OT is full of surprises 
Donāt hesitate to give your conclusions, itās always good to have some refresh 
Iāve had a few sets over the years where I was using the OT as my mixer and I would often have trouble with the sound guy where he would complain about my output being quiet. I tried balanced vs. unbalanced cables but eventually settled on a live setup with a powered mixer.
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I canāt change all my music to waste an entire track for a master track. plus that wouldnāt satisfy the cue outs which are used as aux outs. really, a work around shouldnāt be required.
Right, I have been using a powered mixer, but during production of the music I was attempting to bring the intensity to industry standards without having to push it via an external device, alternate track etc.
overall, thread followers, update forthcoming on gainstaging. I have yet to dig into the links provided; however, I did find the issue replicated on a few songs. On these songs, I have left mixer at 0, pushed track volumes to 127, placed amp volume at +63, and still the master mix is hovering at -18dbvu at best.
Generally mixers compensate for some of this, but that is a huge push required. Iāll dig deeper.
After reading a bit, I stand with the notion that the machine is very quiet.
This picture reflects the OT with main mixer at +63, Track volume at 127 and sample volume at +63. I did not add gain on sample attribute menu as it readily caused audible distortion.
I read about folks hitting unity gain by setting the OT mixer to +22 but that simply isnāt happening here. I might borrow a friends audio interface and see if that is the issue.
I am well versed with Reaper, so there isnāt an error on that end. The Windows Allen and Heath ICE-16 settings also show that the levels are at 100/100 24bit 44.1khz
Unity MAIN LEVEL is 0.
The signal on the right is peaking above 0db, so is that maybe OT normalising the volume on the left? Iāll do a similar test too for science.
But thatās different to the OT itself being quiet right?
This is where I defintiely canāt relate. I just had a kick and a snare on my OT last night and had to ease off both channel volumes because my mixer was saturating.
Thatās Line in on an A&H club mixer with 0db gain.
Is this definitely a volume issue and not a sound design issue? Is all the headroom being eaten up by sub-bass or something?
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My OT MKI isnāt. And it should be quieter than MKII.
It also depends on your audio interface settings. No -12 db pad or something ?
Could you compare these inputs with other gear ?
Is original sample normalised ? (Apparently yes, if it reaches 0db in DAW).
If so, there is something wrong. MAIN +63 adds +12db, (LEVEL 127 and VOL +63, Attributes Gain 0 are neutral), so it should distort
I do my tests with a normalised sine waveform. Distortion is clearly noticeable.
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@natehorn Please do test, I would appreciate it.
@natehorn and @sezare56
Unfortunately I cannot necessarily test other gear as I have no way to eliminate the interface, I simply have to test a different audio interface. The two juggling variables are the interface and the Octatrack. I sure wish it was the interface, and will keep my fingers crossed as this develops.
The image and sample depicted have just a lil sub showing and these images were with only a single sample playing. The sample in the OT (other than the aforementioned + for āvolumeā) and the Sample played by the DAW are IDENTICAL, there is absolutely no effects on either OT or in Reaper, the DAW.
The sample is not normalized via DAW or other hard/software process; it is simply at 0dB since I synthesized it at that level.
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Will do some experiments in the next few hours or so 
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The actual Ice-16 USB driver app doesnāt have a level feature, but these are the windows 10 settings. All maxed and tiptop as you can see.
rather late, so i need to sleep, but will also dig into Reaper to see if there might be something causing dB reduction. Would be a rather crappy default setting, and quite unlikely provided past direct to DAW recordings.
ā¦ot adds no audible additional noisefloor on itās naked outputsignal, evenwhen turned full levelā¦if u experience it, itās embedded in the samples alreadyā¦
part of itās design are various gainstages where u could mess up thingsā¦
main physical input is most tricky, since all u got are ledās, indicating levels by nothing but coloursā¦but even flashing red a ālittleā āsometimesā does not have to result in too hot signal inputsā¦
donāt use normalizeā¦
volume on amp page all up is only suitable for through machinesā¦
so end of the day, yes, all in all, u could say, ot is more one of the quiet onesā¦
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What about unchecking the 2 Exclusive mode options for test ?
As I said, there is something wrong with your settings, with MAIN +63, LEVEL 127, VOL +63, Attributes GAIN 0db it should distort if your sample reach 0db.
(MAIN +63 adds 12db, other settings are neutral).
Would you make a test with a sine wave normalized at 0db ?
Sorry for the non-update but I realised this was fiddlier than I thought as the FX send I use for the OT doesnāt have an obvious unity point and goes up to +6db - I always just dial it to ear but on this occasion that defeats the object - Iād have to move cables around - soā¦ update next time I fiddle with the OT properly
My Octatrack is loud as fuck. Ask my neighbors
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When I first got mine I used it at an open mic and the sound guy had to crank his gain and fader to get it right. I donāt think itās quiet but it would help to have a calibrated digital peak meter some place so you know where it is. Especially from project to project and depending on what your mixing, it can be hard to make everything match across projects.
Okay, did some tests. firstly, no worries @natehorn; I borrowed a friends OT to test my files, pattern remained. @PAPANOONGAKU, the cross project calibration was the initial plan which led down this rabbit hole. Hardcore techno was super hot due to onboard distortion while cleaner productions were super quiet. I was working to match everything when I discovered how short the IDM was regarding intensity.
@lowph yeah, it can get loud enough to merit a welfare check with effects or if you crank the gain or faders on the mixer.
In summary of this whole thread and my angle is, why do we need pre-amps to get our normalized 0dBvu samples to read 0dBvu on the receiving end. here are some tests I did this evening.
picture is a very expensive 220hz sine wave normalized to (nearly) 0dBvu as depicted. I used ReaFir to shelve out the harmonics prior to normalizing the sample. Normalization was completed in Reaper (which Iād trust to feed my cats if I went on vacation).
the other images include descriptions of signal path. All other values in the DAW are equal. No interface gainstaging possible per block diagram. Just OT -> interface -> Reaper.
My interpretation is, you will have to use intermediate gain whether pre-amp, mixer or the like between OT and Destination (speakers or DAW).
A sine wave donāt have harmonics. 
OT MAIN 0, LEVEL 127, VOL 0 should be -12db fs. Too much harmonics. FX should be off. Filter is on ?
What do you mean with 18db analog gain ? The sine seems very distortedā¦
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agreed. the distortion is concerning but probably a product of the sine wave generation and voice stacking with oscillator drift. The real issue is the -24dbvu.
I went ahead and confirmed. All settings are as you stated above and all effects, LFOs, amp features, playback features are all set to default, 0 or none as each case demands.
EDIT: The analogue gain is via a pre-amp.
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