16/24 bit dilemma. Help please.

[burgeis]

I just finished mastering an album but the session was at 24bit/44.1 and accidentally all my bounces were at 24 bit, not 16bit as intended. So I right-clicked the files and did "Export files as regions" in 16/44.1.

So when I loaded those files in Sonoris DDP creator I got that message with each file:

"The length of file is 39500744 bytes. This is not a whole number of CD frames and the file will be padded with silene. This can cause a gap betwenn this track and the next.

Ignore?"

Should I bounce again at 16bit or leave it as is, will it be a problem at the plant or whatever?

Thanks you sirs.

[Riccardo]

I do not own Sonoris but it would appear the message refers to CD frames rather than bit depth. I am sure you are fine with 16 bit files in DDP Creator. Possibly some of the regions you exported are not "whole CD frames" hence the warning?

Originally Posted by burgeis

I just finished mastering an album but the session was at 24bit/44.1 and accidentally all my bounces were at 24 bit, not 16bit as intended. So I right-clicked the files and did "Export files as regions" in 16/44.1.

So when I loaded those files in Sonoris DDP creator I got that message with each file:

"The length of file is 39500744 bytes. This is not a whole number of CD frames and the file will be padded with silene. This can cause a gap betwenn this track and the next.

Ignore?"

Should I bounce again at 16bit or leave it as is, will it be a problem at the plant or whatever?

Thanks you sirs.

[burgeis]

Thank you. I've always exported my files as 16bit and I've had no problem before importing them. But now I get that message with every file.

[Zownd]

Originally Posted by burgeis

Thank you. I've always exported my files as 16bit and I've had no problem before importing them. But now I get that message with every file.

Any chance you also exported as 48kHz?

[burgeis]

Nope, exported as 44.1khz/16bit.

[lowland]

Hi burgeis,

Do you have a piece of software other than your DAW and DDP Creator that can read the sample rate and bit depth of audio files?

It won't do any harm to confirm first what the format of those bounced files actually is - that's where I would start, I think, and take it from there. In my case I would use Sample Manager.

[anrug]

Originally Posted by burgeis

So when I loaded those files in Sonoris DDP creator I got that message with each file:

"The length of file is 39500744 bytes. This is not a whole number of CD frames and the file will be padded with silene. This can cause a gap betwenn this track and the next.

Ignore?"

Should I bounce again at 16bit or leave it as is, will it be a problem at the plant or whatever?

When you export "regions" as tracks for CD you have to make sure these regions start and stop at CD frame boundaries (75 CD frames are 1 second). There is no way around that, tracks on a CD simply can not have arbitrary length. Of course you can fill up the last CD frame with silence, as Sonoris offers, which if you fade to total digital silence at the start and end of tracks--as many people do in song-based type of music--is not a problem. But if your tracks need to continue seemlessly, like in classical music where the ambience never stops or in live performance CD, that's a problem.

The only thing which make me wonder, what Sonoris is doing, is the wording of that message: not the file length is what should be relevant but the length of the audio. Plus 39500744 results in a non-integer number of samples for 44.1kHz, which usually would indicate that the file is probably broken. Maybe Sonoris really shows the file length instead of the audio length, but then why? Maybe it's not recognizing the file correctly?

First I would look up in your file browser, if 39500744 is the file file length or the audio length. Then I'd like to open this file in another software to see if it correctly shows up as 44.1kHz/24bit.

[burgeis]

Thanks dudes. The files are definitely 16bit/44.1khz. I'll just try bouncing them again and see what happens, I've never had this "problem" before when bouncing straight to 16/44. Let's hope that works. Until then, thank you.

[wado1942]

Yeah, I wouldn't take any chances on the master disk being anything other than exactly what you intended, even if that just means just a little extra pad between songs. It's better to just render everything again in the intended format.

[Trakworx]

Originally Posted by anrug

When you export "regions" as tracks for CD you have to make sure these regions start and stop at CD frame boundaries (75 CD frames are 1 second). There is no way around that, tracks on a CD simply can not have arbitrary length. Of course you can fill up the last CD frame with silence, as Sonoris offers, which if you fade to total digital silence at the start and end of tracks--as many people do in song-based type of music--is not a problem. But if your tracks need to continue seemlessly, like in classical music where the ambience never stops or in live performance CD, that's a problem.

