Where each one sits
- Gain comes first, at the input. A quiet microphone needs it raised to reach a usable level; a hot source such as a line-level instrument needs it lowered to stop the signal distorting.
- Volume comes later and is an attenuation. One answer framed the pair as internal signal strength against perceived loudness.
- The consequence that matters: gain determines the level at which a track is stored, and volume has no bearing on the stored audio at all.
- One answer warned that not all equipment keeps the labels straight, so the position of a control in the signal path is a better guide than its name.
Gain staging, and why it removes hiss
The most useful idea in the thread was that this is a chain rather than a single control. Setting every link from source to output to pass as much signal as it can without clipping maximises signal against noise at each stage, so little noise reaches the end. One contributor described a demonstration where a correctly staged system, played very loud and then faded down, produced almost no hiss — against the audible hiss under loud music in most venues.
Setting it
- The common manufacturer guidance quoted was to raise gain until a clip indicator only occasionally flickers.
- But the loudest level short of clipping is not automatically the right one. One answer made the point that gain changes the character of what is recorded, not only its level.
- That matters most on voice, where how hard the preamp is driven and how close the performer works interact with the sound of the take.
- Set it before recording rather than during. Adjusting gain mid-take changes the noise floor partway through the file.
The short version
- Too little gain: a quiet recording that brings its noise floor up with it when you raise the level afterwards.
- Too much gain: clipping, which is not recoverable.
- Volume set wrong: nothing permanent, because it never touched the recording.