Why does Giant Bomb mix their audio so low?

I'm all for dynamic range, especially when it comes to the lovely cambers of our Giant Bombers, but amongst all the other content that I play on my computer or elsewhere, Giant Bomb content always has whisper-quiet audio mixes. During live events, it's even worse and I have to crank it even further.

Vinny/Drew/Dave, can you please turn it up to 5 or so? Not 11, but like 5?

I would rather crank the audio on my end then have it blown out on both ends.

@NPfeifer: For Quick Looks, I think the audio level is usually fine, if just a tad low. But yeah, on live content or live-recorded content, I have to crank up my sound almost twice as high as normal to hear them well. It still surprises me how low the mix is for such videos.

A higher mix would be nice, but it's certainly just a minor concern.

If you adjust the volume slider for live stuff it'll get louder, just mute and unmute and it'll fix. It's a weird thing that you wouldn't expect to work but it does.

I believe you may be talking specifically about the live streams, because the volume is broken on the player. It says the volume is all the way up but it actually starts at the half way point. If you simply click drag the volume from mute to max it should be at the right volume. Muting and unmuting may also work, but I've never tried that.

@vorpalparasite said:

If you adjust the volume slider for live stuff it'll get louder, just mute and unmute and it'll fix. It's a weird thing that you wouldn't expect to work but it does.

It doesn't matter, live or pre-recorded live content is suuuuuuuuuuper low. Button toggles don't do a thing.

It's a fair question, I find my dial turned all the way up for GB content that wouldn't' go past halfway for other things. I'm just curious about what they have to say about it.

So, it's not just me, eh?

Nope, it's not.

I've found switching over from streaming to YouTube format or HTML5 improves the sound levels greatly, but I'm not sure what to do about live streams.

It was worse before, but I still frequently have to max out my volume to be able to hear everything.

I do not claim to have good speakers.

They are generally low but the live streams are bugged in where the volume shows 100% but is actually at 50%. So you have to move it around and back to max to fix it.

I'm with you. Jeff's home stuff is a good volume, I find. I keep my computer at about 1/4 max at all times, and that works, but for GB content, I have to put it max or near max.

@RuthLoose said:

I would rather crank the audio on my end then have it blown out on both ends.

It can suck with some devices, though. For instance, my Macbook Pro has a hard time being loud enough if the mix is excessively low.

The important thing is normalization. There's nothing worse than some of the podcasts I listen to where it goes from impossible to hear to blasting your fucking eardrums and waking everyone up in the same ten seconds.

I have no complaints regarding their audio volume actually. Oh well.

Except that live shows are sometimes kinda low, but, like someone already pointed out, muting and then unmuting usually fixes that.

Isn't this why we have convenient volume sliders on every device?

I have to turn my volume up at least twice as high as usual for all of GB's stuff, which can get annoying if I'm trying to listen to a Bombcast or watch a Quick Look while also chatting via Pidgin or Steam, as it makes the alert noises really loud. I can lower their volume myself in Windows' audio mixer, but that is kind of a pain in the ass.

It's not that big of a deal, but I'd certainly not complain if audio started getting mixed just a little louder on GB in general.

Can't say I have ever noticed this. But I view everything in HTML5 so maybe that has somthing to do with it?

My laptop can get nice and loud, but it's on max for anything GB-related.

Yeah, my laptop doesn't get too loud, and I have to have it at max volume or plug in headphones if I want to actually hear anything, including Quick Looks.
 
It's something I've been complaining about a lot.

@EpicSteve said:

Isn't this why we have convenient volume sliders on every device?

I shouldn't have to change my master volume toggles to accommodate one site's content.

Looks like they covered this in their new behind the scenes feature. Loved that video, still had to crank it, though ;)

With my speakers at less than 50% and my windows at less than 40%, I can hear just fine. They do tend to be quieter than games and the like, but media like youtube videos seem to be generally about the same.

I've also watched live and archived content on my mom's macbook, on my phone, and on an iPad or two. Never had any issues hearing any of it with the speakers. In fact, with my phone, I tend to turn it down a bit because it clips pretty bad on the little speaker on there.

The bombcast mix is usually pretty low, to the point where I was starting to think it was just normalized, not really mixed.

Yeah, it´s a pretty long audio file so mixing might be hard, but I listen to this stuff on the train on some in-ear speakers and sometimes I can´t boost it enough to still hear it over the rattling and shouting on said train.

Looks like they covered this in their new behind the scenes feature. Loved that video, still had to crank it, though ;)

i find that happen also. pretty weird stuff the people are saying with the volume to mute. i'll have to try that then.