Hi all,
I’m looking for some second opinions on how I’m currently using Volume Leveling and Headroom Management in Roon.
My setup has fairly high analog gain, and without attenuation my normal listening volume ends up too low on the preamp’s dial, where control and channel balance aren’t ideal. So I’ve been testing ways to shift the gain structure upwards using Roon’s DSP tools.
What I’m doing now:
Volume Leveling: Album, Target –25 LUFS
Headroom Management: –10 dB
Typical total attenuation: around –20 dB
This gives me:
a much better usable range on the analog volume control
consistent loudness between different albums
no audible degradation (at least to my ears)
From what I understand, Roon converts every sample into 64‑bit floating‑point, applies all DSP mathematically in a single step, and then outputs 24‑bit PCM to the streamer.
So only the level changes — the shape of the waveform stays intact.
I’ve tested this across a lot of my digital collection and so far I’m very enthusiastic. But I’d love to hear from others who use similar settings.
Questions for the community:
Are there any downsides to using both Volume Leveling and Headroom together?
Is there a recommended headroom value when using a low LUFS target like –25?
Has anyone compared heavy attenuation like this with other approaches?
Thanks in advance — very interested in your experiences.
1 Like
mjw
(Father! Father! Resist not! Let us destroy the core! Set us free!)
2
You do not need to apply headroom adjustment when using volume levelling since this is a simple gain ajustment, and any potential clipping is handled during the conversion.
I understand that Volume Leveling already applies its own internal gain adjustment, and that Roon handles potential clipping during conversion.
The reason I still added Headroom is that I need around –20 dB of total gain reduction to get my amp into its ideal volume range (below that the left/right balance is slightly off). I just want to make sure there’s always enough space for peaks on more dynamic recordings.
Maybe it’s not strictly necessary, but in my case it keeps the gain structure predictable and gives me consistent control on my analogue preamp. So far it sounds very clean, but I’m still testing — which is why I asked for second opinions here.
I use volume leveling for obvious reasons and I use gain control to avoid clipping from DSP processes. Occasionally I will go with a simple clean signal and I do hear a difference. Is it better? There’s no way to know because there’s no way to level match. I think you just have to try it and see. Short answer, there’s no reason you can’t use volume levelling and gain control to achieve what you need.
I will do some testing myself as well with an intrinsically low-volume album and keep the same dB output to my speakers, both with and without attenuation.
You don’t need to worry about headroom for peaks when using volume levelling to lower the gain. Only if you are using anything that increases it (such as an EQ stage that might have boosts)
It is possible for volume levelling to increase gain if the recording is ‘quiet’. I’ve seen a +4LUFS increase on one cd rip, albeit with a more typical target of -14LUFS. It’s very unlikely to be an issue with a target of -25LUFS.
It is possible but I don’t think Roon will increase the gain past clipping in these cases. It seems to do a phantom +0.0dB in such a case. Foobar2000 will not increase to clipping point if it’s on the correct settings, even if you have a super quiet DVD rip that’s +10dB rg, and I thought Roon does the same.
I think Roon’s analysis takes account of ‘true peak’ too, so we shouldn’t see intersample ‘overs’ either.
There are a lot of factors to keep in mind when trying to understand what Roon is doing. Sometimes it’s not what you expect, but a bit of thought usually results in an ‘ah, I see…’ moment.