Soundfont volume with sfz VST

[homebrew]

I haven't gotten any responses over at the rgc forum, so I'll try here. I'm not sure if this is a Tracktion issue...

Any soundfont I try is very quiet compared to audio tracks and other VSTis in Tracktion. Is there an adjustment somewhere? I boosted the volume of the track itself, but it's still too low--pretty much unusable.

Anybody here use sfz and have any suggestions?

[rich_h]

No suggestion other than I use sfz and have had no such problem, so perhaps there is something wrong with the installation of it?

[valley]

is there anything much involved in the installation of sfz?

For what it's worth though, I sometimes use sfz too, and like rich_h, I have never experienced major problems[1] with it of the kind you are describing.

sfz does play a litle quiet, simply because it is highly polyphonic. If it played a single voice at a level approaching 0dB, you'd start clipping almost immediately if you tried to play chords. It should be no quiter though than similar polyphonic VSTis...


[1] except the memory leak thing when you load soundfonts that are larger than your system can comfortably deal with.

[rpc9943]

I have this issue as well. I merely drag in some kind of compressor like Blockfish and turn the output level up.

RonC

[homebrew]

Thanks for the suggestions. I did uninstall and reinstall (a slightly newer version). It seems to have helped a bit. It's still quiet but workable. I've bee using TubeLimit to boost it a bit too. I mainly use soundfonts for drums, cause it's the most cost effective solution.

[P.T.]

You can boost the level by adding a vol/pan filter.
There is no need to add artifacts that may come from a compressor.

[koorby]

I found the newer versions of sfz (1.9x etc) to be really buggy, and I reverted back to version 1.30, which is rock solid.

Ditto for using compression to boost volume. I use sfz for all my drums and piano and I invariably use compression on drums to boost levels.