Is it possible to remove this VHS noise using audacity?

[digicube]

Is it possible to remove this VHS noise using audacity without severely degrading the main audio track? I tried using the noise reduction feature but was not successful.

[jagabo]

That can be fixed by adjusting the tracking when you capture.

[digicube]

I thought tracking is just for picture adjustment.

[JVRaines]

HiFi audio is written and read by heads on the drum; hence, it is affected by the tracking control as well. It is very sensitive to the head-switching point.

[jagabo]

Sometimes you need to capture the video twice, with different tracking adjustments. Once to get clean video, another time to get clean audio.

[digicube]

Adjusting the tracking manually can get rid of the noise but reduces the hi-fi audio volume and introduces noise to the picture. I think I better just capture the audio in mono.

[jagabo]

The mono linear track is usually much worse quality than the HiFi track. Did you not understand my last post? You want to capture the tape twice, once with with the best tracking for video, then again for the best tracking for audio. Then combine the good video with the good audio.

[digicube]

I understand but to get best video and audio quality, automatic tracking is best. Adjusting the tracking manually reduces the fidelity of the hi-fi audio and add noise to the picture.

[JVRaines]

No, you apparently don't understand. The automatic setting may give you the best picture, but it is messing up your HiFi audio. Your audio will have better fidelity if you manually adjust tracking to eliminate the artifact. In practice, I have seldom found it necessary to do two captures — there is usually a manual setting that gives good picture and sound.

[digicube]

I've tried manual tracking. By the time all the hi-fi noise is gone, the hi-fi audio has become low fidelity and there is picture noise. I probably have to compromise and leave some hi-fi noise while maintaining high fidelity audio.

[davexnet]

I've tried manual tracking. By the time all the hi-fi noise is gone, the hi-fi audio has become low fidelity and there is picture noise. I probably have to compromise and leave some hi-fi noise while maintaining high fidelity audio.

This means the tracking is so far off the VCR has switched to the mono linear track (much worse quality) .
Perhaps try another VCR

[digicube]

Tried 3 different brand of VCR, still same problem. I think it's a manufacturing defect.

[lordsmurf]

Tried 3 different brand of VCR

That doesn't mean anything. More "brands" are rebadges.
Which exact 3 VCRs did you try?

[digicube]

JVC HRS-7600U, Mitsubishi HS-448, Panasonic SVHS VCR. They are definitely not rebadges since they are of different size, shape and weight.

[lordsmurf]

Just listened to it. No, audacity really cannot do too much for it.
Maybe Sound Forge, with the NR filter, but it won't be entirely gone during audio, just silent parts.
The recording may be misaligned, so you need to misalign a deck to match.
Or use mono/linear track instead.

[digicube]

Yea must be a manufacturing defect since it's a small budget commercial release.

[mike20021969]

just silent parents.

I was just about to say the same thing.

[amaipaipai]

Is this what you want?
I did it with audacity, the principle is called destructive interference. You duplicate the track and invert the phase to make them cancel each other out, in a more sophisticated software you could use some fancy comb filtering marking only the noisy out keeping what you want.

Your sample only has silence, not very useful.

[digicube]

The noise was not eliminated completely, I need a method that can do that like normal tape hiss.

[amaipaipai]

The noise was canceled out, try again with a rendered out sample, see if you can find any.
Again, you sample is useless, get something with a voice or music instead of pure silence.

[digicube]

Unfortunately I no longer have the tape.

[amaipaipai]

Well, you ask to remove the noise, the noise is removed with Audacity. Try again if you find the tape or some parts of the capture.

[digicube]

I can still hear noise in your FLAC file. It should be complete silence.

[amaipaipai]

It is a complete silence (VHS NOISE2.flac), it has nothing in the track and nothing in the frequency analysis, it's all zero.
If you are hearing something, it's on your side.

[digicube]

Yes. VHS NOISE2 is complete silence. Thanks. I was listening to the first file you posted. I assume destructive interference wouldn't work if there are music or dialogue mixed in since the noise is not uniform.

[amaipaipai]

To listen to the first sample you must play it on Audacity with all 4 tacks turned on, you'll hear nothing.
Destructive interference is a concept that you apply with a technique to remove the noise, if you just do the same with a music, you'll flat everything out and this is not what you want.

[amaipaipai]

Get a sample with something on it instead of silence, if is possible, I can have a look at it. Hurry up because I'll leave my office soon.

[digicube]

I found something similar. Here it is.

[jagabo]

His technique will eliminate all the other sounds too.

[amaipaipai]

Here a small sample from your file, if you look over the track and zoom in at the parts that has this noises, you see that it does a common pattern around 196 Hz to 3694 Hz more or less, it looks like a morse code, you'll see a series of peaks. Notice that you can remove a good amount of the noise and trashing a good portion of the frequency we need making it sound like a radio.
To restore the audio to sound natural again, is possible to do what I did to the whole sound (effect > voice reduction and isolation, Isolate and Invert vocals, Strength 4.60, use previous frequency's for low and high), use it like a alpha channel in Photoshop/Gimp.

We use that as a base together with the original sound using a differential filter, everything that is common is rejected, the noise cancel it self out and everything that is not, pass through. Unfortunately you need something much more sophisticated like software and hardware, than Audacity.

Also, this is not a thing you do with one pass, there's no easy way to do it, it's like restoring an old photograph with Photoshop/Gimp, you'll have to work this out.

Things I didn't try but could help, try to remove the vocals around the noisy areas, get a noise profile from that, undo the vocal cancellation and apply the filter in every single peak and see how it goes.