What's the purpose of 192kHz?

[Suda Badri]

Originally posted by SnakeCained
The only real advantage, apart from the subjective nature of sound quality, is that digital systems have lower latency at higher sample rates.

Originally Posted by Mr. Victory

How is that? Could you expand...???

well the computer doesnt have to do as much oversampling or "filling int the details" with a 192khz signal because your converter is already doing that so the computer needs much less time to route the signal around because it is not spending time filling in data of a signal thats say 48khz... jsut because you are listening to a 44.1 signal doesnt mean that what you actually hear it in 44.1 theres a lot of intermediary steps inbetween each of those 44.1 that make the signal be heard as music/sound... i might be wrong, but simply do some measurements, cubase always runs with lower latency when i run higher rates...

not that i care, i still do most things in 24/44.1 but sound design i stick to 192, cuz more options and well the capabilities are there and it can be used for really fun SFX... check out the article below for some quirky stuff

http://hartfx.net/192k-experiments/

[hive]

ime, if you're doing alot of heavy plugin compression / saturation / distortion (harmonics generation) processing, then higher sample rates are worthwhile. aliasing is almost non existant at 192k, cant say that for 96k even. the higher you go, the closer you can get to analog itb it seems.

[unfiltered420]

Higher sample rates have no benefit. Digital (after 24 bit, 44.1) is digital. You can work within any modern format and have way more drastic changes even with a subtle EQ curve or something than upping the sample rate. Digital has a certain sound to it, whether that sound is more real or not is debatable, but the fact is digital has a sound, and that sound is not lessened in any way by higher sample rates or even high end converters.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Higher sample rates have no benefit. Digital (after 24 bit, 44.1) is digital. You can work within any modern format and have way more drastic changes even with a subtle EQ curve or something than upping the sample rate. Digital has a certain sound to it, whether that sound is more real or not is debatable, but the fact is digital has a sound, and that sound is not lessened in any way by higher sample rates or even high end converters.

thats not what Lavry et al says!! Advantages up to around 60khz sample rate. Moves the brick wall filters way out of the audible band.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

thats not what Lavry et al says!! Advantages up to around 60khz sample rate. Moves the brick wall filters way out of the audible band.

Last time I check Lavry sells converters, so even with scientific background, you can't really listen to him. And science only has to do with the portion of music production that is not artistic. No one can really hear above 15-16k anyway, and even if they can the stuff up there isn't useful. A great manual, "The Sound Reinforcement Handbook", says that any system with bandwidth up to 15k can sound breathtakingly good, and anything above that just simply suggests better phase shift in the audible band, but never proven by tests.

These types of things can be debated endlessly, but the fact is, there are much easier and better ways of improving sound than increasing sample rate.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Last time I check Lavry sells converters, so even with scientific background, you can't really listen to him. And science only has to do with the portion of music production that is not artistic. No one can really hear above 15-16k anyway, and even if they can the stuff up there isn't useful. A great manual, "The Sound Reinforcement Handbook", says that any system with bandwidth up to 15k can sound breathtakingly good, and anything above that just simply suggests better phase shift in the audible band, but never proven by tests.

These types of things can be debated endlessly, but the fact is, there are much easier and better ways of improving sound than increasing sample rate.

Indeed true.

You can listen to Lavry - he's a good guy. And I'll back him up all the way (and I'm much higher qualified, as unintentionally arrogant as that sounds).

Moving the filters away from the audible bands lessens artefacts within the audible bands. 60khz should do nicely. 192 is not needed unless you're doing "SFX".

[jamwerks]

Originally Posted by narcoman

thats not what Lavry et al says!! Advantages up to around 60khz sample rate. Moves the brick wall filters way out of the audible band.

Yeah too bad 60khz hasn't been adopted by all parties. I wonder if there is any talk of this at all the AES meetings?

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Last time I check Lavry sells converters, so even with scientific background, you can't really listen to him.

Lavry wrote some great posts here 4-5 years ago I think. I learned a lot...

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by jamwerks

Yeah too bad 60khz hasn't been adopted by all parties. I wonder if there is any talk of this at all the AES meetings?



Lavry wrote some great posts here 4-5 years ago I think. I learned a lot...

