16-bit vs. 24-bit - Less noise or more detail? 

Thank you for bringing the subject. I happened to utilize dithering technic for low level signal detection (as well as I am highly experienced in audio signal restoration) so I'll try to simplify the explanation of dithering. 1) The reason you can't hear dithering noise is because usually a noise shaping is involved pushing the energy of the noise to the higher frequency where the ear is less sensitives. 2) Noise shaping also increases resolution of the low level signals. 3) signals that are at level lower than the least significant bit cannot be restored without dither. In order to be effective The peak level of the dither signal is usually higher than the LSB by 2-3 bits. 4) A lower than 16th bit signal is not only a signal that is at loudness level lower than -96dB it can be an harmonic with signal level lower than 1 bit, say low level violin harmonics played together with a contra bass. These harmonics are also lost (or heavily distorted) by the challenge to affect the LSB bit 5) when (only) a high frequency section of -90db level white noise is played, the LSB bit will change it's status from 1 to 0 randomly, we will get a noise at RMS level of 3dB with average of 0 volt DC' meaning and equal avenge number of "0"s and "1"s . 6) When playing a 1KHz signal @ -108db level with no dithering, the digital recording value will return a constant 0 voltage because the level is too low to affect the A/D LSB bit. 7) When adding the two signals (1kHz and White noise) together we will still get a DC average of 0 Volts, we will get a noise of about 3dB level, and the long time DC average will be 0VD. However, the digital statistics of the noise will have more "1"s during 1 KHz signal period is at the positive area and more "0"s when the 1Khz period is at the negative cycle. 8) This means that when adding an LPF for a 2KHz at the output of the DAC, we will get rid of most of the noise and can reconstruct the -108dB level 1Kz signal. 9) Luckily for us as humans, our brain can recognize the 1khz since we barely hear the noise shaped dither' so no need for adding an LPF in order to hear the 1Khz. 10) When FR is limited to 20Khz (at 44KHz sampling rate), we will be able to recognize only medium frequency which is fairly good result. 11) A High res sampling rate allow pushing the dither noise shaped signal energy to above the 20Khz range, ( beyond human hearing capability*) and allows for higher audio frequencies to be restored. 12) Is Dither needed for 24 bit Hi Res Signals? to my experience the answer is yes. it is not needed for the recording itself' but it is useful for the reproduction. not all systems are capable of accurately produce a 24bit quality of signals (due to poor DAC circuitry for example or other reasons), in other cases the recorded signal is passing through digital compression channels such as streaming or Bluetooth and Etc. 13) For my work I always use a 24bit 96Khz production with noise shaped dithering of 20 bits (4 bits for the dither). 14) * We can hear information above 20KHz: We can't identify tones above 20KHz (on our age ithe limit is lowered to above 12Khz) , this is what makes dither works: We can hear identify a "20Khz to 40Khz modulated white noise carrying a low level hi-mid frequency (it is not realty modulated, just a sum of the 2 signals) Hope the explanation is not to detailed or too complicated.

Many audiophiles conflate bits and sample rates used in the recording process with the bits and sample rates in the playback files. This is a mistake. High sample rates and more bits are used in the recording process to enable editing but are pointless for playback. If you actually had a 24 bit recording with a true 144dB dynamic range and the equipment able to handle it (which is impossible) and your quiet listening room had a 30dB background then a peak sound above background would be 174dB which would be lethal. No, I am not exaggerating, this sound level kills. Even a true 16 bit 96dB recording would be unplayable as the quiet passages would be inaudible or the loud passages screamingly loud. Most modern recordings can be delivered with 10 or 12 bits. A full symphony orchestra giving it all it's got (ƒƒƒƒ) peaks at about 104 dB SPL. Let's give the orchestra 105 dB, and 105 dB - 30 dB = only 75 dB real dynamic range. Most recordings are compressed dynamically to a sensible range so the listener is not constantly having to twiddle the volume control. Higher sample rates on playback produces ultrasonic noise and does not improve audio in the audible range.

This is anecdotal at best so take from it what you will. Years ago, we're talking Pro Tools7 era, I was recording a group and they were going to get the tracks mastered elsewhere. We were about finished when they finally mentioned that their mastering guy wanted 24/48. I said, "Sorry guys, I recorded 16/44.1" This is followed by a little bit of grumbling from the mastering engineer. A few weeks later I get a call from said engineer saying, "This is the best 16/44.1 recording I've ever heard." To me that just came across as silly. I'm sure you've heard better. I'm recording in a project studio in a log cabin with very minimal gear. My only goals were the right mics in the right place and capture the best performance. That same band came back to me for their next album as well. Don't get me wrong here, I wouldn't argue that 16/44.1 is objectively better than 24/48 but to me the difference is minimal. Prior to that time period I was working with ADAT XT20 machines. I subscribe to the concept that if you record garbage at any bit depth and sample rate you'll still have garbage. So, as I said, take from that what you will. I'm not saying that what I did was right/wrong or better/worse, only at the end of the day everyone was satisfied.

