Gain staging... 32 bit?

[jrod9900]

Good question. I'm in PT10 and have yet to go up to 32 bit float.

Jrod

[stinkyfingers]

-18dB is the same at 24bit and 32bit...
how can one sound quieter than the other...?
is this a pro-tools only thing...?

[jrod9900]

No idea... Just saying I haven't used 32 bit yet. I'm curious in it.

JROD

[brew]

Originally Posted by Mazrak

But, is this necessary in 32 bit? If I record something at -18db in 32 bit it's substantially quieter than when I record the same source at -18db in 24 bit.

No it's not--it's not possible for it to be quieter at different bit depths. For one thing, your audio interface is 24 bit, so everything you record is 24 bit. 32 bit is only what happens inside the DAW when you mix. -18 dBFS is the same level no matter what the bit depth is. Think of when you add bits, they are added to the bottom, not the top.

You should leave your DAW set to 32 bit and not 24. Here's an example: what's 5+5? 10. So you had two one-digit numbers and they summed to a two-digit number. That's why you need more bits. If you only had 1 digit to represent your system, 5+5 would equal have to equal 0 or 1 (actually, it would clip your system), and that would be wrong (this is what's known as quantization error).