Starting to seriously record with Cubase. A simple question! (Bitrate/proj. settings)

xgarmothx

xgarmothx

Shredmaster Alpha
Thanks guys,

I've been using Cubase for some time, but am only now going about recording a full record.

I have 2 GB of RAM in a 2.6 GhZ PC - what bitrate, etc. (project settings) should I record at to get the best possible sound without "overdoing it" (as in, "any higher and I won't notice a difference, but it will tax the hell out of my system resources")?
 
xgarmothx said:
Thanks guys,

I've been using Cubase for some time, but am only now going about recording a full record.

I have 2 GB of RAM in a 2.6 GhZ PC - what bitrate, etc. (project settings) should I record at to get the best possible sound without "overdoing it" (as in, "any higher and I won't notice a difference, but it will tax the hell out of my system resources")?
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You should use 24/44.1 for recording and processing.
 
most recordings would be fine with 24/44k but there is some evedence to suggest that some fx sound better at 96 and some latency issues improve there as well...
 
Latency effects latency because all audio interfaces have to buffer a certain amount of samples into temporary memory. Because 96khz is twice the sample rate of 48khz (48khz and 96khz was chosen for easy mathematical reasons), theres double the amount of information that has to be buffered at one time.

So say you set your buffer settings at 1000 samples.

1000/48000 equals a latency of 20.8 ms
1000/96000 equals a latency 10.4ms.

Sound On Sound did a great article about this.

Hope I explained it simply enough.

24 bit/44.1khz is perfect for most recordings.

(Edit: forgot to mention that since 96khz is twice the information to process it bogs the computer down much more allowing less tracks and effects that can run at one time. not to mention twice the space being used on your hard drive.)
 
um, that is an article about midi latency and it is 5 years old and has NO relevance about what he is talking about

1000/48000 equals a latency of 20.8 ms
1000/96000 equals a latency 10.4ms.
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??? How do you figure that out? a 96K sample rate will will have twice as much info so how can a comp process it faster? Bollocks..

24/44.1 is what you should be recording at if you plan on releasing it yourself. The only reason I would ever consider recording higher would be if it was being mastered professionally where they would bring it back to the analog realm for processing.

what you have to understand with latency is that for the most part (i.e. recording live instruments) it is a non-issue since your monitoring chain should exclude the computer completely and cubase will do the rest. I recorded for YEARS using a dual P3 933 using SX2 with 8 tracks at then overlaid vocals and had no problems, latency was not even an issue for recording. Where it will be an issue is when you start using VSTis and will be feeding it a live signal (midi or analog) so what you are playing/singing etc will have a delay to it
 
altitude909 said:
um, that is an article about midi latency and it is 5 years old and has NO relevance about what he is talking about
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although i wasn't refering to that article .... his explanation is pretty much the way it was explained to me... and it is at the cost of some tracks as i understand it...
 
Oops, I posted the wrong article. I had it bookmarked and me being in a hurry I saw the title and thought that was the one. I'll look for the right one and post it. However it is irrelevant at this point. I agree 100%, 24/44.1.

It seems as though it should have more latency because the computer has to work harder. But instead of saying its not true, first try it for yourself. Open what ever audio program you record in and switch it to 96khz. Watch your latency for your interface drop before your eyes. Trust me I wouldn't have posted it if I didn't do the research first.
 
and how do you go about testing it? Try using something concrete like the Cetrance latency tester since what you are saying is not really possible. An audio buffer set set by you or your audio app (say 64 samples), the lower the buffer, the faster data is processed therefore less latency. When you go from 24/44.1 to 24/96 you are effectively getting twice as much data, so what you are stating is that the computer can process twice as much info faster? The ONLY time I would believe that this would be the case would be if you were using a game soundcard like a soundblaster which has a fixed sample rate and running below that would actually result in a longer roundtrip time since the card has to convert the audio stream on the fly
 
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he's right enough, the higher the sample rate the lower the latency.

if I go to my delta 1010 control panel and up the sample rate to 96KHz it drops to 2.9ms at 48KHz it's at 5.8ms ;)
 
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