The advantages of recording analog

[BKKJohn]

Higher sampling rates actually affect bass tightness more than the high end (there was once a white paper on the Digidesign web site about this). But the main reason to sample above 48 kHz is for time/pitch manipulations. If a sound is recorded at 48kHz and stretched to double its length or dropped an octave, the number of data points is reduced to 24 k/sec, and the algorithm has to guess at what goes in between.

 

[sjjohnston]

What is "bass tightness" exactly?

If you have a signal whose highest frequency is below where the anti-aliasing filter affects the signal, the playback output signal should be exactly identical to the recorded input signal. Or at least, to the extent (if any) there's a difference it's not due to the digital encoding, but to the analog components in the signal path. I don't know how that figures into "tightness."

The point where the filter has an effect should be above 10k, which isn't "bass" by any normal definition.

If the main reason to sample above 48k is dropping speed and pitch, I'll happily do without, as I don't think I've ever dropped pitch by more than a few cents, and never dropped speed.

 

[Roozter]

Everytime I come across one of these digital vs analog things, it always perplexes me how one side wants the other to concede to their way of thinking. Who cares, really. If you like recording digitally, if it works for you, do it. If you like working with analog stuff, do it.

I don't understand why some people who record/mix digitally think that digital is "the way" and that people who do stuff analog are just being sentimental or nostalgic or something. I also don't get people who record analog constantly feeling like they have to prove their point that "it's better".

We really, none of us, have to justify why we do things the way we do. And we don't have to push others to work the way we do. Should we all concede and all of us use only one type of guitar for a recording (cause it sounds "the best") through one type of amp (again "the best") into one preamp, using one particular compressor through the same recording/mixing platform and then send all of our mixes to be mastered using the same person with the same equipment? How boring would that be?

I moved from strictly digital stuff to analog because I work at a chemical plant and stare at computer screens 12 hours a day with a mouse in my hand. When I'd get home and head into my little studio I got to where the last thing I wanted to do was look at a computer screen and touch a mouse. Plus, my studio looked like a computer lab and growing up the pictures I saw of studios and what a studio "looked like" looked nothing like mine. So, yea, I said it, for me, there's a bit of nostalgia involved. So what? It's my studio.

Since I've moved into the analog way of doing things I enjoy doing things much better. Is it perfect? No. Is it a pain in the ass sometimes? Yes. Could I get better results if I did stuff digitally? I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. The point is, its how I like doing things.

If someone wants to work completely ITB, then go for it. I won't try to stop you. I won't try to convince you working in the analog domain is better. Maybe for you, its not.

I also think that sometimes people get exited about a certain thing and it gets taken the wrong way. I know when I first got my humble analog set up, I think I posted on here that I thought my mixes sounded better, they were easier to mix, I used less compression, etc. Now, someone could have taken that as if I were saying "all analog is better, and everyone should do it." When, in fact, all it says is that, for me, it worked better.

Ok, my point is, do what you want, let others do the same. It's not that big a deal, really. In the grand scheme of things anyway.

That's my rant. Just had to get that out.

This is very true. And I agree. But sometimes I listen to tracks like Monkey Man and think "were doing it wrong, this is the way to record" which is why im dedicated to an analog/retro philosophy. Give me a Helios and some Ampex machines any day, it would be worth the headaches.

 

[leddy]

Well, I don't know too much about the math, but according to the Nyquist Shannon sampling theorem, once you have sampled about the Nyquist rate (that is, twice the amount of the highest frequency being recorded), further increases don't matter.

True, but you need a brick-wall low pass filter at the maximum frequency you want to record, in order to avoid "aliasing." Such a filter necessarily has some effect (aka "artifacts") below its cut-off frequency. I think the 60k number quoted would pretty clearly get all of that well out of audible range. Then again, some modest artifacts in the top half-octave that some people can hear doesn't exactly seem like a major issue to me. They're almost certainly more minor than the modest infidelities of tape decks.

Here's the Lavry white paper from where 60khz came:

http://www.lavryengineering.com/pdfs/lavry-white-paper-the_optimal_sample_rate_for_quality_audio.pdf

 

[CrowsofFritz]

Thanks for the paper. I'll read it later as I'm on my phone right now.