their performance, similar to elliptic filters, even if that resemblance is just superficial.
Charlie Laub has published valuable articles that detail this crossover filter design improvement, and there’s additional material available for deeper understanding.
The importance of group delay in audio engineering is backed by research, which could benefit those looking to explore time domain behaviors in their designs.

When you combine highpass and lowpass filters, you often don't get the original signal back, which can affect how music sounds. This can be a problem because the phase shift isn't what you'd expect from just delaying the signal.
In the past, before digital processing was common, there was a big need to find better ways to design these filters. One solution was to use a subtractive method to reduce the 'insult' to the signal.
The work from the mid-80s shows that by carefully designing analog filters and using subtraction, you can achieve a closer match to the original signal without extra distortion.

Even though linear-phase filters are supposed to keep the phase of signals the same, they can still cause unexpected phase changes. This can happen especially at stopband frequencies where the phase might jump abruptly.
Using simple filters, like box-car filters, can lead to problems because they may not completely block unwanted frequencies. This can result in the output signal being inverted or misinterpreted, especially when analyzing important data trends.
It's important to choose the right filter. Either use filters that effectively block unwanted frequencies or ones that don’t cause abrupt phase changes, to avoid messing up the signals you are trying to interpret.