What sample rate?

[Edward]

You just agreed with me without realising it.
Cool.

Of course I realised I agree with you.

My point is why would you stay in the 16 bit domain when upsampling if you knew the sq will be rubbish.

[struth]

think you often see that with qobuz, as many you would maybe think would be done in hi rez are kept at 16/44. also you get others at odd levels so obviously they are adj level to suit the sound quality

[dave2010]

There's no data in the groove of a vinyl record though, it's just a groove. Man.

I was an early adopter of SACD. Initially I thought it was the second coming. With the hybrid discs I was puzzled that the CD layer and SACD layer sounded no different. Then I found out.

Also had one of the upsampling players. Didn't like it, sounded a bit blousey, thought the upsampling was to blame. With CD you could not switch off the upsampling. But it could be used as a stand alone DAC too so I hooked up a transport and could switch between 16/44.1 and 24/384 at will with the remote. Not a scrap of difference.

Not to say that up sampling will not make a difference sometimes. Depends on all sorts of things. Lots of variables involved.

This probably won't be your cup of tea, but over the last year I've got into playing different recorders (the blowy things, the 'orrible squeaky things which some 3-8 year olds like to annoy you with right down yer lug'oles ....).

Seems that "real" players can tell the difference between models - and yes - now that I've got more than ten different models (though only one bass recorder - which is just passable). From a player's perspective I can say that there are differences. In order to decide which of some of the models to buy I looked at the Thomann web site - such as this - https://www.thomann.de/gb/yamaha_yrt304b.htm
You should notice that there are audio samples, which are supposed to be representative of the model.
Compare that one, for example with this one https://www.thomann.de/gb/aulos_211a_robin_tenor.htm or even this one https://www.thomann.de/gb/thomann_tr...lockfloete.htm

It is possible that you won't hear much difference, particularly if you're not a player. I actually do have one of the Aulos models - it's OK, and one of the Thomann models - which is really not great. I also played a Yamaha which I borrowed - and perhaps it did sound the best on the Thomann web site - though like Thomann's own instrument, it has fussy keys which don't work too well.

Another comparison site is this one - https://youtu.be/DEJA49rZyCs - you won't find out which is which until much later, if you ever do.

A three way comparison is here - https://youtu.be/tnTimwvHmwM

Sometimes the audible differences seem very small - though that may also depend on the state of one's ears. Sometimes putting olive oil in the ears can make a significant difference to how things sound - sometimes good - and sometimes not good at all. I am prone to ear wax, so sometimes I get a big problem, though often now I just leave things alone and problems do quite often just go away. I do, however, think that extended listening on headphones can make wax and hearing problems much worse.

If you can't hear all the resolution which others claim you should, don't worry about it, unless it bothers you.

[Gazjam]

Of course I realised I agree with you.

My point is why would you stay in the 16 bit domain when upsampling if you knew the sq will be rubbish.

I dont.

Dabbled with upsampling, HQ Player and the like, but nowadays prefer playback in native format.
My Dac upsamples to DSD anyway, so upsampling is moot in my case.

[Hibster_2000]

So it would appear that sample rate questions are the new cable thread?
I have dropped to 24/96 and it sounds fine.

[NRG]

Hi Dave, I agree about your main point about possible improvements via upsampling (I to do image processing) but my narrow point was about doing upsampling (or indeed any processing) whilst staying in the 16 bit domain.

Yeah, upsampling is a frequency change IE inserting samples not a bit depth change. A greater bit depth helps when manipulating digital files like when changing peak levels after which you dither to the required bit depth.

Patrick was shat upon earlier and unfairly, he knows his stuff, the analogy was a good one given a sampling rate (24fps) of a none BANDWIDTH LIMITED input. The resulting aliasing being seen as a wheel rotating backwards.

[dave2010]

Yeah, upsampling is a frequency change IE inserting samples not a bit depth change. A greater bit depth helps when manipulating digital files like when changing peak levels after which you dither to the required bit depth.

If upsampling is used, with interpolation then arbitrary data values may be obtained. If using floating point arithmetic these can be mapped to any bit depth by truncation, though the preferred method would be to use dither.

Whether this could realistically lead to any perceived sound improvement I couldn't say.

Once one starts messing with filtering etc. all sorts of perceived "improvements" can be noticed. In image processing I have been amazed at some of the effects - one being haze removal. The point of the image processing analogy is to show that "improvements" are possible. Such improvements may not actually correspond to reality - it may actually have been hazy in the example mentioned - but then one can open up all sorts of discussion about what "reality" is anyway.

These perceptual changes emerge after either linear (most common?) or non-linear filtering. Doing manipulation of audio signals using digital processing can use filtering explicitly, but will usually change the data very slightly (unless true lossless procesing is used), and the changes may be perceived as improvements, or not. Such changes, which strictly should be considered as noise, will also interact with the analogue circuitry used for the playback.

Someone up thread suggests "too many variables"!

[Macca]

Someone up thread suggests "too many variables"!

Yes, too many variables to be able to deduce purely from listening as to what is causing the outputted signal to be different. Or even if it is actually different. That doesn't seem to stop people from jumping to conclusions or coming out with some pretty outrageous theories as to why. But it's all good fun.

[struth]

like most things for the end user, what sounds best is best . folk can overthink things and spoil what should be pleasure of discovery

[dave2010]

Yes, too many variables to be able to deduce purely from listening as to what is causing the outputted signal to be different. Or even if it is actually different. That doesn't seem to stop people from jumping to conclusions or coming out with some pretty outrageous theories as to why. But it's all good fun.

Indeed. A few years ago I looked at some waveforms from clarinets, and simulated clarinets. The odd thing was that some of the simulated clarinets had really odd waveforms, yet sounded much closer to so some of the real clarinet samples, while some of the real clarinet samples sounded really quite different from some of the others. I was a bit surprised, but that's the way things are.

Despite being aware of some obvious deficiencies in my hearing compared with many years ago, I continue to be amazed on occasions at how much better and realistic (!!) real live sound by live performers in an appropriate environment is, compared with even reasonably good "hi-fi". Of course, sometimes it can be worse, but not often. It's usually much better by several orders of magnitude That applies to almost all forms of music, or aural experiences.