I’m sure people are tired of hearing from me A EE degreed person who understands digital signal processing and audio as well as higher than audio frequency audio processing and equipment that I am involved with. The 24 bits does nothing but lower the already noise floor even lower or correspondingly gives you many more higher register bits for a more high dynamic range headroom. 24 bits is usually useful only internal to audio processing systems like DAWs and mixing console type systems because as you add any EQ reverb chorus Flanger delay, d-Essing special effects (to remove sibilants from vocals) it’s nice to have all that headroom as all those numbers get crunched together with those calculations getting on but on the final rendered output once you master it to 16 bits to make a CD there should be really no quality loss at all. I get so, so tired of the 24 bit vs 16 bit debate everybody has. Tsk, tsk, tsk. 🤨

I've just recently discovered your channel within the last week and after several of your videos, I'm really enjoying the don't-take-it-so-seriously attitude you bring to your posts. Dispassionately examining the rhetoric is very helpful in dialing back the outrage on a topic like 16-bit vs. 24-bit. Even if I can hear the difference in bit rate, I'm more likely to hear glaring differences like room noise or poor mic placement, even when I'm listening analytically. Not to say there isn't a difference, but as you point out, there are some differences that don't make that much difference to the end user. But besides that, no single parameter on its own (bit rate, sampling rate, noise floor, etc.) is the silver bullet that provides the end-all definition of what makes a good recording. (To be fair, the misuse and abuse of some parameters can indeed yield a definitively bad recording, but that's not the same as the hair-splitting between 'near-perfect' and 'nearer-than-that-to-perfect'.) That said, from time to time I still listen to -- and enjoy -- CD's, LP's (to a lesser extent 45 and 78 RPM singles), cassettes, open reel tape and even 8-track cartridges. I call it the 'fidelity-to-what?' principle. Music is such a subjective topic when it comes to nailing down what makes it enjoyable for you, and it's mainly an emotional aspiration rather than intellectual. So if I'm willing, perhaps even prefer, to listen to a cassette from the 1980's or a cartridge from the 1970's, I may not be in pursuit at that moment of 'absolute fidelity to the original sound', I may be seeking the same feeling I felt the first time I heard that song, and remembering the people I was in company with at the time. Thinking of the car I drove or the place I lived. Or in the case of media that predates my own life, experiencing the sound the way contemporaries of that technology did. Fidelity to a memory or emotion, if you will. For example, I remember hearing certain songs on CD in the 1980's that didn't sound quite 'right' to me, because they didn't match my memory of hearing them the first time on AM radio in the early 1970's. Expanding from mono to stereo, losing the noise and static, and widening the frequency range emphasized different sounds in the recordings, but often the speed was off, seemed slow. I later learned that some Top 40 stations had a habit of running their turntables slightly faster, perhaps 46 or 47 RPM, so the music would sound a bit livelier (and by gaining a few seconds per song, you might have another minute or two per hour of advertising time to sell). But the point is, better audio fidelity actually interfered a bit with my enjoyment of some songs until I understood what was going on, simply because they didn't match my emotional memory. (I expect this generation may come to feel that way about 128K MP3's.) By the same token, as an audio engineer (and enthusiast), I'm not against creating and listening to the best we can possibly muster in the sonic arts; in fact, I think we should. Right now I work in a small studio that produces mainly podcasts and audiobooks, and I'm always looking for ways to eliminate audio distractions, especially noise. But I take the view that while we should obviously tend to the technical parameters, we should do so in service to the content we are recording without getting distracted into making the technology the main thing. Yet, in all things, charity. Whatever format a person likes and what they are willing to spend on it is fine with me. If I had elephant bucks to spend, I would likely purchase more classic gear, because it's fun! But I will also admit that even then, the grail for me would not be ALL about the sound alone...some of it would be visual, tactile, nostalgic, and again, emotional.

Amazing...😊 I love your videos. Always make me laugh.😆😂😁 Most audiophiles take themselves and overpriced gear too seriously.... In my opinion.

Love your presentation style: it's entertaining and informative :)

Nice video. I like your distinction between ‘enthusiast’ and ‘audiophile’. I’ve come to realise I’m the former as I don’t have the money to become the latter. I like being happy enjoying the music with my tech that is good enough. 16-bit 44.1kHz for me 😊

As a HiFi guy I used to be totally convinced that 24 bit listening was better than 16 bit, but then I watched an interview with a mastering engineer. I heard him say that he masters differently for CD than he does for Hi Res tracks on HD Tracks. If that's the case for even some of the mastering engineers, then the argument that 24 bit sounds better (based only on it being more bits) is blown out of the water. Also I have more than one example of 16 bit masters of albums sounding clearly better than 24 bit masters (mastered by someone else). It's about all of the production, and not simply 16 or 24 bit. In general you might be better off with 24 bit releases, but that's only because more attention might have gone into making sure it sounds good, given the known consumer of "Hi Res".

Just watched a video by an audio engineer for a record company. He stated that the only difference between 16-bit and 24-bit is dynamic range and you would have to hear the music at insanely high volumes to notice any difference.

Have there been any properly blind tests where people could reliably identify a 24 bit musical signal against the same signal, but degraded to 16 bits and dithered? I would suspect not, but if there was, I'd be more likely to reconsider.

