Recording Preferences

Gale: ToDo needs a link to a page that describes how to do a latency test, so that if latency is constant, correction can be set to remove recording latency. That page should probably be a page under "Help with Advanced Issues".
Bill: Done.

Playthrough

• Overdub: Play other tracks while recording new one: check to enable the feature where you can listen to audio on your PC whilst recording.
• Hardware Playthrough (Mac Only): This sets up your computer to send the sound coming in to be recorded straight back out of the speakers, so you can hear what you are recording. Hardware playthrough has no latency and takes no CPU, but is only possible if your input and output are on the same audio device, and that device supports it.
  • Windows and Linux users can enable this using your operating system's Mixer, by simply turning up the level for the input you are using and unmuting it.
• Software Playthrough: Play new track while recording or monitoring: check so that a track being recorded is patched to output too. You probably will want to listen to the output via headphones.

Latency

• Audio to buffer: If you set this to 100ms the audio will take 0.1 seconds to travel through the sound card. If you decrease this value then recordings will be laid down with less delay and 'software playthrough' may respond faster. However, the CPU will have to work harder as it is taking the audio through the soundcard in smaller chunks. If you set this value too low for example to 1ms, then the CPU will not be able to keep up and recording won't work. 100ms is about right for most people.
• Latency Correction: On most consumer systems there will be a delay between singing or hitting your note and it being laid down in the recording. By default Audacity will push recorded tracks backwards by 130 milliseconds to compensate for this, but you can adjust the correction value in this preference so that your recorded tracks should normally end up properly synchronised with the other tracks after the correction is applied. To set a custom latency value for your system, see the Latency Test page.

Sound Activated Recording

• Sound Activated Recording: Check or uncheck this box to turn sound-activated recording on or off.
• Sound Activation Level (dB): Set the threshold level that will trigger recording.