Microphone is either loud and crackles or does not crackle, but is too quiet

[Valor89]

Hello,
headline says it all. You know when you speak into your mic and you get in that red area of the bar that is shown below "Audiomixer", you get that crackling sound. It starts around -5 dB. However that is the volume I need with my mic (Razer seiren mini) to be well audible. When I stay within the green area, the crackle disappears, but I´m too quiet.

I tested a gain filter, a limit filter and an expander, but whatever I adjust, my problem persists.

I have already 100% of the volume under the windows-sound-settings. So the mic itself is at is volume-peak.

Before razer, I had the same problem with two laval-mics, so I dont think, that razer is the issue.

So how do I remove the crackle and still be heard well?

Thanks in advance for suggestions.

 

[AaronD]

Compress it.

A compressor is a fast automatic volume control. When the input gets loud, it turns itself down. When the input gets quiet, it turns itself up. Its goal is a more-or-less constant output volume.
OBS has a filter for that, and there are lots of tutorials on YouTube and other places about how to use a professional compressor, and OBS's one works the same way...just without the metering to show you what it's actually doing.

Remove all the filters, and set the physical mic gain as high as you can without ever clipping. It'll still be low, as you describe, but that's what the compressor is for. Then add a Compressor filter. Start with:

• Threshold all the way up
• Ratio all the way up
• Attack all the way down
• Release around 150ms or so
• Gain at 0

Then watch OBS's meter as you lower the Threshold to where the meter starts to reduce some more. This is the compressor starting to work. Set it to reduce by a noticeable amount, but not much more than that yet. Then use the Gain to put the meter right up next to full-scale without ever going over.

Listen to that, understand what the settings actually do, from those tutorials, and adjust by ear.

You might also want a Limiter, *after* the compressor, set to -1dB or something like that, just as a "safety net" to guarantee that the output never clips, but it should rarely do anything. The compressor does almost all of the work.

 

[Valor89]

Thanks, I tried the compressor. It didn`t solve the problem, however it helped me to narrow it down more precisely. I think it must have something to do with the performance of my PC. I had a higher GPU-usage of about 8% and the crackle got worse.

Then I tested my mic via two different audio-programs and it worked without any disturbing noise. So the problem must be with OBS. Maybe I will reduce the resolution of the video.

Another question: Is it possible to remove the crackle with an editing- program after I`ve made the video? It doesnt occure too often, after all.

Thanks again for the answer!

 

[AaronD]

Thanks, I tried the compressor. It didn`t solve the problem, however it helped me to narrow it down more precisely. I think it must have something to do with the performance of my PC. I had a higher GPU-usage of about 8% and the crackle got worse.

Then I tested my mic via two different audio-programs and it worked without any disturbing noise. So the problem must be with OBS. Maybe I will reduce the resolution of the video.

I'm not really sure what that would be then. Maybe someone else here knows. If you figure it out yourself, make sure to post the solution, so someone else can find it later and solve their problem too.

If you were plugged into the analog mic input on your PC, then I would say that it's picking up noise directly from the GPU, and the exact combination of activity that OBS uses, just happens to create a low-enough frequency on your rig to be audible. The solution then would be to use a USB thing; keep the analog signal away from the noisy box. But a quick google search says that your mic is already USB, so it's probably not that.

Another question: Is it possible to remove the crackle with an editing- program after I`ve made the video? It doesnt occure too often, after all.

No. Once it's there, it's there. There might be some algorithms to reduce it, but you can't get rid of it completely.

Generally, once things are mixed, you can't unmix them. You can modify it further, which is often incomplete and damages what you want to keep, but that's all you can do.
A common way for technical people to think of non-ideal situations, is to have a perfect signal mixed with the non-ideal noise, which creates an analog-like perspective and allows digital goals to be expressed in the old analog terminology. (keeping the noise floor below __dBFS, translates directly to a certain number of bits required, which is often surprisingly low) The same rule still applies: once mixed, you can't unmix.

 

[Valor89]

Reporting back from the front: Problem solved! It was a simple reason that caused a lot of trouble yet: Too many filters. I deleted all of them, and used only limiter, expander and noise suppresion. Now I have ZERO crackle in my sound.

I think I will still need an equalizer because my voice sounds a bit crispy. So Im going back to the fine tuning.

When people have problems with pop-sounds / crackle, they should delete their filters and only use those 3 basic ones.

Thanks again; I tried dozens of tipps on the web, only yours helped!

 

[AaronD]

Problem solved! It was a simple reason that caused a lot of trouble yet: Too many filters.

Huh. I wouldn't have expected *that*! Usually, those are perfect-in, perfect-out, and the problem is elsewhere. But I guess it's one more thing to add to OBS's growing list of audio problems.

Generally, you do want to keep the filters as clean and minimal as you can. Fix the problem acoustically/physically, not electronically, and DON'T EVER FORGET WHAT YOU'RE ALREADY RUNNING! I've seen the latter mistake far too often, then another filter gets added to try and fix the mess that the forgotten-and-still-active ones create, etc.

...used only limiter, expander and noise suppresion...

I hope it's not in that order, because the noise suppressor is going to get all confused with the changing noise floor after the other two. Generally, noise suppression is the very first thing to do, so the noise that it needs to remove is constant, and limiting is the very last as a "safety net".