Criteriously human, scientific and simple. 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

I regularly show Monty Montgomery’s Digital Show and Tell to audiophiles. It’s here on RU-vid.

CD IS ENOUGH.

I think here is to compare 16-bit to 24-bit on the dB level is not mattering to much. The signal amplitude will stay the same, but basically you get more steps of the amplitude to recover the original signal. Where white lower bit rate you have to add additional noise in form of ditter that you don’t notice the difference, good examples comparison you can also find in pictures.

There is one benefit from tinnitus... the whole noise floor sorta becomes pretty much a non-issue. Recording 16 bit CD is plenty good for cassette, yeah I still do that. CDs transfer to cassette much better than vinyl. That being said that vinyl to cassette thing really doesn't work out very well. But it did enable tinnitus due to being able to turn the volume control to 11 without any feedback.

I find your videos very entertaining and informative. I'm the kinda of idiot that would blow a load of money on high end gear just because on paper a number is higher than another number so it has to be better, even if to my ears there's no decernible difference. Your videos keep me more grounded.

I have always recorded in 24 bit. However as a consumer format, 16 is good but it is so much easier to maximize the quality of 16bit if you start with 24 and then convert the final product to 16.

For me it's all about headroom. This is important for the recording and production phases. I was given a raw 24bit live recording where the levels had been incorrectly set for the first few minutes and I needed to bring the levels up to match the rest of the recording ... I feared the worst whilst remembering trying such things in the old world of analogue recording where the previously inaudible noise floor would intrude unpleasantly. I therefore was blown away when I simply selected the low level section and brought it up to the rest of the recording using Audacity. To my ears it was audibly perfect with no noise floor issues at all! However, an end product distributed in a 16bit format (once all the production tweaks have been done) is fine for my ears.

1:30 in, You make cutting through the BS one of my most enjoyable listens on RU-vid. The fact that these chairs all have headrests make it the joke of the century...

Yt 320kb is great through a half decent 2.0 or 5.1 system. Just my personal humble opinion.

What brought me to watch this entire video, and its arguments, basically reinforces my experiences of digital in another arena… digital imaging… it’s the same technology, just catering to other senses. I was hoping for a clear cut resolve to a single question - are our eyes or ears better at distinguishing noise from detail. After seeing the video I am undecided, but it seems that our ears are actually better at resolving than our eyes… digital images at 16 bit are the absolute precipice of imaging today, well capture at least… scanners go beyond, but it matters little, as our displays are 8-bit based… which begs a different question, maybe more apt to the original… is it the displays which are inferior enough to limit our experiences of digital imaging? In this case the arena of digital sound and digital imaging, go complete circle… in the end, maybe it’s not the source sampling which creates issues, it’s the delivery of the source to us!

Dolby C and chrome tapes made cassettes just about acceptable to me.

24 bit vs. 16 bit is dynamic range 144db vs. 96 db. Noise is from YOUR recording system, from the ambient noise of the room through the microphones through the mic preamps and then the rest of the mixing desk, including the AC system of your room or building. Cassette decks needed Dolby B because of the tape hiss inherent in the mylar tape medium itself which was noise at about -50db from the peak of 0db. With Dolby B, C, S; A for the pro recorders and on. You could get to a noise floor of -60db to -80db, maybe. In my DAW I can see the noise floor of MY recording system in my meters. With my blower motors off in my HVAC system and AC line filtering I can get, usually -70db to -80db down from 0db with my mics open in the recording chain. I can see it. Even with 16bit (-96db of dynamic range) I have still not used up all of the dynamic range and my noise floor is higher than -96db of the 16 bit system. I have not reached the bottom of the theoretical. Detail is a matter of sample rate so if I go above 44.1khz I can record more and I like 24 bit/96khz for all my masters. I have tried 16 bit/96khz and cannot hear the difference, but use 24 bit anyway. I read of some studios in NYC using 16 bit/96khz for their masters. I can't hear the improvement of 192khz or 384 khz using 32 bit float. It is just more work to get back to the 16/44.1 of CDs. In my DAW I have pulled some "professional recordings" from CDs and looked at them at the beginning of a track. They usually leave about 2 seconds of blank space before the music starts. I have seen in some commercial recordings a -40db to -50db noise floor before the music starts. They could have used a noise gate, but did not. This tells me their room is noisy from open mics through their recording chain.

I think you are mistaken about how 16bit/24bit conversion takes place. It is not one bit or the other, there is a conversion process based on the original Nyquist Theorem for sampled signal reproduction. In practice there will be computational compromises in the DAW, which is why many DAWs will use 32bit floating point internally regardless of the bit level of the sampled audio. In other words, there is no masked detail when converting between 24 bit and 16 bit with competent software and hardware.

In this day and age, there's a lot of room correction, digital crossovers, surround sound or other processing, which is applied to the final recording. Not just during production. God knows what other things there will be in the future. 24 bit recordings provide an extra layer of "rounding" to make sure the 14 or 16 bits' payload will still get to us as well preserved as possible, even thirty years from now.

