OK, I know this isn't the IK forum, but I know many of you use T-Racks 3 so I thought I'd ask this here. Posted the same on their forum but response is painfully slow. So....here goes.
 
I'm kinda new at TRacks so bear with me please.
Loaded a 24/48 file into TRacks 3. The song is playing too loud even before adding any modules. Distorting the soundcard going in. The only way I've found to control the level into the card is by using the volume up and down on the compare button of the GUI. I know it's meant for comparing the processed sound vs unprocessed sound.
If I deactive the compare button the song is too loud! I
f I leave the compare button ON while hitting PROCESS, will it affect the results of the processed wav file, i.e. - My Master? Hope that makes some sense.
Thanks.
 
p.s. This is about using TRacks as a standalone app. When using as a plug, I use the gain on Sonar X1 to attenuate level feeding TRacks.

What do you mean by 'too loud'?  It distorts?
You mean it's too loud when there's no preset or anything loaded, i.e the top window is blank?  What does the track's waveform look like in the bottom pane?  If it fills that pane then I can only conclude that you've exported the WAV mix far too hot in the first place.

I didn't export the wav. I'm asking about the compare funtion button. un-activated the wav is in the red, when activated I can control the volume going into my soundcard, but the exported or processed volume is too low. Does it matter if the meter on my sound card is in the red? & no the waveform doesn't fill the pane.

Export the WAV: I meant when you exported it from your DAW in order to load it into TR3.  But you answered the question when you say the file's waveform doesn't fill the bottom pane.

When you say 'in the red', I assume you mean in the horizontal 'Peak' and/or 'Perceived Loudness Metres'?
When I load a file and don't load any presets or modules the Compare button doesn't change the levels or anything at all, which is what I'd expect.  Is your Compare volume knob (below the Compare button) set to 12 o'clock, i.e. neutral?  If it is, I would say that there's a soundcard setting causing this and not TR3D.

Well it begs the question, why are you running it stand alone, rather than as a plug-in, where the behaviour appears to be normal?

If your hitting the red without any effects yet, you need to go back to the mixing stage and fix it. If it sounds bad and goes into the red when you get it for mastering, it will sound bad when your done trying to master it.

Firstly, I did not do the mix. I'm using it as a standalone just to experiment with TRacks. I do like the convienence of loading files into TRacks for comparison, etc.
There seems to be a conflict between the vu in TRacks and my sound cards vu. Is there a way to attenuate the signal being feed to my sound card from TRacks? Is it something to do with the compare button?
As stated, while using TRacks as a plugin with Sonar, I can attenuate the signal being feed to the soundcard with the gain knob for the track. Is there a gain -increase/decrease- function in TRacks 3 or no?
THX