Using Declicker

When to use Declicker

Declicker is useful for restoring for old vinyl and other phonograph recordings that are riddled with clicks, pops and crackles. Declicker can also remove a variety of short impulse noises from other sources, including some clicks caused by digital errors.

Automatic or Manual Declicking?

Declicker features both Manual and Automatic modes. Automatic mode can look at a whole file, or a selection, and detect and remove clicks and pops. For audio files that have clicks and pops throughout the file, Automatic declicking is the best choice as it will save you a lot of time. The Manual declick mode is useful when you want more precise control over repairing clicks, or in some cases where there are a few hard to fix clicks left over after running the Automatic declick mode. Manual declicking must be performed on each event individually.

Using Automatic Mode

When using the Automatic mode, start by setting the Maximum Click Width control, then adjust the sensitivity control to fine tune click attenuation. Before running declicker in automatic mode, it is a good idea to look at the Spectrogram display and visually identify clicks to inspect how wide they are, as this will help you see roughly what your Maximum Click Width and sensitivity should be set to.

Hit preview to hear the result of your settings, and as audio is playing back, fine tune the sensitivity and click width sliders to remove the most clicks and pops. The ideal setting should remove the most clicks without damaging transients in the program material. For example, drum hits may be mistaken for clicks at high Width and Sensitivity settings.

To better hear what is being removed, toggle the Output Clicks Only control during preview playback. This will let you hear what is being removed from the audio, allowing you to fine tune your settings.

NOTE: for material with clicks and pops of very different sizes, try running Declicker in several passes. Start with repairing short clicks, and then continue to longer ones.

Using Manual Mode

To locate clicks, display both waveform and spectrogram by dragging the waveform/spectrogram transparency slider to the center. Clicks will be visible as vertical lines on the spectrogram. To select a click precisely, zoom in and inspect the waveform. While spectrogram will help with finding clicks, the waveform display will help you accurately select click boundaries.

Select the click and press Apply. The click will be removed using interpolation from the surrounding audio data. If the result is not satisfactory, try adjusting Interpolation Order or other parameters. If the click or pop is very long, Declicker may cause a short level drop. In this case, consider using the Spectral Repair tool instead of Declicker.

Read more about Declicker controls in the Reference Guide.