Click the F1 keyboard key each time you need a context-dependent advice on DART, e.g. information about a selected menu item or a dialog box.
To obtain information about an active soundfile choose the 'File info' command from the 'File' menu, or click the INFO button situated on the toolbar.
By positioning the cursor on the overview strip and dragging the mouse with the right mouse button held down you can mark a block of samples.
In order to move the 'Info' window, displayed in the upper-right corner of the soundfile window, click it and drag to a new position. You can also remove the 'Info' window by unchecking the 'Info' command available from the 'Shortcut menu' (appearing on the screen when you click the right mouse button).
The boxes situated on the left side of each detection window are used to select bits for the purpose of editing (which is one the way of correcting declicking mistakes).
The green boxes placed on the right side of each detection window, display the values of signal bits at the current cursor position (if the box is lit, the corresponding bit equals one).
LEFT/RIGHT ARROW = move cursor by one pixel to the left/right \n CTRL+LEFT/RIGHT ARROW = move cursor by 10 pixels to the left/right \n ALT+CTRL+LEFT/RIGHT ARROW = move cursor by 100 pixels to the left/right
F11 = move cursor to the beginning of the block \n F12 = move cursor to the end of the block \n HOME = move cursor to the beginning of the file \n END = move cursor to the end of the file \n TAB = center contents of an active window around the cursor
> = move cursor to the next marker \n < = move cursor to the previous marker
PAGE UP/DOWN = increase/decrease the time zoom coefficient by a factor of 2 \n CTRL+PAGE UP/DOWN = increase/decrease the time zoom coefficient by a factor of 10
UP/DOWN ARROW = increase/decrease the volume zoom by a factor of 2 \n CTRL+UP/DOWN ARROW = increase/decrease the volume zoom by a factor of 8 \n CTRL+HOME = restore the zero offset
To move the contents of the active window by one pixel to the left/right, click the left/right scrollbar arrow while holding down the CTRL key.
SPACE bar (when not playing) = repeat the last-used play command \n SPACE bar (during playback) = stop playing and restore the initial cursor position (stop & return) \n ESC (during playback) = stop playing and preserve the current cursor position (stop & stay)
When the 'Play and show' box in the 'Preferences\Sound card' dialog is checked, the plot of an audio signal shown in an active soundfile window is swept during playback (only when the 'Play all' or 'Play from the cursor' commands are used). To avoid skipping during playback, the time zoom factors equal to at least 100 are recommended when the 'Play and Show' option is switched on.
The 'Play mix' (X) command can be used to switch between the two soundfiles played back simultaneously. In order to use this option mark one of the files as a source soundfile and the other one as a destination soundfile. After activating 'Play mix' the system will switch between the two indicated soundfiles each time you press the TAB key. The playback is always started from the source soundfile (from the current cursor position) and terminated when the end of the shorter of two files is reached. The switched-mode playing is a very convenient way of comparing the results of restoration with the original recording.
Framing a disturbance can be achieved by localizing it at the very beginning and at the very end of two partially overlapping fragments of the recording, respectively (if the disturbance is present in both segments it must be contained in their common area). To set a frame use the 'Set/Remove frame' command available from the 'Edit' menu.
Local cutting of an unwanted audio material may be an efficient tool for elimination of disturbances. If the removed fragment is sufficiently short and the signal on its right hand side is a ônatural continuationö of the one observed on its left hand side, our auditory system can be easily fooled - the disturbance is lost without a trace. 'Smart cut' is a tool which is capable of localizing such ônatural continuationsö by itself, saving a lot of time and efforts.
Local muting may introduce discontinuities at both edges of a selected block, usually heard as clicks. To avoid discontinuity problems use the 'Smart mute' tool available from the 'Toolbox' menu.
Drop markers can be deployed in a soundfile during playback, e.g. to distinguish fragments that require further processing. All you have to do is initialize playback and press the ENTER key each time you wish to mark the currently played fragment. Drop markers are labeled with consecutive numbers and can be handled (localized, removed) in exactly the same manner as ordinary markers.
The shortcut menu appears on the screen each time you press the right mouse button. It allows you to: choose among the five resolution options (1, 10, 100, 1000, 'Fit to size'), remove/restore the small info window, displayed in the upper right corner of each file window and choose among the recently used editing commands.
The overlooked noise pulses, as well as some large-scale disturbances, can be localized by examining condensed signal plots. Try choosing the time zoom coefficient in the range <4, 16>.
If you have problems localizing a short-lived disturbance try analyzing the signal time-frequency spectrum (displayed after pressing the SPECTRAL VIEW button, situated on the toolbar) in the vicinity of the troubled area. If any of the spectral graphs stands out from the neighboring ones the corresponding time frame is likely to contain the source of your problem.
