A stereo noise gate. It mutes the signal whenever it falls below a threshold, so hiss, hum and spill between phrases disappear while the notes you played come through.
Controls
- Threshold (−100 to 0 dB, default −40 dB) is the level the signal has to clear before anything gets through. Set it just above the noise floor and below the quietest note you care about. Around −60 dB only catches true silence; above about −12 dB a normal mix breaks into fragments.
- Smoothing (5 to 500 ms, default 50 ms) is how long the gate takes to open and close. Short settings keep transients and leave clean silence between hits, but can chatter on notes that hover near the threshold. Long settings fade in and out smoothly and soften attacks.
- Mix (default 100%) blends the gated sound with the untouched one. Below 100% the gate becomes a gentle expander: quiet passages are turned down rather than silenced.
The threshold fader shows the setting, not the incoming level. Left and right are gated separately, each on its own level.
Getting started
Gate is an audio effect. It is most useful on material with gaps and a noise floor, such as a guitar take or a vocal: listen to the spaces between phrases, not the notes. The presets are starting points, since the right threshold depends on the source:
- Noise Floor removes hiss between phrases and nothing else.
- Tight Drums opens and closes fast, so hits survive and tails are cut.
- Expander is half wet and forgiving on sounds with a natural decay.
- Stutter lets only the loudest peaks through.
- Soft Swell fades in and out instead of switching.
- Default is a moderate threshold with a gentle transition.
Expect to move Threshold after loading any of them.
Limits
There are no separate attack, hold or release controls and no sidechain input.