What's all this now?

I've been exporting regions of any length I please and burning seamless masters at will for 17 years.

Sonoris DDP Creator, Jam, Toast, Masterlist CD, none of them ever required files to start and stop at CD frame boundaries and none ever added any silence.

[jslevin]

I don't even understand the question.

You're mastering. Get it right. Period.

[anrug]

Originally Posted by Trakworx

What's all this now? Sonoris DDP Creator, Jam, Toast, Masterlist CD, none of them ever required files to start and stop at CD frame boundaries and none ever added any silence.

I have not actively worked with any of the mentioned programs, so I don't know, what they do/did, but there is no doubt that on a CD a track start can only be at a frame boundary, because on a CD a sector of 2352 bytes (1/75 of a second) is the smallest addressable unit.

As fas a I have seen a good DAW will have the CD track start (and track end/pause) marker snap to a CD frame grid. No if you don't do the PQ and CD text editing within the DAW but in a separate program, I'll assume that this mastering program will accept audio files of any length and simply pad the last sector with silence (as Sonoris appearently offers). For people who assemble their CDs with digital silence between each of the tracks this is not a problem at all, the pause will only be slightly longer and the track end(=pause) marker will be a tiny fraction later than expected. Nothing to worry about.

But if you happen to belong to the maybe rare species of people dealing with music, where there'll never ever be silence on the whole CD, assembling files with small gaps if silence in between would be a problem (for which reason it's very smart that Sonoris warns one about it). Of course in that case there is another smart option a mastering program could choose: make an immediate transition to the next file and move the marker backwards (in time) to the closed CD boundary. Maybe that's what the programs you've been working with did, or maybe you had digital silence in between tracks? Just guessing. I certainly haven't done extensive research on this issue.

[PieterS]

Just released version 3.0 of the DDP Creator and removed the warning in this release. It seemed that it raised a lot of questions instead of answering them...

The reason I added the warning in the previous version was because people asked why there were small gaps after dropping a few wav files on the DDP Creator, trying to make a gapless CD.

Anyway, a CD works with frames of 2352 bytes and you can't have tracks that ends between two CD frame boundaries. The DDP Creator just adds silence in that case, always did, with or without the warning.

[Trakworx]

Originally Posted by PieterS

Just released version 3.0 of the DDP Creator and removed the warning in this release. It seemed that it raised a lot of questions instead of answering them...

The reason I added the warning in the previous version was because people asked why there were small gaps after dropping a few wav files on the DDP Creator, trying to make a gapless CD.

Anyway, a CD works with frames of 2352 bytes and you can't have tracks that ends between two CD frame boundaries. The DDP Creator just adds silence in that case, always did, with or without the warning.

Thanks for the info!

This is what I love about GS - always something new to learn.

Still puzzled though...

I never encountered this information in any CD authoring software's literature, including DDP Creator's.

I guess I've been extremely lucky, because I've made many many continuous, gapless masters over the years and never once have I or my clients noticed any added silence at the index point, and not for lack of listening. I'd think a prominent pop would occur in some cases. Is there some kind of smoothing taking place? Perhaps a CD player's error correction fills in the gaps?

Also, if 75 frames/sec is so strict, how come Jam allows you to set the CD frame to 100 per second?

[Petrus]

If you want to be sure about a gapless CD, why not make one continuous file from all tracks/songs, and place track markers on this, which will be placed automatically on frame junction points by the cd authoring software?

[Laarsø]

Originally Posted by Trakworx

What's all this now?

I've been exporting regions of any length I please and burning seamless masters at will for 17 years.

In parallel, maybe, but not in series. However, maybe your will was quantized by the automagic marker placement of your PQ app?

Originally Posted by Trakworx

Sonoris DDP Creator, Jam, Toast, Masterlist CD, none of them ever required files to start and stop at CD frame boundaries and none ever added any silence...

They didn't add silence because they all required files to start and stop at CD frame boundary.



Cheersø,
Laarsø

[Laarsø]

Originally Posted by jslevin

I don't even understand the question.

You're mastering. Get it right. Period.

Actually,you're premastering. Periods.



