Sonnox Limiter (again, sry)

[theBackwardsman]

So I finally got to try this limiter that everyones been talking about, & I just dont get it, Form what ive read its supposed to be transparent: Check
But Loud: ?

I cant push it for more than lika 3-4 bd of GR before it starts to sound like shit, this annoying digital distortion, and yet Ive tried all atk/rel settings possible, tunring on and off the safe switch.

You know sometimes you just like to push it to the limit & I cant get anywhere close to that before distorting.

And most importantly, the enhance function!
I read in the manual about all these functions, bla bla when pushing it over 100 % but HOW THE HELL could that be even possible, I cant push it further than 40 %

Could I be doing something wrong here? I have lots of headroom, worked with lots of careful compressing before, And NOTHING makes it as heavy as I want. I know most of you hate the whole loudness thing, but I think it should at least be possible to try to push things a bit over the top before distorting.

[bob katz]

Originally Posted by theBackwardsman

So I finally got to try this limiter that everyones been talking about, & I just dont get it, Form what ive read its supposed to be transparent: Check
But Loud: ?

I cant push it for more than lika 3-4 bd of GR before it starts to sound like shit, this annoying digital distortion, and yet Ive tried all atk/rel settings possible, tunring on and off the safe switch.

3-4 dB is LOT of gain reduction! It really depends at that point on your sources. The more pure and open the source, the better you are and the fewer artifacts in the limiter. However, the more pure and open the source, the less you may like the limiting. Anyway, the limiter or just one limiter is not or should not be the only ingredient in a "loud recipe", you have to spread it around.

caveat: I have not auditioned the Sonnox.

BK

[ISedlacek]

Yes, Sonnox limiter is often a bit difficult animal. The worst thing happening now and then are small, uggly and unexpected distortions. You can avoid them by switching "safe mode" off, but then it actually does not limit. Or by reducing the gain reduction, but then you don´t get the desired dynamic result. Too many features, too uncertain results, I would say ...

[sonicdefault]

Originally Posted by theBackwardsman

So I finally got to try this limiter that everyones been talking about, & I just dont get it, Form what ive read its supposed to be transparent: Check
But Loud: ?

I cant push it for more than lika 3-4 bd of GR before it starts to sound like shit, this annoying digital distortion, and yet Ive tried all atk/rel settings possible, tunring on and off the safe switch.

You know sometimes you just like to push it to the limit & I cant get anywhere close to that before distorting.

And most importantly, the enhance function!
I read in the manual about all these functions, bla bla when pushing it over 100 % but HOW THE HELL could that be even possible, I cant push it further than 40 %

Could I be doing something wrong here? I have lots of headroom, worked with lots of careful compressing before, And NOTHING makes it as heavy as I want. I know most of you hate the whole loudness thing, but I think it should at least be possible to try to push things a bit over the top before distorting.

What do you have the ceiling set to? Make sure you're not clipping because of the potential .1 variance, or that you are increasing gain somewhere after the plug. Also, consider that you could be hearing artifacts from some other plug.




-SD

[Bob Yordan]

Hiya

My personal reflection on the Sonnox limiter. I dont think of it as being the ultimate transparent limiter. I think UAD precision limiter is better at that. Also it is not my favorite 'push to the max' limiter. It can add a nice commercial touch to a mix if tweaked right, that the UAD PL cant (by itself). It has much more variation in sounds. I wouldn't count on a limiter
as the one tool to make a mix get commercial level. It is more of what you
put in to it that counts. The limiter is the safety net in my chain not the gain amplifier.

[OMU]

Originally Posted by Bob Yordan

The limiter is the safety net in my chain not the gain amplifier.

thumbsup

[George Necola]

buy a TC System6000 for ultimate loudness and improve your mixing.

cheeers

[theBackwardsman]

Originally Posted by sonicdefault

What do you have the ceiling set to? Make sure you're not clipping because of the potential .1 variance, or that you are increasing gain somewhere after the plug. Also, consider that you could be hearing artifacts from some other plug.




