"I have read your articles about 0 reference level as well as all the articles talking about the difference between analog and digital meters. I do mix down from my Allen-Heath GS3000 console. When I used to mix down to a DAT, since the DAT has an input control, I had no problem getting the level getting high on the DAT tape. Since I moved to an Alesis MasterLink, I only get about -9 peak on the digital meter of the MasterLink. Now I understand all you have said about 0 reference level and so on and so forth, so the question is: am I OK at -9 on my digital meter and let the mastering guys worry about getting it to 0 digital during mastering? Or do I try to get my level higher by using a Limiter such as Aphex Dominator etc. between the console and the MasterLink? Of course I can mix hotter directly from the console as you have suggested, but doing so also raises the noise level coming out from the analog console. In short, I believe that there is a level where everything merges together well and raising every fader up is not the right way of doing a final mix. Also some sounds do sound harsh when I raise the fader up too much. I am afraid that if I take to a mastering house, I will come up with the same noise problem. Obviously, when calling the different manufacturers involved, everybody seems to have a different answer."

There are several points to address here:

Once noise is present in a system or recording raising the level of any subsequent gain stage will raise the noise level the same amount (not more, not less). It doesn't matter whether the level gets raised by you or the mastering house. Often we hear people refer to things getting 'more noisy' under similar circumstances to yours. This is generally not what is happening. The noise is being increased in volume along with the music (the ratio of signal to noise should remain the same). It's probably just that you can now hear it above the ambient noise of your listening environment.

All other things being equal digital recordings will have greater resolution and potentially sound better as the signal approaches 0 dBFS. In practice your -9 level is not a major problem. In a 24 bit system a -9 dBFS signal still has significantly more resolution than a 0 dBFS signal does in a 16 bit system. If you are recording these masters at 16 bit then you really need to find a way to get the level up closer to 0 dBFS before the signal gets recorded. This may mean adding another gain stage in between (such as a limiter or something), but I would think you could just turn up the output of your mixer and accomplish what you need. If it's already maxed out we may have another problem. Make sure the output of your mixer is operating at a level consistent with what the corresponding input on the MasterLink expects. The MasterLink has both +4 dBu and -10 dBV inputs. Make sure you aren't trying to drive a +4 dBu input with a -10 dBV output (see our Summit on +4/-10 for more than you ever wanted to know about that topic). If that's not a problem then you may have a problem with your individual channel levels.

You didn't specify where your individual faders are during this mix, but if you are having trouble getting enough level out of the board I suspect your individual channels might be too low. If you operate analog gear at lower than optimal levels your signal to noise ratio is compromised. Given your reference to too much noise and to not enough level I suspect this may be the case. The solution is to go ahead and raise those individual faders up. Of course the problem could have occurred upon the initial recording to your multitrack recorder as well so you need to check those levels too. Keeping proper levels throughout the recording process, not just at the end, is critical. If you do this, and if you have the right connections between the mixer and the MasterLink you shouldn't have trouble getting a higher level recorded, though it may mean driving the output of your mixer pretty hard.

In analog you are always working in that space between distortion at high levels and too much noise at low levels (otherwise known as the usable dynamic range). If you are careful throughout the recording process and at the end have your audio in just the right range between this noise and distortion, but still can't get the level desired to your MasterLink then I would suggest using a clean gain stage in between to turn it up. Again, this is only critical if you are recording at 16 bit. If you are making the recordings at 24 bit it's probably not necessary to worry about it.