Android Ramblings, Craigslist Adventures, Technical Nonsense

I actually made a post on reddit about this a little bit ago, so I thought it might be a good idea to explain in more detail here.

There are an awful lot of settings available in MicDroid, and here's a bit more explanation about what they do.

Android Settings
Prevent Screen Lock: Self-explanatory, screen won't turn off while recording if this is on.
Enable Ads: Self-explanatory, disable this to not show ads.

Recording Settings
Enable Live Correction: Enables playback of tuned sound over speakers in realtime. Requires headphones, otherwise you get really nasty feedback. Also requires that your phone be powerful enough to run it. Realistically this means anything with an ARM v7 chip, which is pretty much all phones after the Motorola Droid 1 except the MyTouch Slide, HTC Aria, and any Samsung phone not as powerful as the Galaxy S (Galaxy, Intercept, etc).
Change Sample Rate: Allows user to change the sample rate of the recording from 44.1kHz to 8kHz. Higher numbers means better sound typically, although it does require your phone to be a bit more powerful. Also, not all phones can record at all sample rates. If you are having trouble getting your phone to record, try changing this to 8kHz or 22kHz.
Change Buffer Size: Allows user to change the buffer size (indirectly). Larger values means the buffer is larger. This value is actually a multiplier, so the difference between an 8x value and a 16x value is VERY large. Larger buffers mean there will be less skipping if your phone can't keep up with the recording and processing. Larger buffers also take much longer to fill than smaller ones, so if you are using Live Correction, it is HIGHLY recommended you keep this number SMALL. Samsung Galaxy S* users are recommended to bump up this setting if they experience trouble recording.

Key Settings
Change Key: Self-explanatory, this allows the user to change the key the program is tuning to. For purposes of this program, minor keys are the same as the relative major key. Musically this is not exactly correct, but due to the way the program processes the notes (it looks at key signature, not the order of notes), there is no difference. 

Pitch Settings
Pull to Fixed Pitch: This oddly named setting controls the degree to which the pitch you hear is your voice, versus a specific pitch (Concert A by default). Higher numbers make it sound more like a generated tone. This should be defaulted to 0.0.
Pitch Shift: Controls how many notes the output is shifted by. Setting negative numbers tends to make the sound deeper, positive numbers tends to make the sound squeakier. Usually you don't need to change this setting too much, maybe a few notes negative if you find the default makes you sound rather chipmunk-like. 

Correction Settings
Correction Strength: This aptly named setting controls the strength of the auto-correction. Higher numbers implies you want the program to make your voice sound more like the correct pitch. Leaving this at Full is generally fine.
Correction Smoothness: This setting controls how gradual the transition is from tuned note to tuned note. For a more natural sound (similar to what is used for vocals in most songs), set this to 'Some' or more. For the T-Pain/Madonna effect, this NEEDS to be set to 'No Smoothing'. The abrupt transitions between tuned notes is what gives this setting it's signature robotic sound. 
Formant Correction: Allows formant correction. This option allows the following to be changed, but does nothing by itself if the Warp Amount is not changed. 
Correction Warp Amount: This setting is meant to fix the chipmunk sound that frequently happens. Negative values attempt to counteract this by making the sound deeper. Positive values seem to make the sound even squeakier. I personally find that this setting is generally unneeded, as pitch-shifting tends to give a better result. Probably a better idea to use negative numbers, if at all.
Mix: This setting changes the amount of tuned (processed) sound output versus original (unprocessed) sound. Generally you want the tuned signal, as that's why you're running this app. :P

Default Settings
Reset to Default: self-explanatory, resets all settings to default.

*Samsung Galaxy S: These phones include the T-Mobile Vibrant, AT&T Captivate, Verizon Fascinate, and Sprint Epic 4G and US Cellular Mesmerize.