-SD

Im not sure exactly where it was,bu what do you mean with .1 variance?

[csl]

For the cleanest limiting with this plugin, turn off safe mode and enhance. Turn on recon meter, auto comp, auto gain. Set your output to something like -0.3dB, minimum attack, start with 20ms release. When I'm limiting the GR meter rarely even registers - but it will still be limiting short transients.

With these settings, if you're pushing the limiter so far that you're hearing distortion, you're pushing it too far (though you can adjust the release time - make it longer for less distortion, though it'll also get quieter). Turning off auto gain will make it louder, along with adding distortion depending on how far you're pushing it.

Folks need to understand this limiter is primarily a limiting compressor in the traditional sense - not a brickwall peak 'none shall pass' limiter, like the L2/PL. This way the attacks are preserved, but will peak over the output setting a little - this is fine! If you're using the fastest attack setting (0.05ms - i.e. just over two samples at 44.1kHz, I think) then set the output to -0.3dB and you shouldn't find any peaks will pass any further than about -0.25dB even when pushed.

Safe Mode was apparently added because people couldn't get their head round the fact this wasn't a brickwall limiter (because it let peaks pass the output a little) and so demanded similar behaviour to the L2. Safe Mode makes the unit act as a brickwall (as does mixing in 100%+ of 'enhance'), with the side effect being distortion may be heard. If you really can't accept the odd peak getting past the output for some reason, then use the L2, UAD-1 PL or something else instead.

It's not the easiest limiter to use, and the settings and labels aren't all very intuitive, but after reading the manual, Paul's replies on here and the extra pdfs from the Sonnox site, you should know how best to use this. Took me a while too!

[jdg]

also, turning on the dither will "clip" the output peaks.

its a great limiter... but u really got use it and get your head around it on a few projects before u can really click with it.

[sonicdefault]

Originally Posted by theBackwardsman

Im not sure exactly where it was,bu what do you mean with .1 variance?

I'm speaking of the potential variance between some electronic devices where you have a file which for example peaks at 0db or -.1db, but the other gear in question sees it as +1 or zero, etc (hence the variance). This isn't usually an issue with pro gear and is most commonly attributed to the CD/DVD medium. It's also why engineers burn their masters from between -.1-.3. This prevents other gear from falsely detecting overages. Because your problem seemed out of the ordinary, I was suggesting this just in case you hadn't considered other gear clipping post limiter.



-SD

[grandmasters]

not transparent at all.... but that's why I use it. Play with a combination of input gain and enhance (the enhance adds gain) to get your desired sound. Monitor though it as you master.

[mac black]

I've been playing with it for a few days.

I really like it .

tdm version anyway ... can see how you can over push it, but, if that's what you want ... it's your call, some people prefer loud and distorted mixes, it's all so subjective .

[Thor]

For the sessions where I actually use a limiter, the Sonnox is the one I use in most cases.

It can do transparent, and it can do coloured (distortion, actually). It's not an L2 (thank God). The L2 sounds like **** if you do more than a few dB, but I don't know what you're expecting of the Sonnox. It sounds great if used sparingly (like any limiter).

There are several posts in this thread, as well as references to other documents that should give you enough to get your head around it. There is a learning curve, it's not a 'more/less' think like the L2.

Hope this (kindav) helps

Thor

[yellowrobin]

Originally Posted by theBackwardsman

So I finally got to try this limiter that everyones been talking about, & I just dont get it, Form what ive read its supposed to be transparent: Check
But Loud: ?

I cant push it for more than lika 3-4 bd of GR before it starts to sound like shit, this annoying digital distortion, and yet Ive tried all atk/rel settings possible, tunring on and off the safe switch.

You know sometimes you just like to push it to the limit & I cant get anywhere close to that before distorting.

And most importantly, the enhance function!
I read in the manual about all these functions, bla bla when pushing it over 100 % but HOW THE HELL could that be even possible, I cant push it further than 40 %

Could I be doing something wrong here? I have lots of headroom, worked with lots of careful compressing before, And NOTHING makes it as heavy as I want. I know most of you hate the whole loudness thing, but I think it should at least be possible to try to push things a bit over the top before distorting.

