Would recording in 24 bit/48kHZ present a problem in the mastering process?

halfred

halfred

New member
I'm recording acoustic piano solos at home. I spoke via e-mail with several audio engineers a while back about having the music files mastered, eventually, for producing a CD. The engineers told me I should make sure to record in 24/96 format. However I'm considering a possibility of recording in 4 channel 24/48. Would that present difficulties?
 
halfred said:
I'm recording acoustic piano solos at home. I spoke via e-mail with several audio engineers a while back about having the music files mastered, eventually, for producing a CD. The engineers told me I should make sure to record in 24/96 format. However I'm considering a possibility of recording in 4 channel 24/48. Would that present difficulties?
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........ No
 
24/96 is for video, I think.
I use 24/48 because I use a stand alone recorder and I can but 24/44.1 is plenty. The idea is to capture everything even though you can't hear it.
I subscribe to that theory to a point but in the end, you'll be mixing down to 16/44.1. CD quality.
 
halfred said:
Any reason why they would say that?
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The Mastering Engineer wants you to record the best possible sample rate possible just so you can give him the best audio possible. 96 is higher quality than 48 but will take up more space on your computer. I'm not sure if I could hear the difference but plenty obviously can. It's a matter of your priority.

If you have the luxury of recording at 96 khz you may as well use it.

I would say that the difference between 48 and 96 khz is much less than 24 bit to 16 bit. That said, I would recommend recording at 24 bit all the time. And raise your sample rate (kHz) as to how much performance and disc space you have.

Hope this post makes some sense! There's no rules for recording but these settings have a direct correlation with sonic fidelity. The higher they are, the clearer your audio should be until a certain point that isn't as audible.. But then again your crappy snare will sound just like crap as it did at 41khz. :eek:
 
Erockrazor said:
The Mastering Engineer wants you to record the best possible sample rate possible just so you can give him the best audio possible. 96 is higher quality than 48 but will take up more space on your computer. I'm not sure if I could hear the difference but plenty obviously can. It's a matter of your priority.

If you have the luxury of recording at 96 khz you may as well use it.

I would say that the difference between 48 and 96 khz is much less than 24 bit to 16 bit. That said, I would recommend recording at 24 bit all the time. And raise your sample rate (kHz) as to how much performance and disc space you have.

Hope this post makes some sense! There's no rules for recording but these settings have a direct correlation with sonic fidelity. The higher they are, the clearer your audio should be until a certain point that isn't as audible.. But then again your crappy snare will sound just like crap as it did at 41khz. :eek:
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Thanks guys for the info.
 
(48kHz is for video also...)

The typical response of full-time industry professionals is that between 70 & 80% record at the target rate.

And without question - If you can't make an absolutely stellar - freakishly amazing - wonderfully worthy of the highest industry praise and put on "audio reference" lists everywhere type recording at 44.1kHz, upping the sample rate isn't going to mean squat.

I'd love to know the 96kHz guy's reasoning...

Side-noting a few things:
If you have the luxury of recording at 96 khz you may as well use it.
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If you can actually hear that your converters are doing a better job at 96kHz you may as well use it. Many do not. Some sound rather nice. Some sound considerably worse.

I would say that the difference between 48 and 96 khz is much less than 24 bit to 16 bit. That said, I would recommend recording at 24 bit all the time.
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Undoubtedly. The freakish resolution, the noise-floor that exceeds the dynamic range of human hearing (and without question, any gear that you're going to put through it) - That's a no-brainer.

"The industry" was more excited when 24-bit became the norm than when digital became the norm.
 
Nice post ErockDude and MassiveDude :D

I stay with 24, 44.1
I can't hear a difference betweem 44.1 and 96 and, like said, it's going to be a 16, 44.1 CD anyway.

The bits make a much bigger difference in quality, methinks.
 
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Well I always record at 16/44.1 because that is what is on CD's.

I made myself a rule that until I can get my 16/44.1 recordings to sound anywhere CLOSE to the pro 16/44.1's, then I'm ready to move up. I tend to screw up in other places that make much more of a difference than the bit/sampling rate. :o
 
And I understand your thinkin V-Dude :D

But I think if ya bumped it up to 24 bit in the tracking and mixing stage, and keep your levels down during both stages, you'd have so much more room to play with that your recordings would have a better chance to get CLOSE to the pro's.

Just a thought dude...:)
 
I'd still bump that up to 24-bit... Your software is almost undoubtedly throwing calculations in 32-bit (at least), so you might as well take advantage of the added resolution at the first opportunity.
 