I'm sure there is a lot of scientific information you can learn from him. But anyone who advocates using anything higher than 92khz has science in mind and not actual music or listening. Science (at this point in time) is only as useful as specs are to the sound of any piece of gear. They matter less and less over the years as average sound quality gets better, but the peak is a hard ceiling. The very best recordings have not gotten any better since the 60's. Maybe quieter, maybe less distortion, but not better. That says something about the nature of the art.

[jamwerks]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

I'm sure there is a lot of scientific information you can learn from him. But anyone who advocates using anything higher than 92khz has science in mind and not actual music or listening. Science (at this point in time) is only as useful as specs are to the sound of any piece of gear. They matter less and less over the years as average sound quality gets better, but the peak is a hard ceiling. The very best recordings have not gotten any better since the 60's. Maybe quieter, maybe less distortion, but not better. That says something about the nature of the art.

He was advocating 60khz at the time, which is of course less than 92. I've only read your last 3 posts, but it's clear from your reasoning that you don't have all sides of the discussion.

There's a search button up on top...

[narcoman]

wouldn't quieter and less distortion be two of the qualifiers for better?

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

That says something about the nature of the art.

art is one of the smaller users of recording. There are many areas that are looking for broader bandwidths and lower noise floors. Even simple SFX use is underserved at the moment. To misquote an old book, music is not the only fruit.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

wouldn't quieter and less distortion be two of the qualifiers for better?

Try to convince an electric guitar player that. Or anyone who uses any colored gear.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Try to convince an electric guitar player that. Or anyone who uses any colored gear.

You're arguing ridiculous sentiments. Distortion in a converter is an entirely unrelated thing to harmonic distortion sought by musicians or recordist in gear such as guitar amps or tape machines.

Behave.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

art is one of the smaller users of recording.

Yeah, but art is the only area of recording where high quality actually is an issue in modern times.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Yeah, but art is the only area of recording where high quality actually is an issue in modern times.

Archiving alone is a bigger area than the whole of music. Same with ADR. Same with broadcast.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

You're arguing ridiculous sentiments. Distortion in a converter is an entirely unrelated thing to harmonic distortion sought by musicians or recordist in gear such as guitar amps or tape machines.

Behave.

We were talking about recordings in general, remember, not converters. And even some converters, like the UAD 2192, are prized for their colored sound, which is a direct result of harmonic distortion. I'm not misbehaving, just knocking you down a peg for not understanding how art can spawn from what science considers garbage.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

We were talking about recordings in general, remember, not converters. And even some converters, like the UAD 2192, are prized for their colored sound, which is a direct result of harmonic distortion. I'm not misbehaving, just knocking you down a peg for not understanding how art can spawn from what science considers garbage.

You are directly misbehaving. Final friendly warning.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

Archiving alone is a bigger area than the whole of music. Same with ADR. Same with broadcast.

Quality has plateaued, with digital in general and especially 24 bit recording. So music is the only area where it is even an issue. Archiving (other than music) and broadcast do not have any info above probably 10k (highest human voice note is lower than 3k). Noise floor is about bit-depth, not sample rate.

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by narcoman

You are directly misbehaving. Final friendly warning.

Do whatever you want, ban me from here, but realize it's just an emotional hissy fit on your part. You are bully.

[narcoman]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Quality has plateaued, with digital in general and especially 24 bit recording. So music is the only area where it is even an issue. Archiving (other than music) and broadcast do not have any info above probably 10k (highest human voice note is lower than 3k). Noise floor is about bit-depth, not sample rate.

We are not discussing bit depth. We are not discussing noise floor.

Military archiving is one of the biggest users of AD systems. For infrasonic reasons they require higher sample rates than musicians use. Music archiving is at the behest of the client - the digitisation (for better of for worse) of many of the majors catalogues are being done at 192 and higher ( I see no reason why but that is what they have demanded).

Restorative and reconstructive work on older films is also a major client (my company has been doing this in the UK and its fascinating stuff).

[_rd]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

But anyone who advocates using anything higher than 92khz has science in mind and not actual music or listening.

Having science in mind, one would not advocate that. The argument that a sampling rate of 88.2 kHz (*)(**) does suffice to theoretically perfectly reproduce a signal with a frequency < 20 kHz is backed by science.

* in practice I'd use 96 kHz for interoperability, compatibility and economical reasons.
** while, e.g. 44.1 kHz would have a Nyquist frequency of 22.050 kHz, comfortably above humanly hearable frequencies, a higher bandwidth is needed to account for the slope of the anti-aliasing filter, for example.

