Gilderfluke&Co old MACs 8 bit Digital Audio System - Manual (Page 108)

If your source has a large change in volume during it, you may want to try 'riding' the level
controls to keep the signal at a consistent level. A better solution is to run the audio through
an audio expander/limiter before feeding it into the DAS-100. This will automatically adjust the
level to keep it within a certain range.
9) Set the sample length. Normally you can time the sound you are going to sample and enter
its length plus a little extra. You don't need to be any too precise with this measurement, as
any extra space at either end can be trimmed off later. The number of EPROMs that this
particular sample will take is now shown on the left side of the menu. This is without any data
compression or silence removal which may take place later, and is rounded up to the next
EPROM even if the sample extends only a little way into it.
10) Set the threshold level. This is an optional feature which makes it easier to start sampling right
when the sound starts. If set to 0, then the sampling starts as soon as you press the SAMPLE
command. If this is set to any other value, the audio coming in on the right channel must
exceed this level before the sampling actually starts. What this means is that you can enter the
SAMPLE command, and then take your time before starting your audio source. At the first peep
out of the source, the sampling will actually commence. The level you set for your threshold
depends on how clean the audio source is. When using a digital source like a CD or DAT there
is very little tape his and so the threshold can be set relatively low (10 or 20). When using a
record or audio tape, there will be a lot of hiss and rumble which can cause premature
sampling and so the threshold may need to be set as high as 30 or 40. If it is set to high, you
will hear it cut off the very start of the sound being sampled when you play it back.
11) Take the sample. Use the SAMPLE command to start collecting data. If the threshold is set to 0,
then the sampling will start immediately. Otherwise, the sampling will wait until the level on the
right channel exceeds the threshold. You can cancel a sample at any time by hitting any key
on the keyboard. You can re-sample as many times as you like.
12) Listen to the result. Use the PLAYBACK command to listen to the sample you have taken. You
can watch for any clips on the LEDs you might have missed while you were taking the sample.
13) If you wish, you can manually trim off any extra time at the beginning or end of the sample
using the START/END TIME commands. If the sample is to be used in an endless loop, you can
turn on the LOOPING toggle, and trim the sample until the ends match.
14) Take additional samples. If you are doing multiple samples in this file set, you can repeat steps
3 through 13 as many times as you wish.
At this point you are ready to evaluate the sampled data:
15) Evaluate the data. You have the option of performing evaluations on any or all of the samples
you have taken so far. Switch over to the EVALUATION MENU.
16) Use the EVALUATION MENU's SAMPLE NAME command to select any or all of the sample names
you want to evaluate.
17) Set the threshold for the silence evaluation. As with the threshold for taking the samples, too
low a level will result in clipping off the starts and ends of sounds. Too low of a level will mean
any tape hiss and noise will be taken for real sounds.
18) Do silence evaluation. Use the SILENCE EVALUATION command to find any parts of the
sample(s) which fall below the silence threshold.
19) Listen to the result. Switch the ORIGINAL/EVALUATED toggle over to 'SILENCE'. Listen to the re-
sults of the evaluation. You can select other sample names and listen to them as well. If the
results weren't satisfactory, or if you have some more samples which need evaluation with
different parameters set, you can repeat steps 16 through 18 as many times as you like.
20) Automatically trim the sample(s). You now have the option of trimming off any silence at the
beginning and/or end of the sample(s) by using the TRIM command. The only samples which
will automatically be trimmed are those which have been previously evaluated for silence,
and are currently selected by using the EVALUATION MENU's SAMPLE NAME command. After this
command has finished you can see that the start/stop times for the appropriate samples have
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