On Dec 21, 11:01*am, msg wrote:
Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article zaQaj.261484$Fc.202074@attbi_s21,
* *Chuck ! wrote:

It's nearly too late now since the new TV's have AVL built-in to adjust
volume increases during commercials, but I am very surprised nobody ever
built a "good" add-on aftermarket volume-leveler all these years. *Why
would it be so hard to build a good yet inexpensive one?

*Have you heard the results of these built in ones? Ok, I suppose, if your
standards stop at AM radio quality.

*The snag with this sort of device is it has to have a fast attack time to
work and a fairly slow recovery. And will work on any programme peak - not
just commercials. Make it fast attack and fast recovery and background
sounds will pump up and down - most unpleasant.

I am replying without first searching the web, but I do remember seeing
adverts over the years for a variety of ALC devices for TVs; the good ones
IIRC used to inspect the vertical interval for clues to program changes,
and also used timing heuristics to predict commercial placement. *I
believe that such a device using learning algorithms with human training
input would have been _very_ effective, after all, at least in the U.S.
on major networks, a human can very easily predict when commercials occur
and when the level is excessive.

Regards,

Michael- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

There is special commercially available equipment made to reduce/
compress the spacing between words without changing the pitch of the
voice, so that the density of the sound is higher. The actual volume
is the same, but the increased density of the sound makes it seem
louder. This of course only works on prerecorded commercials, as a 35
second commercial can be reduced to 28-32 seconds using the
compression technique. At one time I worked at a radio station and
this feature was an added-cost item for advertisers.

H. R. (Bob) Hofmann