Can you hear MP3 now?

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This AM I downloaded the audio for the Republican Primary 2012 Debate from the 19th. Before anyone asks, I feel strongly about listening to ALL candidates before making any voting decisions.

The issue is that nearly every version of the audio and video I found has horribly low sound levels. On a PC, you’d use a 3rd-Party product to re-code the MP3 to a higher audio rate, lose a little bit of quality, but get a file you could hear clear sound on.

On a Mac, it’s actually easier!

Credit where it’s due, I found the basic instructions here on POI-Factory, but there were some hiccups along the way with iTunes 10.5.1 (the current version for Lion).

First, download the audio. You can get it from wherever you want, I found it on Ron Paul’s podcast. His Podcast team has been posting the audio from every debate within 24 hours, so very convenient; and I didn’t have to do anything quasi-legal like recording the YouTube version.

Next, load the audio that’s too low into iTunes. The easiest way is to just drag and drop the file from wherever you downloaded it right into a playlist. If the audio in question is a podcast, then you can just find the podcast episode in iTunes.

Right-click (CTRL-Click) the track in iTunes and go to “Get Info”

Go to the Options tab

Slide the Volume slider to the right to increase the volume level for just this track and hit OK.

This may take a little trial and error to find the right level for you, but iTunes will remember the level each time you hit OK.

By the way, the same trick works to LOWER the levels, should you ever download an audio file that has the levels set way too high.

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