24-bit 192-kHz Music Downloads and why they make no sense

combatentropy said:
Did you even read the article?
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The article only deals with frequency response, S/N, and dynamics. It does not address time domain issues in analog acoustic spaces. True this is more of a recording issue than a listening issue particularly. But the reason many serious audiophiles still prefer a pure analog signal chain even with less S/N and more limited theoretical dynamics has to do with spatial perception governed by time domain responses of human hearing. If you record an orchestra in an acoustically dead studio sound stage, there would be no perceptible difference between lower vs higher sampling rates. Record the same content in Fisher Hall and the differences become pretty obvious. I don't think ultra high sample rates are particularly useful necessarily, but there is significant difference between 16bit and 24bit sampling in spatial resolution.

I suffered a severe ear infection last fall that is still affecting my hearing. The left ear is still about 6dB down compared to the right though frequency response tests the same in both. But man has that ever screwed up my spatial and directional senses. There is a lot more complexity to human hearing than just frequency response and signal to noise ratios.
 
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Razz16mm said:
there is significant difference between 16bit and 24bit sampling in spatial resolution
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I'm not sure what you mean by spatial resolution. Surround? And how exactly is it affected by bit depth?

From what I understand, dynamic range is what is affected by bit depth. And from the article:

Handled correctly, the dynamic range of 16 bit audio reaches 120dB in practice . . . That's greater than the difference between a mosquito somewhere in the same room and a jackhammer a foot away.... or the difference between a deserted 'soundproof' room and a sound loud enough to cause hearing damage in seconds.
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Again, we are talking about distribution format. You may want to record or mix in 24 if you're doing a lot of pulling and stretching in post --- not unlike the way 10- or 12-bit video comes in handy in video post-production.
 
ullanta said:
Have you seen these? http://www.essentialsound.com/essence-power-cord/index.htm

They definitely make a difference to the sound when I listen to a system that uses them... it adds a sort of quiet quiet snickering, and the -163dB sound of eyes rolling. I like the fact that the endorsements imply that the sonic improvements might not be heard immediately so much as after a period of "breaking in."
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Holy Rip off Batman! What say we get into that business, $1,349.99 (introductory price) for a power cord... We can call ours Reference III and charge more.
 
Razz16mm said:
The article only deals with frequency response, S/N, and dynamics. It does not address time domain issues in analog acoustic spaces. True this is more of a recording issue than a listening issue particularly. But the reason many serious audiophiles still prefer a pure analog signal chain even with less S/N and more limited theoretical dynamics has to do with spatial perception governed by time domain responses of human hearing. If you record an orchestra in an acoustically dead studio sound stage, there would be no perceptible difference between lower vs higher sampling rates. Record the same content in Fisher Hall and the differences become pretty obvious. I don't think ultra high sample rates are particularly useful necessarily, but there is significant difference between 16bit and 24bit sampling in spatial resolution.
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First your mixing bit depth and sample rate. One might argue the point of "spacial resolution" as in relative timing between ears as being slightly better with higher sample rates since it would be a finer resolution. When it comes to "accuracy" though it all goes to hell if you playback over speakers. At that point it all gets very influenced by the room your in and the reflections and acoustics and of course your position. This also plays havoc with any "spacial resolution" also since the "error" induced by having your head a 1/10 of an inch from the ideal location swamps and gain you might have with a higher sample rate.

This is even worse when you stick a bunch of analog gear in the path. Those analog parts all have delays associated with them and unlike digital circuits where you can predict what that is and compensate the analog components are constantly changing because of heat, power draw and the generally limited ability to make two analog parts exactly the same. So not only are you going to have an unknown delay offset between channels but it's going to change dynamically.

In the real world these delays are so small that you don't notice but if your talking the micro delays for audio location and position it's significant.

I love analog and it's what I grew up with but all of this "more XYZ" mumbo jumbo that gets put out there is just marketing.

Most things aren't even recorded in a way that makes playing through speakers come anywhere close to a "performance" recreation.

They sound "good" but calling them "accurate" is like calling Jim Cameron's TITANIC a documentary.

If your source isn't accurate then nothing you do on playback is going to make it so.
 
ullanta said:
Have you seen these? http://www.essentialsound.com/essence-power-cord/index.htm

They definitely make a difference to the sound when I listen to a system that uses them... it adds a sort of quiet quiet snickering, and the -163dB sound of eyes rolling. I like the fact that the endorsements imply that the sonic improvements might not be heard immediately so much as after a period of "breaking in."
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Hoo boy. Here's my favorite part from that site:

Deep Cryogenic Treatment to -300°F
Cryogenic processing alters materials at the molecular level. This permanent, irreversible process releases residual stresses, and alleviates the negative effects of crystalline grain boundaries in copper and brass. This process effects a measurable reduction in the cord’s resistively for improved current flow. The result is an utterly "transparent" soundstage background.
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I'm gonna go right out and dip all my cables in liquid nitrogen. (It's pretty common where I work, on the engineering campus of a big university.)

- Greg
 
I should dip myself in cryogenic temperatures if it reduces residual stresses! :)

I always align my speakers with the natural N/S poles of the earth, that way, I don't get distortion called 'compass reflections' in my cone movement. Hehe.
 