Nice story. Daft arguments No real conclusions except sustaining “Some might hear the difference!” myths. “Yes, I can positively taste from which side of that certain hill in France the grapes in this glass of whine came from!” In the real world many other parameters are more important. Like the fact that really dynamic recordings are very rare today. Loudness rules.

there is a diffrence in music 16 bits sound boxy 24 bits is still in some kind of box feeling but with 32 bits it dissappear the noise cliping is gone basically

Should an audiophile listening chair have spikes like speaker cabinets do?

i've listened to 24bit recordings on 24bit hardware (the high end soundblaster cards were very expensive.. so i got them second hand..) and i cannot tell the difference between a 24 and 16bit recording of the same song... might not be listening to the right music, but, old CD releases of movie soundtracks from disney, is i do believe, (disney used to know what they were doing) as good as home audio will ever need to be... listening to the Lion King on cassette i knew when the intro chant was coming... on CD it still makes me jump... The Pirates of the Caribbean soundtracks are really fun to use to demonstrate what 'dynamic range' means and what the 16bits of a CD can really do... as far as decently mastered audio goes you dont need more than 16bit.. i have no idea what kind of godlike ears one would need to require a medium that encompasses the entirety of the dynamic range of a jet engine starting from cold and going full throttle.. at that point you don't need 24bits; you need hearing aids...

Headroom and post production :)....Nice video as usual. Thanks :)

With all the tools available now for recording i find that many "pop" recordings just don't sound very good. I listen to these recordings because the music is still wonderful. All the processing and especially the compression used, can degrade the listening experience. The so-called "audiophile " recordings often sound better because the sound engineers at every step in the process were meticulous in their attention to detail regardless of the bits used. A strong esthetic sense by the engineers in tune with what the artists had in mind makes for great listening experiences. Great recordings sound just fine on today's modest audio products. They can sound very fine on every level of gear .. provided the listening space is reasonable good. Bad recordings sound bad on every system and worse on systems with better resolution. The esthetic sense of the recording engineers sensitive to what the artists were trying to communicate can't be measured. Yet, when great musicians and great recording engineers work together the results can truly be magical. I am very happy when the tools available for recording are improved but in the end, the human beings producing the music is the most critical factor.

OK, I confess, I'm a hard-core audiophile with a soundproof acoustically treated room, I don't have a fancy chair, I have a 3 seater on a small podium. My Audio note dac 1.1x signature is an has an 18bit AD1865 chip in it, sounds amazing. I've had dac with 24,32 bit and dsd 1024, in the end the Audio note suited me best. I remember as a kids I use to buy the best blank cassettes I could find, mostly Sony HF/UX ES 90/Metal master. I would use both the EQ and dolby b and c to tweak the sound to my liking. I loved my Sony Walkmans. I was 11 when I got my favourite headphones, the Sony mdr v7's. Love Audio Phil 😂

Any recommendations for a good upgrade for my tinnitus, so I will get a noice-free experience? ¯\(ツ)/¯

Also, think that a very quiet room has a noise level of 20-30dB and you damage your ears if listening louder than 80dB. That is 50-60dB dynamic range. The 16-bit quantization noise will be more than 30dB below ambient noise. Even without dither it can be very difficult to hear distortion 30-40dB below noise level.

If it looks like bullshit, sounds like bullshit, and quacks like bullshit then congratulations, those speaker and cable up grades can be yours for a bargain TV only special price. But wait, if you're one of the first 6 million suckers , you can get double your purchase for free, but wait.....

Y'know what happens most of the time? Home audio listeners end up with a 16 bit recording sitting in a 24bit container with the lower 8 bits either zeroed off or randomly making noise.

16 bits are adequate to make noise-free recordings. 24 bits gives us ‘slack’. For example, an engineer on a live date doesn’t get the opportunity to set gain before the converter and notes the channel is peaking at minus 30. No problem!! Feeding a 24 bit converter at -30 or even -40 is perfectly valid. Just leave it and enjoy the song. 16 bit would be deep into the noise at -40, completely unacceptable. That’s pretty much it. Detail doesn’t really enter the equation as long as you are not in the noise. A perfectly set 14 bit converter captures the same detail as a 24 bit converter because we can’t hear more than 85dB of dynamic range on a single channel contributing to a stereo mix. This isn’t just theory, this is memory. I recall those days when success was tracking at -2. It was stressful and resulted in overloads nobody needed.

Firstly, let me say that this comment will make it fairly obvious that I can’t be considered to be anything approaching an audiophile or technically au fait with matters discussed regularly on this channel, but it illustrates the reality of the (my) aging process. One of the “joys” of getting old and turning 70, apart from developing a taste for droll, witty and, at times tongue in cheek RU-vid channels, is that you lose the ability to hear above and below certain frequencies. So when I sit down to listen to music, taking extreme care not to get too excited and turn it up too loud thus activating the tinnitus that’s always just lurking in the background in my ears, I just don’t know what I might be missing in those frequencies, what’s more I have no idea if there’s actually anything there in the recording and as naïve as my attitude might be, I don’t care, I still enjoy the music. As to any noise I may hear, which I admit I find quite irritating when I do actually hear it, there’s a chance it may not even exist in the recording but be a product of my less than audiophile system or possibly the “head noises” that old age brings on, I just don’t know - but some things you’ve just got to accept, like getting old or, say, never achieving perfection.

