[stv014]

Quote:

I've been operating under the impression that the main benefit of upsampling to a higher bit rate is that there will be no loss of resolution when attenuating the volume in the digital domain, or when doing any other DSP. Kind of a "digital headroom" thing.

For digital volume control, you only need increased DAC resolution. Higher sample rate is useful mainly for other types of effects and synthesis, to avoid/reduce aliasing and/or interpolation artifacts.
 

 

[grokit]

So going from 16 bit to 24 bit would work better for digital volume, but changing the sample rate is what we want for reducing these artifacts?

 

[killkli]

True!
Though the one who sells "higher" bits music often comes with better recording & mixing control.
So it's still better than normal CDs.
But if the record company's doing great job in their recording & mixing, than it's really no perceptible difference between 24bits & 16bits.
Nor was it with 44kHz & 96kHz  .
 
Also, I guess it's easier to achieve better recording result with vinyl, since it a simpler matter than digital.
And that's the reason I think many people still preferred vinyl over CD.
 
 

 

[grokit]

I agree that the SACDs and vinyl can be mastered better, but unfortunately this isn't always the case!
Vinyl vs. digital, there's a whole 'nother debate...

 

[firev1]

Quote:

Also, I guess it's easier to achieve better recording result with vinyl, since it a simpler matter than digital.
And that's the reason I think many people still preferred vinyl over CD.

This is not the case, its often because the recording engineer knows less about cd mastering vs vinyl mastering. Some of the earlier recordings made with cds had the problem where the engineer compensated for vinyl loss which is the main reason for the harshness in earlier recordings. 
 

 

[grokit]

Don't forget about the use of compressors/limiters in the mastering process for many CD's, in order to make them sound better on one's iBuds.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war
 

 

[maverickronin]

Quote:

Don't forget about the use of compressors/limiters in the mastering process for many CD's, in order to make them sound better on one's iBuds.
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

I think its more about car radios than ibuds.  Or at least it started that way.  I know I can't listen to any classical at all in my car.  Its either ear piercing or I can't hear anything over the road noise.

 

[bigshot]

The reason so much compression is used is because of ipods. When you put music on shuffle play, compressed songs sound louder than wide dynamic range songs. Labels don't want their song to suddenly be quiet compared to other songs so they compress. Pretty soon it started feeding back on itself and they wanted their songs to be compressed even more so they would sound louder than compressed songs.

 

[scottie584]

I often skip loud songs on my phone, much more often than quieter ones. So I wouldn't necessarily say that more loudness and compression is more attractive to a consumer.

 

[Griffinhart]

ReplayGain exists for a reason.
 
-- Griffinhart

 

[scottie584]

Which doesn't get rid of the original compression. It just balances out the volume.

 

[Griffinhart]

Nothing's going to get rid of the original compression short of getting your hands on the original recordings and doing your own masters. ReplayGain gets rid of the loudness.
 
-- Griffinhart

 

[daveDerek]

Quote:

The reason so much compression is used is because of ipods. When you put music on shuffle play, compressed songs sound louder than wide dynamic range songs. Labels don't want their song to suddenly be quiet compared to other songs so they compress. Pretty soon it started feeding back on itself and they wanted their songs to be compressed even more so they would sound louder than compressed songs.

actually routine overuse of compression goes back to commercial radio, well predating mp3 players, especially when played back in the relatively noisy environment of a car. this is also seen on tv, and is exaggerated during the commercials when the average volume level all of a sudden shoots up over the level of the program.
 

 

[hlinssen]

   I thought I'd add my exasperated plea to good people like Carlos Santana and Bruce Springsteen, to name a couple:  "Please do not compress your disc releases so extremely.  I keep buying and trying, but they are totally unlistenable on my system".
   I used to use a dbxII compander to restore some dynamic range, but switching transients from my DAC zapped the left channel input, and now I have to listen to their recording as pressed...
 
Harry Linssen

 

[JefferyK]

Deleted by author.