24 bit audio revisited

[Jim Berry <jberry@xxxxxxxx>]

  >>If only the remastered recordings were done right, though!  They were 
  >>supposedly done in 24 bit (which is pointless, it has to go down to 
  >>16 anyway

Wrong!!!!!! 

It is not my point to do an in depth discussion of digital audio theory. The
general consensus among those who do this for a living is "work in a high
bit resolution and then dither down to 16 bit at the final stage"

Taking the audio to 24 bit (or even higher) is a huge benefit when you are
doing signal editing and processing. Each altering of the audio stream
leaves audible artifacts (read as "rounding" errors). The higher the
resolution used the less these ""rounding" errors accumulate and destroy the
signal. 24 bit is better in most cases. 

There are other benefits to a higher bit depth too but again I am not going
to make this a digital audio theory dissertation. I just aim to somewhat
debunk the 24 bit is useless myth.

Last point here is 24 bit depth is only part of the story. they no doubt
used a high sampling rate too. Most likely 96kHz (vs. 44.1kHz used for CD).
This too has it benefits. "24 bit mastering" is a marketing tool. It has
some truth to but it can be misleading if it not understood buy the
consumer.

  >>plus it's not going to make 30+ year old recordings sound the least bit
better

Very true, but it can't make them sound worse either. Don't handicap
yourself from the start. If you start with a better digital approximation to
the analog signal than you will have a better chance end up closer it at the
final stages of production as well. 

  >>and yet there's loads of clipping!

You can thank the record companies for that idea. That is done at the
pre-master stage. I'd like to kick the guys ass who came up with that way to
put a signal to CD. For some reason all of them think the signal has to be
hot as hell to make it sound good (audiophile record labels excepted). Check
most commercial CD's today and you will find this same problem. Sad but they
just don't care if it's any good. They only care that somebody on a 10 year
old walkman can play it or that it sounds good going down a gravel road in
'74 Chevy van without a muffler. Some things never change...

BTW: The clipping has nothing to do with the fact they used 24 bit
technology. It has everything to with low brow record company policies.

Jim