You're not humble, you're outspoken as you were when denying any difference on Lossless v Spotify 320 thread. You can't seem to accept that some folks can hear the differences you can't.
Again, the goal is not to blind-test to see which one is better. The goal of A/B comparison is to hear what each dither scheme is doing to the sound. To that end, it doesn't matter if you know the dither is being applied. Now, if you really cannot hear any difference, it might mean that the dither you selected is doing its job correctly.
My friend and I wrote down our notes on each noise shaping scheme and kept them secret from each other in our single blind tests. Afterwards, we compared notes and they matched. Some types were easily audible and identifiable, and some were more subtle.
Again, you really do not need to blind test this. I don't know why some of you guys (not you, necessarily) are so damn stuck on blind-testing. A sighted A/B test will do. The goal is not to see if you can hear a difference at all, but what the dither is doing to your music. When I do my A/B comparisons, I listen for: 1) the collapse and distance of the soundstage 2) the reduction of the front-to-back depth 3) bass 4) timbre If I do not hear a difference between the source and dithered file, the dither and/or noise shaping I picked is doing its job. I do not bother listening to the tails of the music. I do not care about the noise. Noise is gonna happen. The less the better, but, still... We cannot assume all dither and/or noise shaping is transparent. And, at times, you may want the sonic signature of a type of dither to alter the sound of your music, though I can't figure out why one would want to do that. This has everything to do with the topic. You have to use dither when take a 24-bit file down to 16-bit. Well, if you don't, you will wind up with some nasty results.
We're all outspoken with our opinions aren't we?....but if you're going to be outspoken please fill out your equipment profile.
I don't care about blind testing, just sharing that I did blind test this. I was trying to help support your argument and show people how they could run their own blind tests at home, for people that are into that sort of thing. We mostly see people sharing their feelings that things don't matter on here, so I am hoping that by making experiencing the difference easier, we are lowering the bar to entry, for people that aren't necessarily handy with software/computers.
According to Robert Harley, the editor of The Absolute Sound magazine: yes, it does produce smaller steps in volume. According to him, this is especially important during quiet passages when only a fraction of the total bit depth is being used. His book The Complete Guide to High-End Audio contains extensive technical discussion about why he believes that hi res sounds superior to CD quality. I'm a sociologist, not a physicist or engineer, so I'm not qualified to comment on the accuracy of his technical arguments. All I can say that it matches with my subjective experience on my current system.
From what I can gather, and it is hard to gather from this, you could be much clearer in your communications. You claim that one hear the differences between 24bit and 16bit, but then the details reveal that could be because of the variances in dithering profiles. And then your caveat is that with the “correct” dither profile that you don’t hear any differences between 24bit and 16 bit files. I wonder why you even post? To aggravate people?
Here's another track that clearly sounds better (to me) at 24bit v 16bit, would be great for others to try the comparison and report back:
Why there is a difference I have no idea, could be the DAC prefers 24bit, although since some 16bit files sound as good, probably not. Could be the software I used to down convert (Audacity), although Qobuz 16bit files also don't sound as good as their 24bit versions.
Yeah, no need to blind test unless we're emotionally invested in a certain product or could be swayed by appearances, or brand names like with most hardware testing. Testing dither - say iZotope MBIT+ vs. Saracon POWr2 dither shouldn't need blinding unless I own shares in the company I suppose. ;-)
This is what I do. I record my live stuff at 88.2/24 with peak @ approximately -12db and then normalize. Everything is as clean as a whistle.
The 24-bit version is 88.2kHz, right? Are you starting with 24/88.2 then dithering to 16/88.2 for a listen? If not, the 16/44.1 CD version is a bit different in levels as I recall a few years back when looking at this...
Other than post #39, which warrants further investigation, is there another mathematical explanation of why 24-bit might sound better, and once again I ask does bitrate pertain to anything other than noise floor and dynamic range?
If you are trying to suggest that I am a shill for a company, i'm not. I am trying to encourage people to do their own testing and not rely on the "because...science" guys to tell them what they can and can't hear, which happens all too damn much on this forum. The "because...science" guys usually have never done their own testing.
Where did I suggest you were a shill? I agreed with you man that blind testing a dithering algo isn't needed. In principle, unless we have emotional biases (like own shares to the company), stuff like dithering requires no blinding. I think you're being a little sensitive with a joke at the end to lighten the mood and misread the smiley face. I think I'm encouraging people to test themselves as well and would happily run another blind test with the track from Random Access Memories (16 vs. 24 bits) if anyone thinks this would be helpful. BTW, aren't we all "because... science" guys these days chatting over computer networks!? It is literally "bits are bits" science that allows us to interact this way. When it comes to bitdepth reduction and dithering, I think it's fair to say that unless one is an alien or have magical hearing, or listen in an anechoic chamber, I highly suspect that 16-bits are enough (most albums sold as 24-bits actually are not true high-resolution anyways). Just like I suspect basically all of us here are humans and can't fly. Is that a problem to show skepticism if someone were insisting they can? Nobody needs to be upset since this isn't all that controversial (compared to say cables!)...
On this I might agree. I have used the dithering with Foobar2000 (since my DAC accepts only 24 bit input natively), and in the past I also tried a Marantz player which had two different dithering algorithms. Dithering done well is better than simply truncating bits and replacing them with zeros. The difference is subtle, but it's there, it's a bit like the noise shaping done for DSD. But still, no difference to my hears between native 24 and (correctly) dithered 16 bit.
That’s not even close to accurate. We’ve no idea what our biases are, as in which are at play and for what reasons. A person can easily be invested in an outcome because of an initial impression or social reinforcement, or even just for outcomes sake. Sure we do 24 bit vs 16 bit music files Of course as with all things, it depends. Usually not difficult to find “broken” implementations, regardless of the reason.
This would be far closer to what I think........(with sincerely great respect for you) "Some folks make claims to hear BIG differences, that are not verified, where I claim the differences are in reality probably far smaller than described." That is not being outspoken at all, but simply being more realistic and conservative and in line with Blind testing myself and several other forum members have taken, which for the most part concluded the differences are fairly hard to hear or impossible for many or most listeners. I never denied ANY difference, but simply said those claiming Huge, or Night and day differences, were most likely not hearing 320kbps at its best for various reasons. I did the hours of comparison and so have many others with actual musical content in blind testing.
A friend had a system comprised of a McIntosh 2300 pre, 2 601 mono block amps, playing through B&W 802D speakers with 2 JL Audio subs. He used an Oppo 105 (I forget the upgrade) as DAC and CD. We compared the Beatles UK vinyl, orig and remastered CDs and the 44.1\24 USB versions. Both of us agreed that the 44.1 sounded the best especially compared to the CD versions. I certainly don't claim to have Golden ears or be an expert, but to me there was a noticable difference that was definitely an improvement.