"The reasonable amount of noise from LPs..." I never found it reasonable. It annoyed me when LP was all we really had. I could not drop LPs fast enough when digital audio came out myself.

The cheapest and most effective way to improve detail and soundstage is cup your hands behind your ears 😂 whilst seated in your audiophile chair in a dark room😂

Is dither worse than the noise of the audience during a live performance?

Whenever I misbehaved my mom said to go to my room without dither. Take that for what you will.

dither is needed any time the bit depth is reduced to avoid quantization noise. combining multiple 16-bit pure digital signals into a single 16-bit output needs dithering if the bit depth is being reduced. I would love to have a listening environment available where -96dB against a max reference level (100dB SPL?) is even detectable; maybe I need to find a local audiophile who has this. from my experience, dolby C does a decent job on cassettes, and dolby S is comparable to noise levels on CDs (we'll ignore wow and flutter), but I'll still take dolby B over nothing at all, especially on type I tapes. I blame the current unavailability of new competent cassette decks and limited availability of used ones coupled with misplaced nostalgia for the sad state of no noise reduction at all on most new cassette releases. ("but it's analog!" yes, but my otari has a lot more hit points than your nakamichi.)

Audiophools think they can hear the difference - until they enter a double blind A/B test. I own a midlevel DAC, headphones amplifier, and headphones, but a person can take things so far that they aren't listening to the music, but instead they are listening to the equipment, and isn't that missing the whole point of listening to music in the first place?

I sometimes repurchase music in 24-bit format when it becomes available, and even though I definitely have the highly accurate equipment required, I perceive very little improvement (at best). Still I purchase 24-bit here and there, because (much as with 4K in the movie realm) I expect that careful remastering has taken place as part of the process, at least usually. The satisfaction of having the definitive version (I suppose that's a third dimension, David, besides noise and detail) of something that's worth having the definitive version of, is often tempting.

This was fantastic when you consider that the Audiophiles will in the same breath say that vinyl sounds far better than 24bit audio. So about half the detail of their 24bit sound file,, that they will say FLAC sounds worse than WAV as there is some form of data compression in haw it’s encoded, but that’s a separate comment. Glad we didn’t take into consideration the noise generated from not using medical grade electric plugs, and how we skimped out with consumer usb cable to our DAC we bought off Amazon.

If we stay in the analogue domain first, before addressing the video's question, then let's first wonder what "bandwidth" is needed for a 440Hz music note. That's a loaded question, though. Play that central A note on a piano, violin, flute, clarinet, saxophone, etc. Each time it is 440Hz, right? But none of these have perfect sines as wave shape. So there is information on the 440Hz that we can analyse so as to recognize the instrument (voice, kind of sound), and we can place it somewhere in space. But to recognise individual voices/instruments must be learned and that takes many learning moments. If you never went to a live classical concert, then you don't know what is wrong with a recording of that (if there is something wrong). Imagine the clarinet produces a block wave and the flute sine wave, but a cello has a sone wave with a couple simple spikes in them. Here we have left the 440Hz as each of the deviations are in a much higher frequency range. Our ears are physically limited to about 20kHz, when measured in sine waves, but that is a coarse abstraction. Whatever the point of the 20 kHz, in electronic recording and playback, the question is not what we can hear - assuming an exceptionally well trained listener - but what bandwidth is needed in an amplifier, cross-over filter or speaker to play a perfect 440Hz block wave, or to get the two tiny spikes that make a cello sound like cello, sound like a cello in playback, because the tiny spikes are at the right place and in the right form. Because - phase fault, if the spike shifts it's no longer a cello we hear, and if the shape distorts, it's no longer a cello too. And the same applies to aunt Lucy's voice, or uncle Stephen's. I saw a pianist in a Steinway grand piano parking room of a concert building - 5 model D grand pianos. She had to select one that best matched her music in character and best matched her touché in its action. She played all five and about number 2 said, "I played this one last year". I saw a blind person in a new large room that asked, are there windows there, pointing at windows, and is there an open door over there, pointing at one. The auditive brain is much faster than the visual and it relies on wave shape processing in an acoustically relevant to human survival band. Electrical engineers underestimate how good it is. Listeners accept electronically mixed recordings that have "micro-dynamics" for left right but conflicting phase information. This all goes back to wave shape. If you ever saw how good an amplifier can play back a block wave at 20 kHz then may be aware to never have seen a block wave, but spiked versions with over/under shoot, or saw tooth, or sine approximations based on a perfect block wave input. My pre-amplifier as a bandwidth of 1MHz. The power amp "only" of 150kHz with peak current delivery capability of 60A per channel. An electrical engineer once responded to my reasoning about wave shape that Fourier analysis could create a block wave with only five sine waves. Well, you need five half sines each of different frequency to fill the positive block and there is no amplifier in the world that can do that. I guess. And, what signal source does the Foerier transformation? How many bits do I need? What sample rate? Lets go to the bandwidth requirement first. You tell me. Oh, a big problem in life and science is that people think something is not true when they cannot imagine it to be true. Remember the geocentric model of the cosmos? The problems are all over the place and humans are very capable of filtering the message out of the noise, but that doesn't mean it sounds nice or correct. If we throw speakers into the debate then it becomes hopeless almost. With lousy amplifiers and loudspeakers we do not need a lot.

