Distortion in REC mode at 75% level....?

`greets


the other day I wanted to sample some sounds from a Roland SH32 synth but I was getting a distorted sound even though the peaks were at about 75% peak level in the REC mode window. I tried another SH32 sound and it was working fine even at more than 90% peak level.

I then looked at the distorted samples in TRIM mode and they did go over 0db. Does this mean that the REC window level meter shows the input level incorrectly and only on specific sounds, frequencies?

Could DC offset play a role in this? I think the distorted samples had some dc offset.

IMHO you should always trust your ears before you trust a meter -- but especally that meter while recording into that ADC. Hard to tell if it's the way the meter average is calculated or something to do with the limits of the ADC headroom for that device. Or both.

Of course there are no db increments on that meter so nobody can really say if it's callibrated or not.. I know where zero db is supposed to be on that meter because I've bypassed the internal ADC by spdif-ing from the output of an S5000. On an old hunk of studio iron like that you not only get numbers on that meter but you also notice that when you go past zero, you always distort, and never before. If you watch both meters you can see where the zero is on the 1k, but swiching from the digi to the analog in with the same signal running direct may not produce the same result above or below the zero line.