I'm using audacity... how do I remove white noise? it's driving me nuts

NathJ_2018

can anyone help me on this?

HuduVudu

@Diego

Diego

Hey, @NathJ_2018 !

The only way to do so in Audacity is to go to Effect > Noise Reduction, then you want to select a small portion of only the white noise so audacity can register it, and hit "Get Noise Profile",

After that, you select the whole track you want to isolate and go to "Noise Reduction" again. But instead of hitting "Get Noise Profile" You want to go to the Step 2, which is right below. You want to select how much of that sound you want filtered out. But be careful with filtering too much out... as it might cut some of the higher frequencies.

NathJ_2018

thanks Diego I'll give it a try

Diego

Tell me if it works for you!

NathJ_2018

I'll have to fine tune the settings but it helped A LOT thanks so much!

Klaus_T

@NathJ_2018 if you talk about the noise that was on the assignment: it sounds like the recording level is too low (the signal-to-noise ratio is too small). I don't know what the rest of your setup looks like, but try this while recording to avoid excessive noise:

try to get the loudest signal with the least amount of gain/preamplification (i.e. get closer to the mic and/or reduce input gain), and try to not boost the signal too much at any given stage. the key word here is "gain staging".

white noise has the nasty habit of being completely chaotic (=unpredictable for any algorithm) so any noise reduction plug-in will also deteriorate your signal (which might still yield usable results mind you). it is better to avoid (or reduce) it in the first place.

let me know if you need further help with it