I don’t consider myself knowledgeable enough to get into an argument, much less a discussion over this. What I can say with reasonable certainty is an AAD CD sounds better than the other options. Did you or did you not do a video on this subject? This would get a real rowl started. I can’t see how this matters much except in streaming on the 24 bit thing. It isn’t analog and therefore is not natural. This opinion may not be shared by many. I prefer LPs.

GREETINGS FOR YOUR WORK.KEEP GOING THIS WAY.👌👌👌

Close enough for most practical purposes in light of consumer product. For a more nuanced understanding, I recommend Digital Audio Explained for the Audio Engineer, by Aldrich. Technically, bit depth contributes nothing to detail above the bit in question. That is, 24-bit is more detailed than 16-bit - below about -100 dB full scale. Above that level, everything is identical. You can prove this to yourself with a null test. Take the best 24-bit file you can find, apply 16-bit dither to a copy. Compare the original and a copy in a 24-bit DAW with one channel phase flipped. There will be no signal AT ALL above the 16-bit dither noise. If you understand how digital audio works, that result and its meaning will be intuitive.

Hi, really awesome your sarcastic comments in your videos. Ha! I (43) actually used Dolby S HX-Pro AND cleaned the heads recularly. I also used my dad's AKAI 4000DS reel-to-reel. Copying Paul Simons "Graceland" :-) My dad and I, we discussed those things like flutter and distortions factors when buying a tape deck. I guess, when dealing with digital audio (recording) the sampling rate will be more cruicial when using certain effects because of harmonics above the Nyquist frequency, and audible non-harmonic frequency components.

Betty and Debbie the antidote to .....well you know what! :0)

For digital recordings lower noise allows greater clarity and separation to be heard or percieved on a good system. The problem is that the sound is so good that you don't need to concentrate to hear it. On vinyl recordings however the very high noise level forces the brain the concentrate and strain to hear the detail behind the noise and therefore the hearer is encouraged to listen to the music more actively and often perceives this as better sound quality even when it is not. Experiment... take a top quality 24bit recording and mix in some snap, crackle and pop from vinyl and it instantly sounds better to an audiophile. Odd that.

I have my aged DAC with 100dB Dynamic range that specifies SnR without THD. I turn it to maximum to have maximum Dynamic range (100dB) then I attenuate the output of DAC by 30dB analog potentiometer (variable resistor potentiometer) to pass it to my amp with more than 124dB full Dynamic range/more than 99dB at 1W signal output. No question I don't hear my amp noise from my licening position since my speakers have sensitivity only 90dBA/(m*W). 0dBA - is the lowest sound the human can hear, while the amp is -9dB below 0dBA level, so it is 2.83 times less signal volume that human can hear. But I also don't hear my DAC noise since it is -100 - 30 = -130dB below maximum signal my amp can produce, and -6dB = -130dB+124dB below my amp+speakers own noise level equal to -9dBA (-15dBA accumulated). Now if I play my CD-DA player via my aged DAC will I hear any noise? No, I will not since CD-DA dithering will be between -120dB and -130dB level - way out from any human hearing capabilities. Do I need 24bit music to level noise to -150dB level? I don't think so since the amp is still the main source of noise at -9dBA level.

15 hours old now this video, and the comment section is both as entertaining and insightful as expected (as is your video of course, David! 😎). But in this whole audiophile debate, including the idea that microphone placement is the most important aspect, isn't the _really_ most important aspect overlooked? *THE* *MUSIC* (and the people/band playing it!). I have some genuinely poor quality recordings of one of my favourite blues-rock bands jamming live on stage, with the bass mixed far too loud, the singer's microphone too soft, excessive microphone distortion, analogue clipping; you name it. But both the band and the audience are having a fantastic time, and the groove is unbelievable. Then I don't care about 16 vs 24 bit, or any of the recording flaws; I still very much enjoy listening to it, almost feeling it like I was there, despite all the technical flaws... In some ways a poor quality recording can be a help; if I still thoroughly enjoy the music, then I know there is something inherently good about that music, and the musicians performing it. Music that needs those extra bits to make that extra bit of "magic" happen (sic., no pun intended), I have always found _a_ _little_ suspect. I do have some myself, but that music often seems to have more of an outer-worldly feel, rather than the 'human' touch... (and yes, that's not just electronic music, there's some classical music like that as well).

I have tinnitus. 12 bits are quite enough for me!!!

32bit mastering is the new no1, just in the same way as 32bit colour is in windows, this is EXACTLY the way you should look at this topic, less bits=less colour. with 16bit you just dont see the full picture. 16bit dithering is no different that a blur effect of a low res image to get rid of the artifacts. and no "audiofools" dont have better hearing, they simply have more money, in my vast experience of audio i can tell you the best is NOT the most expensive. also another thing we only listened to cassettes back in the day because there was no other option.

