Recording At 24 Bit, 96 KHZ

  • Thread starter Thread starter Village Idiot
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JMarcomb said:
I havent seen an article about a sound engineer using 44.1
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If you're referring to what I saw as general consensus, it's not about what I read. I know a few engineers who work in Pro Tools ... they do this for a living and one of 'em is award-winning and nationally known. Keep in mind until earlier this year, Pro Tools went to 48KHz max. And the three engineers I know and talked about this with said they work in 44.1 because the math errors and general inaccuracies incurred in going from 48 to 44.1 for CD Redbook offset any gains in tracking at the higher rate. Anyway, my statements were just recaps of these engineer's opinions, and I respect their opinions because I've heard their work.

Since Pro Tools has been around and dominant among professionals for a while, it's safe to say we've all heard lots of commcercial releases recorded at lower than 88.2 or 96. I don't know if it will continue with PT HD out now. All I know is, my signal chain and skills probably don't merit worrying about it.

I'm getting myself into that zen state where I convince myself this is so. :)

Thanks for the added insight, Chess. I'm wondering if the 2" tape was more a benefit for physical reasons (behavior of analog signal) than 96 Hz is for its mathematical reasons?

And I agree: there's a difference in what runs through my 18-bit, 20-bit, and 24-bit converters that I have available. Of course, I'm not sure that difference isn't as much a quality issue as a bitrate issue, but, 24 sounds best, so that's what I'm usin'! Difference in 16-bit and 24-bit sessions using the 24-bit converters, too.
 
here's my take on this. You seem to get more headroom.

going for 24/96 recording:

And the downsampling to mp3 doesn't seem to suffer as much even though much MORE is being thrown away!

using the same signal path I get db incoming values that are much lower but when mixed down sound as clean as louder tracks tracked at 16/44.

Here's a sample encoded at 192 Kbps: 1895KB

Sounds clean to me and I had lots of room left over!

 
cominginsecond said:
With your PC I wouldn't even consider doing 96khz. The very, very slight added sonic advantage would be overcome by the endless headaches caused by the strain on your CPU.
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I totally agree.
 
geekgurl said:


Keep in mind until earlier this year, Pro Tools went to 48KHz max.

.
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Are you thinking of the 192khz system that came out this year?
 
JMarcomb said:
There is definitly a sound quality increase from 44.1 to 96

Can most people hear the difference? Not unless you have trained ears.
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Well..That's my point.
And that's why I am recording this at a higher resolution.
Because I DO hear the difference.

And like Brian Wilson, it will probably drive me crazy someday.

And there has been no strain on my CPU because I have been backing each track to it's own CD, thus clearing all the other tracks from my hard drive.

VI
 
charger said:

No. I think 9 out of 10 people will get the same results using 44.1 or 88.2. And that 10th person will be able to outspend you by hundreds of thousands of dollars.
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Actually, I spent 130.00 US for my soundcard.
 
And there has been no strain on my CPU because I have been backing each track to it's own CD, thus clearing all the other tracks from my hard drive.
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I'm not talking about storing the files, I'm talking about playing them back. If you record at 24/96 instead of 24/44.1, you will reduce the number of tracks you can play back by more than half. Is the slight, slight, slight sonic advantage really worth the reduction in track count? If you use processor intensive plug-ins, this reduction will be even worse, in my experience.
 
Hey Coming in Second:

You are probably going to be proven right.

I am just trying to get the absolute best out of these recordings with what I have available to do it with.

Every pro I read on the subject says to record at the highest KHZ, then dither down as needed until you reach main mixdown time, at which point get it to 44.1 so it will be CD compatible.

And I will dither down as needed by way of my CPU usage.

That's all I am trying to do.

It is a serious amount of work, but I just LOVE a challenge.

VI
 
Actually, I spent 130.00 US for my soundcard.
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You missed my point entirely. Your target format is 44.1 (CD), so if you go and record at 96 k and then do the same session at 44.1 k, in the end (on CD) I guarantee you you will not be able to tell me which one was recorded at the higher resolution. I've done this test several times with audio from 44.1 to 176.4, and in the end, off the CD, I could never tell. And yes, I have very good ears too.

Every pro I read on the subject says to record at the highest KHZ, then dither down as needed until you reach main mixdown time, at which point get it to 44.1 so it will be CD compatible.
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This may be true for pros, but remember, they are not performing nasty internal computer downsampling. They send their mixes to a mastering engineer, who uses extremely expensive (more likely $13,000 than $130) D/A converters to get the audio into his analog mastering chain, which probably consists of a couple hundred thousand dollars worth of gear. Then he sends this analog audio through an A/D converter that again, costs many thousands of dollars, to get it back on to the master at 44.1/16 bit. All of his digital gear is also meticulously clocked. There is no possible way that you will achieve results anywhere near this with your $130 soundcard. Sorry.

Also, "dithering" is the process of introducing extremely low-level noise to mask the results of quantization that occur when you reduce bit-depth, not sample rate. Any pro who tells you to "dither" from a higher sample rate to a lower one is not a pro, he's a moron. I think you may be confusing the fact that many pros say you should use higher "bit depths" when recording and mixing. Bit depths and sample rates are as different as grass and steel.

I invite you to post some mixes, I'd love to hear how this all sounds.
 
Village Idiot said:
Hey Coming in Second:

You are probably going to be proven right.

I am just trying to get the absolute best out of these recordings with what I have available to do it with.

Every pro I read on the subject says to record at the highest KHZ, then dither down as needed until you reach main mixdown time, at which point get it to 44.1 so it will be CD compatible.

And I will dither down as needed by way of my CPU usage.

That's all I am trying to do.

It is a serious amount of work, but I just LOVE a challenge.

VI
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I have read of a few pros who have stuck with 48 even though they have 96 and better available.

If you check out the link I posted earlier, you will discover that there are many who prefer 24/48 to 24/96 when it is converted to 16/44.1.
 
Damn i missed this one completely, DJ....

I would say with that system it will be hard to do it all at 24/96....i have a Celeron 500mhz. so beyond experimenting, ive never done anything past 24/44.1....if i had the resources i would do 24/88.2, but im pretty much in the same boat with you.....

if you do wanna stay 24/96 the whole way you may have to crank the buffers to max...fader movements may take a sec but it will help....also you could do submixes to help out......

also, if possible, dont use N-Tracks dither....mix it down but stay 24/96......but if thats all you have, thats cool......

so hows the recording going?......
 
@GEEKGIRL do you record at "different fur recording studio"????? its on frisco. im in vallejo. what type of music do you do????



CZAR
 
Gidge In That Houuussse!

There ya are...:D

I backed everything down to 24/44.1 tonight, and you know what?
I am just fine with that...

I will post a snippet of what it sounds like maybe later tonight.

The sessions are going great, and I've gotta say that I am rather proud of this little Audiophile 2496 card.

Of course, running everything thruu this MAckie 1604-VLZ PRO has been a great help! ;)

VI
 
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