Dogbreath said:
But I think if ya bumped it up to 24 bit in the tracking and mixing stage, and keep your levels down during both stages, you'd have so much more room to play with that your recordings would have a better chance to get CLOSE to the pro's.
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Massive Master said:
I'd still bump that up to 24-bit...
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+1 on the 24 bit.

For sample rate, I used to record at 96khz because I read that it gave the best sonic rendition, plugs induced less error especially when stacked and mastering engineers preferred as much data as they could get.

Thennnnn... I started listening to people like DogBreath and gave 44.1khz a try. To me, disk space isn't the question, it's processor resources that benefit the most. I couldn't hear any difference whatsoever, but my cpu useage dropped like a rock. And my UAD capacity at least doubled!!!
 
Massive Master said:
If you can actually hear that your converters are doing a better job at 96kHz you may as well use it. Many do not. Some sound rather nice. Some sound considerably worse.
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This is the key, IMHO. It's not a question of the sample rate itself making a difference, it doesn't. Period. What makes the difference - if any - is how well or not the converters your using perform at each sample rate.

If you can *honestly* hear a positive difference when using anything faster than 44.1, that would be the only reason IMHO to do it. If you can't hear the difference, or if it sounds worse to you, then don't do it. (BTW, this is all true of *any* sample rate, not just 96k and 44.1k)

That's step one.

Then step two is to decide whether the difference is ENOUGH to warrant it. I don't mean disk or CPU usage, though that is important to consider when mixing, of course. I'm talking about the potential audible cost of sample rate conversion at the mastering stage. The mastering man is going to need to convert a higher rate to 44.1 eventually, which will have some kind of effect on the sound. While that's usually fairly minimal, if the difference in quality between sample recording rates is also minimal, it may all just be a wash making the extra effort on both yours and the mastering guys part a matter of extra work for no real gain. Choose the higher sample rate only if the difference is so obvious as to clear any further audio cost hurdles down the road.

Then step three in the decision process (though maybe this should actually be step one), is to figure out of your mastering engineer is someone who actually has game or if it's just some schmoe with PTLE, Hair-Ball set to auto pilot, and a cracked copy of Waves, who figures that "mo' louda' is mo' betta" is all he needs to know to be an alleged "mastering engineer". If it's the later, the less you give him to do, the better. Just send him everything at 44.1 and be done with it.

Personally, with my current converters I'm firmly in the 44.1/24 camp.

G.
 
Well the theoretical frequency limit is about 22kHz recording at 44.1, which is higher than most ppl can hear anyway.. IME, the only time you need to use high sample rates like that is if you're recording music for dogs. Trust me, Dogbreath bitches like all hell if he can't hear enough 30k in the cyms...
 
suprstar said:
Well the theoretical frequency limit is about 22kHz recording at 44.1, which is higher than most ppl can hear anyway.. IME, the only time you need to use high sample rates like that is if you're recording music for dogs. Trust me, Dogbreath bitches like all hell if he can't hear enough 30k in the cyms...
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:mad: :mad: :mad: bastid.....bring dat 30k up. :mad:


:D

(love the pic btw :p)
 
It's nice to hear a nicer bass or piano note listening to songs rendered to 320 kbs and thru decent listening devices. But sometimes there's so much air it makes you feel a bit sick. It's a bit hard to explain. It's like when you walk thru the forest everything is cool, fresh smells etc, you enjoy the walk but if you really start to listen you'll hear all the freakier sounds that birds make and add to that the rustling in the trees you might start realising you are alone in the middle of a forest and start feeling apprehensive - like it becomes a bit more than background but entirely surrounds you and permeates into you.
Does that make any sense?
Sometimes it's a bit freaky hearing every nuance.
 
But I think if ya bumped it up to 24 bit in the tracking and mixing stage, and keep your levels down during both stages, you'd have so much more room to play with that your recordings would have a better chance to get CLOSE to the pro's.
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+ 1 more on the 24 bit.
The difference in sound is enormous and some of that quality does stick around after mastering.
As for 44.1 versus 48 or 96.... I hear a difference in my own stuff at 48 and although I doubt that any of it sticks, I'll give my recording the opportunity to sound as good as it can. In the end, it costs me nothing and my gear can handle it.
If I was still recording on the PC, I'd go back to 24/44.1.
One glitch can ruin a whole session.
 
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