Thanks for this explanation. Here’s an anecdotal story of why 16 bits isn’t enough, and why, as a professional video editor, I always do my final mixing at 24 bits, even if the tracks I’m working with start at 16 bits. A couple of decades ago, I put together a “reference” audiophile CD for an audiophile club. I ripped tracks from commercial CDs, assembled them, then burned a compilation CD. The copies sounded like the originals, but the live tracks had applause cut off, and levels of some tracks were too low. So I brought the ripped, uncompressed AIFF files into a Pro Tools project to fix the minor issues. I added fade-ins and fade-outs to the live tracks, and adjusted levels on a few tracks to make things more consistent. I spit the problem tracks out of Pro Tools at 16/44.1 and burned new CDs. I was proud of myself until I listened critically to the results on headphones. All the tracks that came out of Pro Tools sounded noticeably degraded. It was not subtle. When doing final mixing on my video projects, I typically use EQ, noise reduction and compression/limiting. I can clearly hear my processing degrading the 16/48 tracks, which limits how far I can push the processing if working at 16 bits. At 24 bits, the same mix with the same processing sounds cleaner. To me, it’s not subtle. Would my clients care when listening to my deliverables? Probably not. But I care because I know what to listen for and can easily hear the difference.

In my opinion, less noise means more detail. This is why there is a signal to noise ratio measurement. more signal, better detail, less noise, better detail..

I've just moved from a 24-bit recording interface, to one that does 32-bit floating point, and my DAW software supports that. I haven't had it long, so I've only done some preliminary testing. Aside from the convenience of having so much dynamic range that you can essentially set your mic levels after the fact, there is a bit of an audible difference. I honestly wasn't expecting to hear a difference, but when changing only the interface, the 32-bit recordings sound more 3-dimensional, more dynamic, and like I can hear farther into the mix. It's a subtle difference, but enough that I noticed it when I wasn't listening critically at all.

"BEAUTY - Philips 3000 nose hair trimmer" - LOL - (It worked!) - Made my night 🤩

Loving the nice debates in the comments and proving that RU-vid can be interesting on a number of different levels.

True revolution or Musical Change can happen only if we make different Sounds Speakers and headphones with different response to frequency giving different output results and current situation with low quality, high end and studio sound reproducing devices Listeners are listening not critical like we do and context is different something like just another Track or a just another Story telling through the Sounds/ Music. Like Hz the more is enabling more accurate sound manipulation and processing but end results will be none ... but if devices become more quality then maybe we will hear noticable advantage. Cassettes were blurry for me compared to Digital Disc .

I seem to remember early CD recordings or players only supporting 14 bits because 16 bits was a little ahead of the technology. What I do remember is that the Magnavox player I bought in the mid-80's made music sound brittle. Thankfully it self-destructed after a couple years.

I concur with your axioms.....are you an enthusiofile per chance?

Cactus sorbet sounds wonderful

But Audiomasterclass didn't go into 32-Bit PCM and 64-Bit Float and they are the new mainstays for 1-1 audiophile recording now. 16-Bit and 24-Bit are both out of date Wave recording technology in your latest Audacity. So where does the headroom change the quality in 32-Bit PCM and 64-Bit Float. lol

24Bit needed only for editing, and not even for editing (if you are carefull) 24bit not needed for playback. Noise level waaaaay below the room noise, and waaaaaay below most folks electronics noise (amp+pre). Doubt dithering is actually needed in 16bits, perhaps needed at 14bit. And audiophools listen to vinyl with 65-70db SNR yuck

EVERYTHING BEGINS WITH RECORDING QUALITY. A LOT OF STUDIOS ARENT HI QUALITY.

More bits equals less quantization error. This applies across the entire dynamic range, not just in the inaudible portion that is also being captured, stored and reproduced digitally. I don't understand why people who defend the idea that there is no audible difference between 16 bit and 24 bit, cling to an argument that you can't hear any difference across the entire dynamic range because of the differing noise floors, then offer a test that takes place below the threshold of human hearing to validate their argument! The funniest thing about that "null test" is that it applies dither to the 16 bit signal, which further reduces the noise floor of the 16 bit signal and invalidates the test.

You are assuming all recordings are created equally. In the real world we cant always get the best recordings. I have a very good portable dap and planar headphones. I have a 16bit recording of Aja which I like better then my 24 192 copy. I have a dsd 128 copy of Gaucho which is better then anything else I have except Kate Bush the Dreaming in dsd 256. I have king crimson Lizard in dsd 128 which is not as good as my 24 192 copy. It depends on the recording, I dont make judgements based on specs anymore. If the 16bit sounds better I keep that one.

idk why i have 16 and 24 bit files but 24bit sounds lower volume than 16 bit.

I'm sceptical about anything higher than 16/44.1 - the industry is using the higher numbers to make money out of gullible people. If people are hearing "an improvement" then it's either down to a mastering difference between the two versions, or they are possibly believing they are hearing an improvement because it's bigger numbers and the gear costs more - so it must be better! In a long running experiment, someone has proved that there is no discernable difference between 16/44.1 and higher resolutions.

16/44.1 or 48 to 24/44.1 or 48 no, you won't. but from16bit to DSD or 24/192....hell yes.

I look forward to the return of Betty and Debbie. Have they had their toenails painted, I wonder?

