recording at 24 bit 48k?

[Knivez]

i know that recording at higher rates is the better way to go but i never fully understood why?

is it going to make a huge difference on the mix or the master?

its definitly a huge difference on memory usage

is it going to make your sound better? cleaner?

im just kinda lost on the whole recording bit rates and what not so if anyone can give me a good run down of it that would be awesome

[bouldersoundguy]

24/48 or 24/44.1 are both fine. Stay at one setting for the whole project until mastering and go to 16/44.1 at that stage.

[somegeezer]

I'd say keep to 44.1 for music. If you can, and have the space to do so, record at 24, 32... or whatever you can put it to. Then bring it down to 16 after recording to put to CD. If you are doing audio for DVD/film, 48 is definitely better for you than 44.1.

[ecktronic]

Recording at 24bit I would say is the norm these days. Compared to 16bit, 24bit recording mean you have much much more bits to work with so you can keep your recording levels lower. I tend to record to around -6dB peak.

As for 48kHz sample rate, make sure you stay at 48kHz the whole project until the Mastering, then you want to have your master finished to CD redbook standards, 44.1kHz, 16bit.

Recording at 48kHz is known as oversampling, this spread the same amount of noise that you would get in 44.1kHz recordings over the wider 48kHz, so when you down sample back to 44.1kHz there is less noise.

G

[TimOBrien]

The only good reasons to go 48k is if you're doing video (where the final file is 16bit/48k) or use hardware that is native 48k.

Otherwise just lock it down on 24bit/44.1k and worry about other more important things...

[Massive Master]

The only good reasons to go 48k is if you're doing video (where the final file is 16bit/48k) or use hardware that is native 48k.

Otherwise just lock it down on 24bit/44.1k and worry about other more important things...

Amen, brutha. Never understood why anyone would record at a video rate and then do the sloppiest possible resample for the lowest possible gain in fidelity (which is gone and then some by the time it's downsampled)... I see the rappers doing this a lot for some reason -

[DaleVO]

Knivez... Ditto what the others said.

Here is a good description that I read on another forum:
"Yes, you now have a faster sampling rate, with more layers to sample from. You've about doubled the size of the file.

With 16 bit audio, there are 65,536 possible levels to sample from at any frozen moment of time. Think if it as a picture, the more information the clearer the picture. With every bit increase of resolution, the number of levels double. By the time we get to 24 bit, we actually have 16,777,216 levels of information.

Then we add the sample rate. This is the number of times your audio is sampled per second. With a sample rate of 44.1 kHz there are 44,100 slices sampled every second. With 96khz there are 96,000 slices of audio sampled evert second.

Your original file is 16bit, 44.1 so that is 44,100 slices, each having 65,536 levels. Increasing to 96kHz, would give you 96,000 slices a second with nearly 17 million levels for every slice.

Recording at 24/96 yields greatly increased audio resolution-over 250 times that at 16/44.1. That is why for VO I always record at 24 bit (24/44.1) for radio. For video I record at 48 khz -most editors only use that sample rate- and anything for HD or Blue-ray I use 96kHz. (Sticking to 48kHz is not a bad idea across the board for even general VO work)

If you are hearing a difference make the change." Posted by Mike Sommer


Maybe more than you wanted.
Dale

[Ethan Winer]

i know that recording at higher rates is the better way to go but i never fully understood why?

Recording at high sample rates and large bit depths is not better than CD quality for most situations. If your end product is a CD, then it's better to just record at 44.1 KHz and avoid a potential degradation from the sample rate conversion that's ultimately needed. As for bit depth, the only thing that affects is the noise floor. When was the last time you heard hiss on a CD that was from the CD itself?

The only time I'd bother recording at 24 bits is for a live event where there's a potential for unexpected loud volumes. With 24 bits you can record at -20 and still have a silent noise floor. Then again, even with "only" 16 bits, recording at a peak level of -20 is still quieter than the finest analog tape recorder.

--Ethan

[bouldersoundguy]

With 16 bit audio, there are 65,536 possible levels to sample from at any frozen moment of time. Think if it as a picture, the more information the clearer the picture. With every bit increase of resolution, the number of levels double. By the time we get to 24 bit, we actually have 16,777,216 levels of information.

The reason for recording at 24 bit is that it provides a lower noise floor so you can record at a lower level and not ever have to worry about clipping. Recordings done at 16 bit have exactly as much resolution as those done at 24 bit but with a higher noise floor.

[Bristol Posse]

Plugins will have to work harder at higher sample rates since they will have to process more samples per second and this will use more CPU or DSP power depending on what kind of plugs you use.

Also converters *May* be more comfortable working at some sample rates than at others


whether any of this makes any audible difference to you is really going to depend on how well the plugin is coded, how well the converters are designed and how much expectation bias you have picked up surfing recording sites

Some people swear they can hear a big enough difference in the recorded and plugin processed output to warrant recording at a higher sample rate and have to downsample to 44.1k or MP3 for distribution. Others say it is bunk

I'd say, as with so many audio questions, so long as you have the disk space and CPU/DSP power to handle it, you should do whatever floats your boat

YMMV