Hi-Res audio doesn't mean the audio contains more information.
Everyone these days thinks Hi-Res audio is the way to go because if you go from 16 to 24 bits it means the resolution is higher and therefore the sounds has more detail and other magical properties. It's an understandable assumption but also a false one because it's all about the dynamic range. You see, if you add an extra bit of data, the noise floor is moved down by 6dB, or to put it another way, for every bit of data added, the dynamic range is increased by 6dB. The only difference between 16 and 24 bit is an extra 48dB of dynamic range (8x6=48), that's it, nothing else is going on. 16 bit audio has a dynamic range of 96dB and 24 bit has a dynamic range of 144dB. It's not open to opinion or interpretation, it's simply the mathematics that's at the basis of all digital audio.
So what does this mean in practical terms? Let's take the deluxe limited edition of Jethro Tull's The Zealot Gene album, it has a dynamic range of 18dB with is pretty damn good. That means only 3 bits of data are used, the rest in inaudible noise. Even if you have a recording with a dynamic range of 60dB, only 10 bits are used. The only place where a higher bit depth and higher sampling rate have a real benefit is in recording studios. If you are hearing things like a wider sound stage, more depth, better mid range or whatever it's because something was done to the record during mixing and/or mastering. It has nothing to do with the higher bit depth.
So what about the sampling rate? Divide the sampling rate by 2 and you have the maximum frequency range. 44.1Khz has a maximum frequence range of 22.05Khz and a sampling rate of 192Khz has a maximum frequency range of 96Khz. Since pretty much no on can hear anything above 22Khz it's absolutely pointless to go higher than 44.1Khz for consumer audio.
To sum it up, if you play a 24 bit album, than the same album in 16 bit and you hear a difference it's because something was done to one of the albums in the way of processing, mixing or mastering. When a 16 and 24 bit album are processed, mixed and mastered identically, they will sound identical. Don't get hung up on Hi-Res, focus on the quality of the recording.
-
Not true. A higher bit count and/ or frequency is providing more information to accurately try to create the original musical signal. Look at it this way. The more data points you have to create a sine wave, the more accurately it will look like the original sine wave. This is way more detail, air, presence is heard on a higher frequency/bit
rate recording, but only if it was originally recorded at the higher. Upsampling and oversampling are ways to try and replicate that, but are artificial and do not achieve the same results.0 -
The only thing a higher bit depth does is it allows you to encode a larger dynamic range, it has nothing to do with resolution in the sense of more detail, a wider sound stage, more air or whatnot.
When you talk about more data points to measure the incoming analogue waveform, you are talking about oversampling. The problem with an analogue waveform is that it is always changing and, even when oversampling at 192Khz, this introduces quantisation errors. You can hear this because it causes distortion of the waveform when it's converted back to an analogue signal by a DAC. And here's where dithering comes into play. What dithering does is it adds a very small amount of white noise to the digital signal and this completely randomises the quantisation errors. The cool thing about digital audio is that randomisation, when it's converted back to an analogue signal is audible as pure white noise. The end result is a perfect analogue waveform and a bit of noise and modern DACs with noise shaped dithering move this white noise to less noticeable areas of the spectrum . In other words, by dithering, all the measurement errors have been converted to noise that exists alongside a perfect analogue waveform. All of this has nothing to do with what you describe. More detail, air or presence is the result of audio processing and mastering and how well it's done.
0 -
I followed about 10% of this discussion.
What does this mean in a practical sense? I have hearing loss in the treble range, but not in bass, so my hearing aids adjust appropriately. (It s**ks getting old.) I subscribe to Tidal HiFi (not premium). I have Pulse 2i's and a C368. Will I hear any difference between HiFi and Premium on Tidal?
That being said HiFi sounds great on my systems.
My Library is all 320MPS... how much loss of quality is occurring there?
That being said, I listen to music all day long since it helps distract from my tinnitus... blues and jazz... It's just a Slow Dance.
Thanks!
0 -
I'm sorry, but OP is wrong on this. Higher bitdepth and sampling rate does mean that the audio has more information.
First, bitdepth as pointed out increases the dynamic range. He outlines this in the post, and then completely ignores his own proof. Human perception of dynamic range is about 120 db, which is beyond redbook format CD's capability of 96 db. This is actually why higher bitdepth music was released. So 24 bitdepth should be able to represent right around the human threshold of dynamic range (ie perception of soft and loud).
As for sampling rate, definitely more info. The higher the sampling rate, the more a digital audio stream can replicate natural transitions between frequency.
As a few side notes, even from a purely technical standpoint. An uncompressed PCM audio file will be larger in 24 bit than 16 bit of the same audio track. Likewise a 48 khz sample will be larger than a 44 khz sample all things being equal. So literally more zeros and ones in the file.
Also touch on the mastering side of things. It's false to presume that dynamic range of the actual song won't be different in 16 bit and 24 bit formats. If the mastering engineer wants to take advantage of 24 bit capability, the song can be mastered with that full dynamic range. When the same track is mastered for the 16 bit version, either the dynamic range is shrunk down to fit the 96 db limitation (which you should be able to perceive with your perfect 120 db human hearing range) or you simply get clipping if the 16 bit version was poorly mastered.
I don't want to get into the "do you specifically here the difference" as that is a personal psychoacoustic issue. But if you analyze these files objectively with software you can clearly see the difference.
@Curt A
It makes a practical difference if you can hear the difference. This will depend on your hearing, the source material (there is 20x or more raw data in an lossless 24b/192khz flac audio file than your 320kpbs 16b/44khz MP3, just look at the file size comparison), the equipment you are playing the music (speakers/DAC/preamp/etc), the volume you have it set to, and even room specific acoustics.
Take home message, when in doubt, play the best quality track available. You specifically may not hear the difference but it may be higher audio quality but at least you give yourself the chance of hearing the better quality.
0 -
Thank you. That’s what I was trying to say, but I said I said it in a highly simplified fashion. Your additional comments were great.
1
Please sign in to leave a comment.
Comments
5 comments