When I was 10 years old, I enjoyed watching Terminator 2 from a VHS tape on an old TV more than the remastered 4K blu-Ray version now. I'm sure when musicians make music, they intended it for audiophile people with 1000000 $ sound systems. Other wise you're going to miss out on their music's intention.

Hello DM, After a while this entire topic gets silly. Just put on some music and enjoy. If you look for disappointment, you're sure to find some. So just put on that "Dyke and the Blazers" album and relax ! Bill P.

Disk size is cheap, BUT STILL, with often 192/24 disk space goes out of control. I decided, based on quality or importance of the material to bring the flacs down to 96/64/48 or redbook, also some to 19-22 bits via dithering.

24bit, Dolby C, DBX, and of course, an Eames Lounger for me!!! 😎

I'm an audiophile purest. I only listen to music played back on my "Webster-Chicago Model 7 Wire Recorder". It's the only way to truly experience the musical message that the artist is trying to convey.

Oh it was worth hanging on through all of this JUST for that ending. 😂 You brightened my day and lessened my DAW worries both at the same time with this video. Most grateful for your simplified explanation. It's pretty much all I needed. Now to chase down what the heck is causing my glitchy pops and crackles in mixdowns. Now I know it can't be my 16bit 44.1kHz limitations. Processing power maybe? Just bad software?

To add to this conversation: I recently listened to Houdini by Enimen on Tidal and Qobuz. Both were playing at the same 'quality' 96.0kHz. The Tidal version sounds markedly different to me, better.

I have spent many hours comparing 16 bit to 24 bit when using the same DAC, and same sample rate. The difference is often very significant when listened to on good gear. I am currently using a MOTU M4 to 2 hafler dh220s to drive kefXq9s. Most albums that were recorded in 24 bit will sound substantially dryer and less rich when played at 16 bit. There is also usually a lot of information from the decay of sounds that is chopped off with 16 bit. So, the the difference in 24bit is that it is not only less dry, more spacious, and richer, but there is more information about the echo and natural decay of sounds in the recording. The increased dynamic range is not always noticeable, but the attack of something both natural and abrupt, like a snare, for example -- will sound slightly different at dynamic ranges above 96 db, even at low volumes.

Some of the best DAC's can only achieve 21bits if you are lucky a lot reach less so 24bits is lost anyway, the majority of recorded music doesn't even reach 16bit once mixed and mastered, if you were to hear the noise from a 16bit stored recording your system would have to be pretty damn loud probably beyond normal listening levels too, also your analogue components would have introduced more noise and distortion before it reaches you anyway.

In the modern world of mp3, loudness war, music played on smartphones, I consider myself an audiophile, but 16/44,1KHz is enough for me, because the background noise present on the master recordings is always higher than the ground noise of the 16bit. Than why should I bother with 24/48 or 24/96Khz tracks, sacrificing more storage space? Not to mention that it is already difficult to find records that exploit correctly the entire 16 bit range. Maybe the difference can be heard on 24bit files of some classic or jazz music, but they are not my genre.

i told A Dj Friend About It, He Said It Dosent Matter People Dont Hear The Differnce But I Could Hear The Differnce Between Mixes The High And The Low Quality

I take issue with 99.9. I maybe say 90%. This is subjective of course and in a vacuum 90% is ok. But if you compare to something that is better then better is better. So that 90% may become 99.9. Also, Now Let’s talk DSD. Your decimation is trashing the air using PCM

So what is best for me on a Computer PC. i have a sound card that can play 16-bits or 24-bits and betwen 44.1 Khz - 48 Khz - 88.2 Khz - 96 Khz - 176.4 Khz - 192 Khz ... Witch one is best do you think? Thx for a good video. / Sweden!

This reminds me of the issue of recording on a 4 track cassette and later recording digitally. The analog cassette buried a great multitude of sins and the digital put a glaring spotlight on the same. The same guitar player who objectively played better over that 20 year span was taken aback by how clearly digital exposed every mistake no matter how seemingly minor sounding during recording. 😃

A record has if you are lucky something around 50 db of dynamic range and it turns out that most hifi systems can't reproduce it because they will already start to compress and distort the signal so 16bit is already completely overkill and 24bit is not changing anything at all. It is like debating if Thor or the Hulk is stronger. Fun when you are 13 but at some point you grow out of it. And the correct answer is the Hulk of course ;-)

A roundabout way of saying that CD quality is all you'll ever need unless you believe in snake oil (Audiophile Oil). I concur.

Is Audio Phil mocking the Audiophiliac?

16 BITS ITS ENOUGH.

Surely there are much more important factors making a crappy recording crappy than it being in 16-bits instead of 24. Maybe focus should be elsewhere. Just because there exists some low-hanging fruit (using 24 bits instead of 16) does not necessarily make it important. My axiom #0: More bang is better than more bang-for-buck.

16 BIt Is Like Have A Car Without Steering wheel Just Noy Good Enough

Devil is in the detail

3:20 Acoustic band? Is that abdominally fitted, and tightened to prevent noisy emissions?

ah yes the master baiter

Which sounds better, a dirty record, a dirty cd, or a dirty lover? Not just bits but naughty bits. So many variables, so little time. XOXO