Stereo Balance is poor

[trap49]

I'm a new user and have watched a lot of the videos to get started.  I have a new A-T USB turntable plugged into my PC running Windows 10.  Vinyl Studio seems to run fine but the record level is set to 100 and the green meters only get to about the 25 mark.  What's worse is that the stereo mix is bad.  I tried recording The Who - Tommy and one track is hardly audible but they both show as coming in at the 25 mark.  I tried adjusting the levels in the Graphic Equalizer but this only sets the volume but not the actual audio coming from one of the tracks.  Is this a problem with the Cartridge in the turntable, or the USB cable?  And how do I test this?

[Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)]

Hi,

I would think it's the cartridge, although it's strange about the meters.

Anyway, boosting the signal and adjusting the channel balance in the Graphic Equaliser should fix it - the changes will be applied to your saved tracks.  Also, you can save the settings as a preset, which might come in handy.

Or you can use the Normalise function.  That also has a setting to fix the channel balance.

[trap49]

OK, I tried a different approach and hooked up my USB Turntable via the RCA cables to my DAW to test that out and eliminate the cartridge as the problem.  The stereo mix through the DAW was fine, so I routed the output from the DAW to the USB on my PC and launched Vinyl Studio.  Immediate difference:  the Record Level, which was at 100 for the USB connection, had dropped to 57 using the RCA cable, and the meters showed much stronger signals, peaking at 60-75.  I tried a test recording and it worked perfectly.

So Vinyl Studio is functioning as expected, and the cartridge on my turntable is also working fine.  That leaves either the USB cable that was included with the turntable, or the turntable preamp.  I will investigate further, but thanks very much for your prompt reply to my original post.

[Paul Sanders (AlpineSoft)]

OK, thanks for the update.  Must be the electronics in the TT.  A USB cable is digital - it wouldn't weaken or unbalance the signal, just maybe make it unreliable.

I think my favourite is Acid Queen.

[Steve Crook]

It might be worth checking that you've got the correct settings on the USB connection in Windows.

It could be that the sample rate configured is wrong.

On windows 10/11 go to "Manage Audio Devices" select the "Recording" tab. in there you should see your turntable if you're plugged in and switched on. Check that the sample frequency and bit depth are the same as that set for the TT. In Vinyl Studio check that your Recording Options/File Options correspond to the settings you've got in the TT and Windows.

I have an ADC that had similar problems because windows said 16/48 and I'd got the ADC set to 24/192 with results an awful lot like those you describe.