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Sibilance Problem on Digitized LPs

I'm fairly new at all this and am having a problem with excessive sibilance with recorded LPs. Currently not using any sort of DAC either in recording or playback (Is this the whole problem???). I'm using Audacity on a Mac running Leopard to record from a stock Music Hall MMF-5 turntable hooked into a BBE FJB-200 X phono preamp via a long run (25') of left/right RCA cable adapted down to the Mac's audio in pin connector via a Monster Cable RCA-into-stereo-pin-connector cable. These recordings are exported from Audacity into Itunes as either WAV files or AACs and both have the excessive sibilance. I've played around a lot with the level of the recordings but the sibilance problem persists. None of this is present on CDs I've ripped to Itunes with the rare inexplicable exception. Does anyone have any ideas as to how I might remedy this? Thanks.
lg1

Showing 2 responses by joelv

joelv's avatar
joelv
103 posts
 
Is the sibilance present when you're listening to an LP? Or is this sibilance appearing only after the music is recorded?

I agree that it just sounds like mistracking. Good cartridge alignment and proper tracking force and VTA will alleviate most sibilance problems. The quality of the stylus could also be an issue - is it a new stylus/cartridge?

If you're only experiencing the sibilance after bouncing from Audacity, make sure you aren't using any kind of "mastering" Eq or "maximizing".

Hope that helps!

-Joel
joelv's avatar
joelv
103 posts
 
Some basic things to check for are:
Samplng rate - you want at least 44.1Khz
word length/bit depth - at least 16 bit.
This is on the way in, of course.

When bouncing down, what are the settings you're using? .WAV files can be any sample rate/bit depth can't they? And AACs are lossy, so you can definitely crunch up the top end by using low bit-rates. You might try doing a full-sized WAV file (CD-quality or better) if you aren't already.

Those checks done, I would check all cables to make sure the signal isn't getting mangled on the way into your computer. 25' is long enough to get some audible loss from the phono pre to your computer input, especially going RCA to 1/8". Loss of high-frequency information is the usual result, though.

Try monitoring the sound from the computer as you record (headphone out jack from the mac?). Do you hear the sibilance on the way in? If so, that long cable would become the #1 suspect for causing signal damage. Perhaps it's the length, the connectors, or some combination of the two.

If those don't cover what's going on, and there's really no extra processing going on (EQ, "mastering" compression, etc), then I'm at a loss. Good luck again!
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