New to recording, I had been reading about proper recording levels recently, and understand that in your DAW you want the levels to be around -20dbFS on average and with peaks no higher than -6dbFS.
The level and VU meters I’m aware of in the OP-1: Recording Level in Tape, the track level and VU meters in Mixer (T1), VU meter near the I/O, meters of some sort in Mixer (T4).
1) Roughly where should all these meters reside on average when recording to a DAW?
2) The Mixer (T1) VU meters do not display similar levels to the physical VU meter (is this meter the sum of all 4 tracks?). Which VU meter matters more or should neither ever hit red?
3) There’s the Master Out in Mixer (T4). I believe that just affects the balance, and so should be maxed at 99 on both channels?
4) But then there are 4 meters of the left of the Master Out (T4). Are they relevant to recording levels?
with 16 bit you’d like them above -24dB (means at least 12-bits in use)
with the OP1 I find having the tracks as hot as possible sounds great but is difficult to achieve, so all in all I’ve stopped caring about the meters. only what you hear matters. (I keep master out on T4 at max, but drive usually low, can drive all I want later in DAW)
I assume having tracks "hot" means to have their levels maxed. Why then is that difficult to achieve?
“hot” as in loud but not overloading. the closer you get to overloading a track the more hazardous those peaks, especially with synthesized percussion and without having a compressor on the OP1. so it’s a tradeoff.
"hot" as in loud but not overloading. the closer you get to overloading a track the more hazardous those peaks, especially with synthesized percussion and without having a compressor on the OP1. so it's a tradeoff.
