upgrading audio quality

[aruwin]

Hello, I am recording a song using the laptop, but I want to make it sound like a studio quality. Is there a freeware that can do that? The original audio is not too low quality but the difference of the music quality and the voice quality is so obvious (music was recorded too but it is HQ because of the cable connecting the instruments directly to the laptop).

[smrpix]

You can play with Audacity, but you will quickly discover why studios don't use built-in laptop mics and spend thousands of dollars on hardware, software and facilities.

[aruwin]

You can play with Audacity, but you will quickly discover why studios don't use built-in laptop mics and spend thousands of dollars on hardware, software and facilities.

I actually recorded my voice using audacity. What settings should I use to make the sound quality better?

[Hoser Rob]

There aren't any free or paid programs that will make a crappy sounding signal sound good. GIGO. Yes, you could play with a tube emulator plugin for audacity or the like. But cheap mics sound like cardboard, period.

In fact, even the separate mics you commonly find in studios onstage don't sound all that good. Really good mics are very expensive and fragile. The #1 rule in pro audio: it shouldn't break if you drop it on the floor.

Nevertheless, you'll get far better vocal quality with even a $50-100 (whatever that would be in Malaysia I don't know) mic.

For a laptop you'll also need an external mic adapter/preamp. Beware of some mics that need external power. You can only get 5V from a laptop usb port and the mic may need more.

Even with a pretty cheap mic setup you'll get much better audio than with an internal laptop mic. I think microphone quality is probably the #1 thing in recording. You're dealing with a recording and playback chain, and no part of that can be any better than its input.

[davexnet]

You can play with Audacity, but you will quickly discover why studios don't use built-in laptop mics and spend thousands of dollars on hardware, software and facilities.

I actually recorded my voice using audacity. What settings should I use to make the sound quality better?

Can you post a sample?

[Cornucopia]

@Hoser Rob, I don't know where you got that "Rule #1". I know of a number of top quality Ribbon Mics and a few Condensers where if you were to drop them on a hard floor, they WOULD break. But no self-respecting audio engineer would ever allow that to come to pass with mics such as those: wrapped in velvet-lined case, handling with gloves, only brought out at record (or testing) time, etc. Those mics are PRECIOUS!

@OP, Hoser Rob is totally correct on the other stuff. If you HAVE to record onto your laptop (a reasonably viable option), you should be getting:

1. A phantom-powered condenser mic that costs ~$75USD-$300USD
2. A mic preamp+A->D+usb interface box that costs ~$75USD-$200USD
3. A solid mic stand that costs ~$30USD
4. A good sounding, quite QUIET environment with which to record in

That would be a good start to get PROFESSIONAL sounding audio. You could cut corners on any one or more of those things, but you would in essence be cutting corners on the quality. If you REALLY wanted to be top-notch, audiophile, studio quality, you'd be spending 10x as much on the 1st & 2nd items (with more breakout of separates), 2-4x as much on the 3rd, and WAYYY more on a separate, acoustically transparent/neutral, isolating sound studio/booth. And at that point, you wouldn't be recording to laptop anymore. Plus, you would be spending much more on appropriate monitoring as well...

HR does mention another good point: links in the chain. The weakest links are often the Input (Talent, Room, Mic, possibly Pre & A->D) and the Output (slightly D->A, moreso Amp, Speakers, Listing Room, Ears). Particularly when it comes to Digital. Which app you use to record with makes hardly any difference with the quality (main difference is in the features available).

Getting back to "fixing what you've already recorded" - Noise reduction, EQ & Modeling can only improve things somewhat. As I've said before, if you started with (on a scale of 1-10) you started with an 8, you could easily bump it to 9 or 10, but a 4 or 5 cannot EVER get bumped so high. They would more likely get bumped to a 6 or 7. And if you have a 1 or 2 or 3 (sorry to be brutally honest, but that's probably closer to what you've got - though I haven't heard it yet...), you could maybe bump it to a 4. As was mentioned, GIGO.

Well, that was a lot of time basically re-iterating what Hoser Rob already said...

Scott