For certain classes of disturbances, backward time processing gives better results than forward time analysis. For example, clicks with soft (round) front edges and sharp back edges usually fall into this category. Backward time processing can be easily realized using multi-component configurable restoration filters, accessible from the 'Restore\MyFilter' menu.
At any time, any given collection of opened files can be saved as a group of files. When saving such a group, DART XP Pro creates a configuration file <groupname.dgr> which contains information about the current system status including the list of opened files, the source/destination assignment, synchronization details, cursor, marker and frame positions, time resolution and scale settings etc. Because of this, whenever you open an existing group, you will find everything in exactly the same order as at the time of saving.
If you enable the 'Autosave' option in the 'Preferences' dialog, available from the 'Options' menu, the system will save - by means of creating the configuration file <autogrp.dgr> - the information about all files open at the time of quitting DART XP Pro. These files will be automatically loaded when you start the system again.
If you register the original archive soundfile as a root soundfile, the DART XP Pro librarian, called the Soundfile Manager, will help you to organize and keep track of all renovation experiments involving that file. Soundfile Manager creates and updates special database files <rootname.sfm> which contain information about all files derived from a given root file and form a 'family tree' called an audio tree. By evoking an audio tree, you can easily review and listen to the results obtained for a particular root soundfile.
In order to analyze and efficiently compare different versions of the same sound material, you can synchronize the displayed windows. The full synchronization (provided by default when you start a new session with DART XP Pro) guarantees that all changes in display features made in the active soundfile window (position of the cursor, time zoom, volume zoom, offset, left/right channel selection, marker and block locations, info) will be automatically extended to other windows shown on the screen.If you want to select custom features to be synchronized, or to disable synchronization, choose the appropriate option using the 'Synchronization' dialog box accessible from the 'Window' menu.
If you enable the record level peak hold function by checking the 'Peak hold in Record' checkbox in the 'Preferences' dialog, available from the 'Options' menu, the indicators corresponding to the highest level observed during a recording session will burn continuously (they can be reseted by clicking anywhere on the bar graphs).
For your convenience the clipping lock function is provided - to enable it check the 'Clipping lock in Record' box in the 'Preferences' dialog available from the 'Options' menu. The clipping lock allows you to check whether any clipping problems occurred during recording (which is useful if you canÆt watch the bar graphs all the time during recording). To reset a clipping, lock click on the corresponding indicator.
Markers and click markers are not permanent, i.e. they disappear when you close a soundfile and are not brought back when you open it again. However, you can save the current positions of all markers by saving a group of soundfiles (choose 'Save as' from the 'Group' menu).
Frames are not permanent, i.e. the frame is not restored when the corresponding soundfile window is closed and opened again. However, you can save the current position of all frames by saving a group of soundfiles (choose 'Save as' from the 'Group' menu).
Working with large resolution factors may result in very long times needed to draw or redraw signal plots, especially if the corresponding windows are synchronized. To speed up plotting, at a price of reduced visual accuracy, check the 'Enable turbo plotting' box in the 'Preferences' dialog, available from the 'Options' menu. If you don't want to compromise drawing accuracy, minimize all windows that are not used at the moment (as long as the window remains minimized DART XP Pro simply 'freezes' its content) or turn the synchronization off (press the SYNCHRONIZE button situated on the toolbar).
When synchronization is switched on, the default time zoom will be applied to the the first of the newly opened soundfiles only. You can overcome this limitation by switching off synchronization among the displayed windows. This may be particularly useful should you prefer to work with the 'View all' resolution applied to all signal plots shown on the screen.
For each soundfile window the horizontal (time) axis is calibrated in hours, minutes and seconds or in samples. To select or change the calibration units, use the 'Time scale' box in the 'Preferences' dialog, available from the 'Options' menu.
If you audition the soundfile using the 'Play window' (W) or 'Play block' (B) commands, make sure that the selected material is long enough - your audio card will fail to reproduce sounds that are too short, e.g., are a fraction of a second in duration.
To help you compare several variants of the recording with different sampling rates, a special time synchronization feature was added to the 'Options' dialog available from the 'Setup' menu. When the 'Time sync' box is checked, and synchronization is switched on, the cursors in all displayed windows are automatically time-aligned. This means that if the 'Play local' command is used the same portion of the audio material will be played back irrespective of the corresponding sampling rates. Similarly, when a block of samples is selected in an active window the appropriately scaled (contracted or extended) blocks will be marked in the remaining windows.