You also have to "clip" it to make it louder after the limiter . (here) is a free clipper. All the really loud material that you are hearing was "clipped" in one way or another. So just use your limiter for a reduction of 2-3 db's then insert this clipper. You can also use two clippers in the line if you need it. Or you can use a clipper with no limiter .But remember "too much clipping will also distort your material" But you should be able to get it close to any pro level with it. But the bottom line is the pro mastering guys have "great converters" that they use to "clip" it with. So I think anything you want to put out on a "National level" should go though a pro mastering engineer. Anyway hope this helps, if this is what you were looking for.The other thing is I don’t understand is how they advertise these software limiters as if you can use more than a db or two. When you actually pull the damn things down more than that, they always sound like crap. Maybe hardware limiters do better in that area, anything hardware always seems to do better in my world.

[Red Mastering]

Originally Posted by OMU

thumbsup

+big One,
use compressor for it
limiter is just for that 1-2dB safety

it's my opinion, so it doesn't have to be wright

[csl]

Originally Posted by yellowrobin

You also have to "clip" it to make it louder after the limiter . (here) is a free clipper. All the really loud material that you are hearing was "clipped" in one way or another. So just use your limiter for a reduction of 2-3 db's then insert this clipper. You can also use two clippers in the line if you need it. Or you can use a clipper with no limiter .But remember "too much clipping will also distort your material" But you should be able to get it close to any pro level with it. But the bottom line is the pro mastering guys have "great converters" that they use to "clip" it with. So I think anything you want to put out on a "National level" should go though a pro mastering engineer. Anyway hope this helps, if this is what you were looking for.The other thing is I don’t understand is how they advertise these software limiters as if you can use more than a db or two. When you actually pull the damn things down more than that, they always sound like crap. Maybe hardware limiters do better in that area, anything hardware always seems to do better in my world.

Hi yellowrobin - Why would you clip something you just limited? Surely you'll simply be shearing off your carefully limited peaks, negating any point in using the limiter in the first place. Also don't understand why you'd have two clippers inline. If you clip a dB, then clip another dB separately, how would that differ from hitting one clipper with 2dB.

I have to admit, generalising about the use of clipping in mastering makes me uncomfortable. Sure, in extreme cases MEs have to push their levels using clipping under client duress (if they want to get paid, anyway), but I'm pretty sure clipping is still something wouldn't want to encourage. Perhaps I'm being naive.

IME If you make careful use of saturation before you hit the limiters you shouldn't really have to limit more than a dB or two to get inside -10dB RMS (with moderate bass levels), which most limiters can handle with ease.

Sure, limiters will fall apart when you try and compress down into the lower frequency ranges, but so will clipping, to an even greater degree. If limiting distortion is masked by the material then great, but at this point, as far as quality is concerned, you're fighting a losing battle.

[yellowrobin]

Originally Posted by csl

Hi yellowrobin - Why would you clip something you just limited? Surely you'll simply be shearing off your carefully limited peaks, negating any point in using the limiter in the first place. Also don't understand why you'd have two clippers inline. If you clip a dB, then clip another dB separately, how would that differ from hitting one clipper with 2dB.

Hello csl. It seems to me that after I use a limiter, then I use a clipper for "level" or "loudness” if used in moderation (is that an oxymoron?) , will not negate the "character" of the limiter. Now I may be wrong and my ears could be fooling me, but the sound or character of the limiter stays. Anyhow , anymore I use clipping instead of a limiter, it just sounds better to me . And for the question about two clippers in line, that is something that "Bang" on this board has used, and he seems to like the sound of. Maybe he can chime in and explain that.

[bass man]

Sonnox limter is just fine, L2 too , get to know it better , work with it .....

[puremastering]

The best limiter you could find on the market is the TC System 6000. First of all, you need to properly compress your song. Don't forget to put the ouput ceiling at -0.2dBFS

Marco