T racks mastering suite has "compare" feature... great!! I can't hear much difference?

Hi there ChuckC This could be one of those situations where the compressor is working and doing good but it is just not that obvious at first. In fact it could be said that when a compressor (over a mix that is) is doing well it should not be that obvious to the ears. But what does it do instead you may ask.

Well it glues things together, reigns things in that might be otherwise leaping out at odd times and just giving the track a little more attitude and feel. And keeping the overall level of the track a little more even and constant. And also as Bristol has pointed out the average rms value of the signal is going to get a little higher too. This is not easy to see with normal Sonar meters for example as the rms values are displayed a long way down. You really need a proper plugin to see rms values much more easily and accurately eg BlueCat meter for example.

It is important to always switch back to raw trcaks and hear them at the same volume as mastered volume. That way you can hear if you are doing good rather than bad. Limiting should be a different story though. A heavily limted track should be 7 or 8 or more (10!)  db higher in rms value than the raw track. But if you are hearing the raw track at the same volume then the limited version is not going to be much different but in real life it will be way louder.

After a while even subtle compression makes a track sound completely different to the raw tracks. Raw tracks to me sound a little out of control and ordinary compared to beautifully compressed tracks instead. But the compressor also has something to do with it too. I have just finished mastering an album using a hardware Smart C2 compressor and this is quite expensive. I bet that it is in a totally another class to the T Racks stuff, maybe not but one thing I know is that you have to spend a lot of money on a compressor plugin to get anywhere near it in sound and what it does.

Here are some settings to try on a total mix. Attack to about maybe 15 ms or so. Release start with say 150 ms or 300 ms. Ratio 1.5 or 2:1 and set the threshold for about - 3db of gain reduction. Makeup gain to suit eg 3 db is a good start. Try this and switch back and forth to the raw tracks and listen out for the total overall sound you are hearing. I bet after a while you will start to really hear what it is doing. The raw tracks will after a while start to sound unpolished compared to the compressed track.