Create Great-Sounding Recordings in FreePBX using Audacity

Hi DJ. This is MT. I'm glad to make my first Geek-Post on this useful blog. I bet at least one other geek will appreciate our notes.

After asking yourself the age-old question of "Why Mailbox" (see video) you must ask yourself "Why Audacity recordings?" The answer is simple: better quality control.

It is important to understand that using X-lite or another softphone or even IP phone hardware to record your messages, voice mails, announcements and other such recordings limits you not only to the maximum quality of your headset mic or phone, but also to one mono track. With a bit of extra work you can mix down multiple tracks and create very high quality recordings for your callers to hear when they call you. Also, it seems that FreePBX has some kind of built in way of supposedly controlling the volume of the recordings that the caller hears (ever heard a complaint that your messages were too loud or too quiet?) but we have found that whatever that control is, doesn't give us full control of volume. By using Audacity, you can adjust, in detail, every aspect of the audio file.

Before you begin, you'll need to take note of something important. This is where I wasted no less than probably 4 hours. If you go to the 'System Recordings' section of your control panel you'll be greeted by what looks like a helpful message:

Alternatively, upload a recording in any supported asterisk format. Note that if you're using .wav, (eg, recorded with Microsoft Recorder) the file must be PCM Encoded, 16 Bits, at 8000Hz:

So, I obviously just copied those settings in Audacity.

(Sidetrack): You'll need Audacity (open source audio software) to do this, so grab that here: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ (/sidetrack)

So those settings above are missing something SUPER important. In fact, if you do not heed this, it simply won't work. It will seem like it's uploading. It might even seem like it uploaded, but your recording WILL fail. Here's the key. Your recording MUST BE MONO! So, once I figured that out (I had to deduce that, actually, by looking at the format requirements in the message!) I simply converted my Audacity project to mono from stereo and voila! It didn't work. Wha? Yeah. It still didn't work! So I wasted another two hours until I finally figured it out. Take SUPER special note of this gem. Not only does your Audacity project need to match the file requirements of the message, AND be a mono project, but it must also NOT CONTAIN ANY STEREO TRACKS! The problem I had is that a little music blip that I used was a stereo track and the file would not export correct to mono because of it. So, you must make sure that if you use any stereo tracks in your audio project that you make sure you manually set them to mono. Thankfully, it's really easy! You just go to your stereo track, click the little black arrow thing that points down and a menu appears where you can 'make mono track' (or something like that).

*090617 - correction: You must first click 'split stereo track' and then go back to the split tracks and do it again and click 'mono'.

Once you've made sure all your tracks are mono, and that your project is set to the correct format, you can export your project to one file which will become your message for your callers.

Before exporting, assure that your entire project is in the correct format. To do so, just go to 'edit/preferences/quality' and make sure it's like this (the last four I just kind of left as is):

-deafault sample rate: 8000Hz
-default sample format: 16bit
-real-time sample rate converter: fast-sinc interpolation <-- what is it?
-high-quality sample rate converter: high-quality sinc interpolation<-- what is it?
-real-time dither: none <-- what is it?
-high-quality dither: triangle <-- what is it?

Under the same window but under the 'file formats' tab, make sure the 'uncompressed export format' is set to 'WAV (Microsoft 16 bit PCM)'

You're ready to export!

To export, just go to 'file' and 'export as .wav'. To make sure your file is in the correct format, touch it with your mouse, right click, properties. In the 'general' tab you should see that it is a .wav file. In the summary tab, it MUST be like this:
-bit rate: 128kbs
-audio sample size: 16 bit
-channels: 1(mono)
-Audio sample rate: 8HZ
-Audio format: PCM

If it's not, go over this post again and adjust. Don't even try to use the file in your PBX box if it's not.

You've now determined that everything is good to go so now you need to get the audio file into your PBX. This is under 'system recordings' in your control panel. I would still recommend, at this point, just doing individual extension recordings using your hardware phone or softphone. Callers are used to this kind of quality and even expect it. I'm leery to even try a high quality extension recording unless the extension leads to a 'general department' and not an individual... but feel free to make a 12 inch remix techno recording for yourself. I think it's cool....

Anyways, if you can't figure out how to upload your recording to the system recordings, there's no hope for you anyways, so I won't bother explaining it.

Now that your recording is up there (let's assume it was an outgoing voice menu) now you need the actual voice menu so the thing works. that's called an IVR in PBX Land. You'll need to read my post called 'Setting up an IVR (Voice Menu) in FreePBX'

Until then. Stay geeky. Don't quit.