24bit.turtleside.com — A "quick-and-to-the-point" FAQ of 24-bit recording/listening. It's recently updated, but for EXHAUSTIVE details on 24-bit recording, go to www.24bitfaq.org. These are great resources for bootleggers and live concert collectors (like me!).
Oct 20, 2005 View in Crawl 4
snyderOct 21, 2005
P.S. This website is misleading and provided no actual intelligent or meaningful information about 24bit. If you want an actually informative website on all things audio technology, check out Hydrogenaudio.org . The creator of "--alt-preset standard", the most widely used preset for the LAME mp3 encoder (the best mp3 encoder in the world), created the Hydrogenaudio forums a few years back and it quickly became a major center point for audio technology advancements and analysis. The makers of the LAME mp3 encoder, Nero's AAC division, OGG's creators, and some of the best listening test organizers all post and contribute to the site on a regular basis. And they don't tolerate people coming in making claims like "this sounds better than this" without that person bringing proof or examples.
yamahasteveOct 21, 2005
Actually, 24bit audio is more of a "marketing" feature than a technological feature. At a nominal 6db of signal to noise ratio for each bit of resolution you would mathematically have 144db of signal to noise from the DAC (or ADC if you are recording it). You would be EXTREMELY hard pressed to build a device capable of that SN ratio... what does this mean? It means that the lower resolution bits are useless probably to around the 95-105 db signal to noise region, or about the 16 bit to 17.5 bit range. It would take a serious peice of equipment to actually have a measureable difference between a 16 and 24 bit recording; if possible at all.
schottyOct 21, 2005
to ambro:I havent seen that occur ever. All of my players (except maybe since I havent tested it, my 2 new DVD-R/W drives) will play the data as if the data was in 16/44.1. Now that means lower sampling or bitrates sound like the chipmunks and higher sounds like God is talking to me in a deep booming voice.Perhaps its just the age of my equipment that is of quality, and the lesser standard of others (car stereo, DVD player, etc).
fujoflyOct 21, 2005
Recording at higher sampling levels IE: 24bit/96khz gives you more information to mix with and a more accurate picture of the actual waveforms being sampled. Where this can really be noticed is in the quality of a reverb sounding more natural at higher resolutions, and the overall dynamic qualities of the audio source. The way to think of it is the difference between 72dpi and 150dpi in picture resolution. Both show the details of the picture, the 150dpi image shows the details and the nuances of the image better than the 72dpi image when finally printed. Record at a higher bit rate and mix down to low. But if you don't have a good pre's, mic's, or converters, or technique along the way a higher sampling rate won't fix any of your problems and it will only magnify them.
jarrodOct 21, 2005
Snyder:Have you ever heard a 24-bit recording or are you just hypothesizing and spreading FUD? I can tell a big difference between even a 16-bit recording made with a 44.1khz vs. a 48khz sampling frequency.
underbitemanOct 21, 2005
okay, I think some of you are confusing bit depth with sample rate. 24 bit gives you more dynamic range i.e. how strong the signal is, than 16 bit. If you are doing audio recording, you want to do it in 24 bit for the headroom (S/N ratio). But for the end product, there really is no significant advantage of 24 bit, because most of all commercial music are very heavily compressed/limited, never really utilizing the dynamic range advantage of 24 bit. As for the sample rate, that's a very hotly debated topic but for the 99.9% of consumer, their equipment is not going to have enough fidelity to allow them to discern the difference between 44.1 and 96, given that the person listening can actually tell the difference between the two (also less than 99.9%). So it's pretty much a mute point.
snyderOct 21, 2005
@jarrod.I'm not spreading fud. If I am one thing, I am a lover of audio. If you consider someone to be their job, then who I am is a music producer. I record in 24bit, so to answer your question, yes, I've heard 24bit.
kindrobotOct 21, 2005
I record all my individual audio tracks in 24 bit. The final mix is saved as well to both 24 bit and 16 bit wav. I CAN tell the difference between the 2, and it is not all dynamic range, although it is the most noticeable advantage. But it is NOT.. NOT the only difference. The difference is audible, even with compression/limiting.
peptisOct 22, 2005
kindrobot: You need to take more care when converting to 16 bit. If it is done properly you won't be able to tell the difference. You cannot simply save it to a 16 bit file without doing anything else.
crvernonOct 22, 2005
The typical home audio setup isn't even qualified to operate at 16-bit/44.1KHz so 24-bit audio isn't much of an advantage to the average user.Dynamic "range" is the ONLY thing that is affected by bit word length in a NORMAL audio file.*The 16-bit word offers 65,536 distinct dynamic levels.The 24-bit word offers 16,777,216 distinct dynamic levels.The frequency range is determined ONLY by the sampling rate.*They Nyquist Theorem implies that the sampling rate must be twice as high as the heard frequency to record it. Thus, the highest frequency that can be recorded on 96KHz equipment is 48KHz (a frquency 24KHz above the normal human hearing range.)If a unique 24-bit word is presented to your DA** converter 96,000 times every second (as it is with 24/96)thenthat converter is telling the magnet in your speaker to move the diaphragm (speaker cone) to one of 16,777,216 places each 96,000th of a second. And ... assuming that place 0 is 0 dB then place 16,777,216 would be around 145.8 dB.***Almost no consumer amplifiers have a signal-to-noise ratio of over 100 dB, which means that almost no consumer amplifier has a dynamic range of 0 - 100 dB.Check this out:<a class="user" href="http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6462_7-6333607-1.html?tag=prmo1">http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6462_7-6333607-1.html?tag=prmo1</a>See? Only 1 of the best of the best is rated at 110dB. None come near 145dB. But the truth is that these products don't need to have great dynamic rangebecause most commercial recordings are mastered to be extremely loud at all points. Movie soundtracks get a little bit more range, but not much.*Variable bitrate files, normally measured in kbps, excluded here.**Digital/Analog converters interpret digital (distinct) information and relay them to any analog (continuous) speaker.***some assumptions are happening here, but generally to calculate the dynamic "range" you would use [6(N) + 1.8 dB] where N is the bit word length. With this equation, a 16 bit recording would have a dynamic range of around 0 - 97.8 dB
vaudorMay 1, 2006
HelloI would like to ask a question to composers or music engineers out there. I make music based on samples (micro-samples I take out of cd or even mp3 pieces). I use Acid mostly as my host.Now, I used to have my acid projects in 16/44.1. Is there any benefit on starting a project with 24 bit depth, even if the original samples are in 16 bit ? My thinking is that it leaves mores bit depth fot the effects (reverb, compressor, etc). Knowing that I will have to mixdown to 16 bit in the end as this is for cd mastering.Any opinion will be appreciated. Also, if anyone knows acid, is there a way to convert a 16 bit project to 24...Thanks
mixermikeDec 12, 2007
heres my question. whats the point in recording in 24 bit if cd quality is 16 bit?