Cheersø,
Laarsø

[Trakworx]

Originally Posted by Petrus

If you want to be sure about a gapless CD, why not make one continuous file from all tracks/songs, and place track markers on this, which will be placed automatically on frame junction points by the cd authoring software?

I use Sonoris DDP Creator. Does anyone know if it can do this? Thanks.

[PieterS]

Originally Posted by Trakworx

I use Sonoris DDP Creator. Does anyone know if it can do this? Thanks.

Yes, version 3.0 can do this.

[anrug]

Originally Posted by Trakworx

Still puzzled though...

I never encountered this information in any CD authoring software's literature, including DDP Creator's.

I guess I've been extremely lucky, because I've made many many continuous, gapless masters over the years and never once have I or my clients noticed any added silence at the index point, and not for lack of listening. I'd think a prominent pop would occur in some cases. Is there some kind of smoothing taking place? Perhaps a CD player's error correction fills in the gaps?

Error correction of the CD will not deal with this, after all the silence may be on purpose.

But maybe you just never came across the combination of conditions which makes some programs like DDP Creator pad an incomplete CD sector.

1. First of all you have to have a continuous program, like a CD with classical music or a live (concert type) recording, where the room noise never stops.
2. Second you must assemble your master by bouncing separate tracks of this music (this is not what you usually do with a gap-less program, I'd suspect), you'd much rather bounce one long file. Or you'd use a DAW which can handle PQ editing, avoiding a separate program for this.
3. And third the program doing the bounce must allow you to set start and end of your tracks/regions at non-CD-track boundaries.
4. Forth the program you use for assembling and PQ editing must decide to pad the incomplete CD frames at the end of your bounced files, instead of connecting them seamlessly together. (Which is possible despite the CD sector boundary if you are happy to have your track marker moved a little--less than 1/75 of a second obviously).

Only in this combination you're asking for trouble. Well engineered programs will e prepared to deal with this (and often at the cost of hiding the details from the user so he doesn't get troubled with to much knowledge).

Also, if 75 frames/sec is so strict, how come Jam allows you to set the CD frame to 100 per second?

So you have a timeline/grid with milliseconds labelled as CD frames? Is that what you mean? Sounds unlikely to me, I have to admit.

[Trakworx]

Originally Posted by PieterS

Yes, version 3.0 can do this.

Thanks! If I upgrade to V 3.0 does it come with instructions on how to use this feature? And will the markers be placed automatically on frame junction points?

[Trakworx]

Originally Posted by anrug

Error correction of the CD will not deal with this, after all the silence may be on purpose.

But maybe you just never came across the combination of conditions which makes some programs like DDP Creator pad an incomplete CD sector.

1. First of all you have to have a continuous program, like a CD with classical music or a live (concert type) recording, where the room noise never stops.
2. Second you must assemble your master by bouncing separate tracks of this music (this is not what you usually do with a gap-less program, I'd suspect), you'd much rather bounce one long file. Or you'd use a DAW which can handle PQ editing, avoiding a separate program for this.
3. And third the program doing the bounce must allow you to set start and end of your tracks/regions at non-CD-track boundaries.
4. Forth the program you use for assembling and PQ editing must decide to pad the incomplete CD frames at the end of your bounced files, instead of connecting them seamlessly together. (Which is possible despite the CD sector boundary if you are happy to have your track marker moved a little--less than 1/75 of a second obviously).

Only in this combination you're asking for trouble. Well engineered programs will e prepared to deal with this (and often at the cost of hiding the details from the user so he doesn't get troubled with to much knowledge).

So you have a timeline/grid with milliseconds labelled as CD frames? Is that what you mean? Sounds unlikely to me, I have to admit.

Yes, I think all 4 of those apply. I'm exporting files of arbitrary length from PT9, some of which are continuous/gapless, and using DDP Creator 2.0.4, which is said to add silence. No noticeable silences so far, though I only switched to Sonoris a few months ago. Still, connected songs with indexes between them is something I do pretty often. I rechecked some of them and I hear no silences. Maybe PT9 automatically exports files to match CD frames?

What I mean about Jam is that it has a pop-up control at the bottom of the main window that lets you select a CD frame rate of either 75/sec or 100/sec. I've burned Redbook masters using the 100/sec option with no subsequent problems. IDK, perhaps redbook standard allows for this. Anybody know how this can be?