20 bit to 24 bit?

S

satnomb

New member
Hi all,
Newbie question: can I plug an 20 bit optical Spdif output to an 24 bit input? I just get a Mac G5 wich have an 24 bit input and I have a multitracks recorder wich have a 20 bit optical. I do some video editing on my G5 and I record my music on my multitracks. You see the goal? :) I want to put music on the film...
Thanks for your answer
Bernard
 
i think the 24 bit on the Mac card is just a maximum. they advertise it as 24 so it sounds cooler...but it should be able to do 24 bit and below without any conversion. your software program you use, however, might not use 20 bit. I think 20 bit was something DAT players used for awhile, but I've rarely seen it in most programs. Looking at Sound forge looks like it has 14 and 24, but no 20.
 
That make sens

I think you're right, the output of my multitracks should be mainly to do a mixdown and stay in digital domain and the use of a DAT for that make sens to me. You're right about the software too, I use Finalcut and i'm not shure I can configure the audio to accept 20 bit. May be I should buy a firewire audio card, something straight forward.

Thanks
Bernard
 
I use a tascam MA-AD8 and it is 20 bit. I hook it up the exact same way (option wise) as a 24 bit signal.

I believe this is the correct way to do it as the signal just adds placeholder data in the last 20 bits that are not significant ... but allow it to be read as 24 bit ?
 
satnomb said:
I think you're right, the output of my multitracks should be mainly to do a mixdown and stay in digital domain and the use of a DAT for that make sens to me. You're right about the software too, I use Finalcut and i'm not shure I can configure the audio to accept 20 bit. May be I should buy a firewire audio card, something straight forward.

Thanks
Bernard
Click to expand...

well, i didn't mean it wouldn't work in a 24 bit audio program...it just won't stay 20 bit. i think it'll just convert it to 24 bit, although this probably isn't optimal as it might change the sonic quality a little.
 
I'm not sure the audio quality is affected. I think it justs adds high order zeros.

e.g to change 3 bit 011 into 4 bit, it becomes 0011.....maybe
 
The quality should not be affected moving from 20 bit to 24 bit. The other way could certainly affect it. As long as the sample rate stays the same, there should be no real problem in changing word lengths:)
 
Great info

Thanks all
I think i'll just buy an optical cable and give a try. By the way the recorded data format of my multitrack is 16 bit linear, and i'm not shure of what exstatic calls the sample rate. In the user manual of my multitrack they say the sampling frequency is 44.1 Khz, wich is pretty standard I think. Are we talking the same thing?
 
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