Audiophiles can't tell the difference between Monster Cable and coat hangers

We've always believed that the perceived quality boost that comes from using high-end cables is really just a trick of the mind (read: justifying the ridiculous cost of premium cables to yourself) -- if you've dropped enough cash, you can probably hear anything you want. Still, our belief is one thing -- cold hard proof is another, and it looks like a group of 12 self-professed "audiophiles" recently couldn't tell the difference between Monster 1000 speaker cables and plain old coat hangers. Yeah, coat hangers. The group was A-Bing different cables, and unbeknownst to them, the engineer running the test swapped out a set of cables for coat hangers with soldered-on speaker connections. Not a single one was then able to tell the difference between the Monster Cable and the hangers, and all agreed that the hangers sounded excellent. No wonder Monster has to rig HD displays. Still, we bet people still fall for the hype -- oh hey, if you're looking for the ultimate in sound, we've got half a meter of oxygen-free, triple-wrapped double-insulated Sonically Shielded AmpliSized Egyptian Llama cable here that we'll part ways with for just a couple grand.
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http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/15412-post28.html

...just saying.
 
combatentropy said:
I'm not sure what you mean by spatial resolution. Surround? And how exactly is it affected by bit depth?

From what I understand, dynamic range is what is affected by bit depth. And from the article:



Again, we are talking about distribution format. You may want to record or mix in 24 if you're doing a lot of pulling and stretching in post --- not unlike the way 10- or 12-bit video comes in handy in video post-production.
Click to expand...

Noiz2 said:
First your mixing bit depth and sample rate. One might argue the point of "spacial resolution" as in relative timing between ears as being slightly better with higher sample rates since it would be a finer resolution. When it comes to "accuracy" though it all goes to hell if you playback over speakers. At that point it all gets very influenced by the room your in and the reflections and acoustics and of course your position. This also plays havoc with any "spacial resolution" also since the "error" induced by having your head a 1/10 of an inch from the ideal location swamps and gain you might have with a higher sample rate.

This is even worse when you stick a bunch of analog gear in the path. Those analog parts all have delays associated with them and unlike digital circuits where you can predict what that is and compensate the analog components are constantly changing because of heat, power draw and the generally limited ability to make two analog parts exactly the same. So not only are you going to have an unknown delay offset between channels but it's going to change dynamically.

In the real world these delays are so small that you don't notice but if your talking the micro delays for audio location and position it's significant.

I love analog and it's what I grew up with but all of this "more XYZ" mumbo jumbo that gets put out there is just marketing.

Most things aren't even recorded in a way that makes playing through speakers come anywhere close to a "performance" recreation.

They sound "good" but calling them "accurate" is like calling Jim Cameron's TITANIC a documentary.

If your source isn't accurate then nothing you do on playback is going to make it so.
Click to expand...

To put it in visual terms, people complain about banding in low contrast gradients like skies with 8 bit video, 10 bit gets rid of most of it, 12 bit is better. You can add noise to the 8 bit version to smooth over the banding (dithering), but the information to accurately produce the gradient in the first place is not there. Dithering 16 bit audio just covers up least significant bit digital artifacts that are quite audible in some kinds of recordings by raising the noise floor. But the resolution and dynamic range reserve necessary to reproduce the subtle dynamics and intermodulation products of complex sounds decaying over time in a reverberant acoustic space is not quite adequate at 16/44.1. This of course presumes that your playback equipment is adequate to resolve the differences in the first place. For most kinds of recordings and most audio systems I would agree that it isn't an issue.
 
I have a friend that spent thousands on speakers and was floored when I told him that most albums in the past 30 years are near field monitored on Yamaha NS10's that cost around $500 when they came out. If you don't know them they are the small black monitors with white woofers you see in almost every studio shot. I love that more expensive speakers hear more than the engineer that mixed the songs. Even the large monitors cost a lot less than these "audiophile" systems.
 
thekreative said:
I have a friend that spent thousands on speakers and was floored when I told him that most albums in the past 30 years are near field monitored on Yamaha NS10's that cost around $500 when they came out. If you don't know them they are the small black monitors with white woofers you see in almost every studio shot. I love that more expensive speakers hear more than the engineer that mixed the songs. Even the large monitors cost a lot less than these "audiophile" systems.
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Or the other wringer speaker, the auratone, which I have seen in many studios as well (also known as the horrortone)

:)
 
And of course, the number of award-winning and best-selling music recordings made with "botique" microphone cable is vanishingly close to zero.
 
Razz16mm said:
But the resolution and dynamic range reserve necessary to reproduce the subtle dynamics and intermodulation products of complex sounds decaying over time in a reverberant acoustic space is not quite adequate at 16/44.1. This of course presumes that your playback equipment is adequate to resolve the differences in the first place. For most kinds of recordings and most audio systems I would agree that it isn't an issue.
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??? So if you can't see the emperors cloths you just haven't spent enough on glasses?

For all the reasons I mentioned none of those subtle nuances are going to come into play if your listening over speakers in a space. Earphones maybe.

Your making me think you have spent more than a Sound Devices recorder on power cables and now have to justify that expense.

To me if it makes you feel super special then go for it. None of this stuff is going to hurt the sound, just your pocketbook. But your going to get more joy from other "devoted hobbyists" who have also spent big bucks on high end zip cord than you will from working professionals.
 
thekreative said:
I have a friend that spent thousands on speakers and was floored when I told him that most albums in the past 30 years are near field monitored on Yamaha NS10's that cost around $500 when they came out.
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Those Yamaha NS10's and Auratones are NOT used as mastering monitors, they are the standard check monitors for "real life" stereo systems. Mastering is done with Genelecs, PMCs, ATCs, ADAMs, Dynaudios, WhatEvers and at the end checked against a known standard "average" system.

And yes, 24 bits is nice when recording, but with a 16 bit CD we need to play the recording at around 120 dB SPL peak level to hear the noise floor. Who has the system, room and ears for that?

I know a guy who spent over $100000 on tri-wired speaker cables to "make sure he has the best possible cables". Never occurred to him that it would have been much much cheaper to construct a system without speaker cables, the ultimate solution (DACs next to power amps hard wired to speakers).
 
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