[narcoman]

interesting you'd use 96 instead of 88.2. I use 88.2 a lot for stereo projects precisely because of the reasons you state. Any reasons for your 96 preference?

[_rd]

Originally Posted by narcoman

interesting you'd use 96 instead of 88.2. I use 88.2 a lot for stereo projects precisely because of the reasons you state. Any reasons for your 96 preference?

I like to have as much of my source material in the same format as possible. Most of my base material is in 96 kHz for historic reasons, and although I don't mind upsampling in DACs for listening, I'd rather not modify my sources that way. But that would be necessary if start to add sources sampled with 88.2 kHz.
The other thing is that I design much of my equipment myself and I have more oscillators in stock with a frequency that is a multiple of 96 kHz. Again, probably for historic reasons, because there was a time when 48 kHz was considered the "professional sampling rate".

Well above the Nyquist requirement for perfect reproduction, but needing >8% less processing power than 96 kHz, and actually being supported by most if not all modern equipment (unlike, say, 60 kHz), 88.2 kHz could be considered the sample rate sweet spot for music signals.

[Doc Mixwell]

What's the purpose of 192kHz?

To capture frequencies as high as 96Khz

[ShadowAMD]

Originally Posted by Doc Mixwell

What's the purpose of 192kHz?

To capture frequencies as high as 96Khz

Yep, the market for cat's, dogs and bats have gone up over the years.. It's just like a cat watching a TV

[hive]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

Higher sample rates have no benefit. Digital (after 24 bit, 44.1) is digital. You can work within any modern format and have way more drastic changes even with a subtle EQ curve or something than upping the sample rate. Digital has a certain sound to it, whether that sound is more real or not is debatable, but the fact is digital has a sound, and that sound is not lessened in any way by higher sample rates or even high end converters.

i'm talking about plugins sounding better at higher sample rates. recordings sounding better at higher sample rates is something else. don't dismiss it so easily til you've done the comparisons.

[string6theory]

Originally Posted by mangoid

Maybe i can clarify a few points...

...

So the superiority of DSD is a prime example of how the whole "we can't hear way up there anyway so what's the point" argument is founded in misunderstanding - presumably originating from non-techies reading techie threads and misunderstanding them and then passing them along to others until the misunderstaning grows to urban legend proportions.

Fellow gearslutz, higher sample rates are not about *hearing higher frequencies*; they're about increased resolution, accuracy, detail, transient response, and subjective and objective realism in the frequency range we *can* hear, and... also stuff that's subtler and harder to express in words (and thus harder to "defend" in jousts of naked, ignorant wit) but nonetheless real and powerful and valuable... ya know... the "energy" of a performance.

Whether a given converter box or signal path actually *delivers* the full picture of purity and energy that the technology theoretically allows for is an engineering issue (and no doubt poor engineering will continue routinely to be paved over by compelling marketing) and, as always, beauty is in the ear of the beholder.

^ THIS

[unfiltered420]

Originally Posted by hive

i'm talking about plugins sounding better at higher sample rates. recordings sounding better at higher sample rates is something else. don't dismiss it so easily til you've done the comparisons.

Oh I have. I am an open minded person, I don't dismiss things easily. I don't work in digital anymore, not to say it's not great, but for what I do, the analog gear I have learned to use works better for me. However I have used digital extensively, and have A/B'd a few high end converters. I have found certain differences between some converters, and understand what many are talking about when they describe what they hear, but I also figured out that simply changing EQ settings very lightly can have the same effect and so much more.

Now with sample rate within the same converter, the difference may be audible at best. But changes are not necessarily good, even subtle ones. Sometimes things tend to sound better to the engineer simply because there is a change.

Things sound different in comparison than in pure perception. In fact our entire perception is based on changes and relative comparison. So just because a higher sample rate or knob tweak sounds different and maybe even better by comparison, that does not mean that the end product is any better. So why bother with ridiculously priced converters and higher sample rates and cables that by their design are meant to be benign?

The mod has accused me of being insulting and rude in my posts, but I simply tell it like I see it, and that is something that any social group or forum such as this doesn't tolerate. I could just tell people what they wanted to hear, but then what is the point of open exchanges of information, to stroke each others egos?

[hive]

Originally Posted by unfiltered420

I don't work in digital anymore, not to say it's not great, but for what I do, the analog gear I have learned to use works better for me.

/end thread

[Ciozzi]

What's the purpose of 192kHz?

Wasting resources for the most....