Input Levels: Hotter on the Right

i just meant leave this topic alone until something becomes more concrete not leave the forum completely i'm glad you think i'm funny though.

i think morgan meant dithering is optional because you could chose to truncate the signal and bypass dithering algorithms. dithering, as you mentioned earlier, will also reduce data (but not simply truncate). the difference comes in with how the data is reduced. dithering will do it in a way, that as morgan mentioned is "psychoacoustically pleasing" - meaning you should hear no difference. dithering will remove and add "noise" where it makes sense. if you truncate a bit stream there is a very good chance that you'll be able to hear the difference.

zs941
i think morgan meant dithering is optional because you could chose to truncate the signal and bypass dithering algorithms. dithering, as you mentioned earlier, will also reduce data (but not simply truncate). the difference comes in with how the data is reduced. dithering will do it in a way, that as morgan mentioned is "psychoacoustically pleasing" - meaning you should hear no difference. dithering will remove and add "noise" where it makes sense. if you truncate a bit stream there is a very good chance that you'll be able to hear the difference.

What do you mean by that?? How do you truncate a signal and bypass dithering algorithms??

Are you sure you know what dithering is? Why would one choose to dither?

Also, how do you truncate a bit stream?

What do you mean by that?? How do you truncate a signal and bypass dithering algorithms??

you truncate a signal when you feed a 24 bit stream into a 16bit system, for example. that's what happens when you sampled a 24 bit stream into your MPC (sample rate issues aside). that's also what happens when you load a 24 bit sample into your MPC. it's does the truncating for you. you really never want to truncate anything. another way to truncate your data is if you're working in a DAW with a 24bit file and you want to bounce it to a 16bit file there may be an option to pick a dithering algorithm (in Logic i have POW-r algorithms 1-3) or None. If you chose none your 16bit file will be a truncated 24bit file. i hope that explains it but ask more questions if it's still unclear.

Are you sure you know what dithering is? Why would one choose to dither?

yeah, i'm sure i know what dithering is. and if i didn't, you just posted a good definition a few posts back which explained it (i know we gave you sh1t for it but it was still useful). you almost always want to choose to dither because the algoritms do a pretty good job of taking the 24bit data and removing bits "intelligently" and not just truncate 8 bits. in addition, if you want to take a 16bit file and turn it into a 24bit file you can dither it "up" which will add "noise" to the file to fill it out, again, in a seemingly intelligent way and not simply by tossing in bits at some point (top, bottom, middle, random). it's sort of hard to explain what that means without explaining some binary math which i'm not gonna do here. if you're curious about learning about what that means hit me with a PM and i'll try and round up some good links for you and try to answer your questions but this is pretty off-topic.

i guess an anology would be something like this. if you wanted me to paint your house green but you don't have enough green paint in the exact color you wanted (the signal). you also have some left-over paint of different colors (the noise) and we could try mix them together intelligently to get more of a green that is close to what you wanted (still not exact but very, very close). we paint the house and it looks great. that's dithering up. we could just also add a bunch of white until we get enough paint. you'd have some shade of green but maybe not what you orignally wanted but anybody walking by would say "that's a green house". that's adding in bits randomly.

and don't ask me to paint your house!

Jahrome: I'm sorry I couldn't answer your post straight away but on this side of the world it was night, which is when I sleep, not everyone stays up all night arguing on the internet.

zs has pretty much covered all the bits and pieces about dithering/truncating/sample rate conversion I think. The only thing I think I can add at this point is that another time you would truncate instead of dithering is when you don't have the option of dithering, like inputting a 24 bit signal into an mpc.

Anyway, I really think you should spend some time learning about these sorts of things. You seem to think you're some kind of expert regarding the 2500 cause you got one of the first ones and you always offer your opinion. If you got yourself educated then your opinion could even help people and peole would respect it.

Have a read back through this thread, there's a lot of stuff you missed or just ignored when you posted. You should also read those manuals you like to quote from so much.

Anyway, I'm not going to try to help you anymore as you're not trying to help yourself. Good luck selling people 2500s, I have to say you still do know more than most guys who work in music shops.

peace

I ignored alot of stuff..basically because their was alot of BS sprinkled over the facts.

The MPC 2500 can be fed a 44.1khz sample recorded at 24 bits (via SPDIF input) without any loss in audio quality or pitch changes (pitch chages will occur if you use a higher sample rate than 44.1khz as is true with any 44.1 khz sampler). Regardless if anyone claims that data has been truncated, dithered, or whatever you want to call it. There is no added noise that is audible.

As far as stating my opinion...I am free to do so as is anyone else. As far as being an MPC 2500 expert.....maybe not, but I do know how to use it and yes, I was one of the first...and brought the very first units to hit US soil (outside of Akai). Not bragging..just simply the truth.

Some may respect my opinions...some may not....don't care really. But still enjoy the exchanges...and at times...love getting people worked up without insulting them or calling names I am a gear slut. I know way...way more than the guys at the music shops. I hope I don't offend them..but the select few that beta tested the MPC 2500s OS...I know more than they do only after having it for 24 hours If they are mad...oh well. I still have found some OS issues that no one has yet to discover...but the few that have these units have not used it extensively to uncover any problems.

As far as manuals...I never read them. I may use them a a reference very infrequently...unless I am debating/arguing with someone over a particular nothing.

morgan, I don't really need your help. I know that you have to dither a 24 bit sample to get it to play right on a CD. If you want to use something to truncate the bits..thats your business. But you do have to do something. And this is not OPTIONAL. Don't really need your luck. Alot of my MPCs are now owned buy users in all parts of the forums

Whats really funny about all this is that no matter if the samples I tested were dithered or truncated, as you say, they all sound alike from my tests.

jahrome wrote:morgan, I don't really need your help. I know that you have to dither a 24 bit sample to get it to play right on a CD. If you want to use something to truncate the bits..thats your business. But you do have to do something. And this is not OPTIONAL. Don't really need your luck. Alot of my MPCs are now owned buy users in all parts of the forums

Just like the rest of you, I guess I like to argue just to argue and to be right, so I can't resist beating this dead horse .

Yes, dithering IS OPTIONAL. For instance, in the version of Cubase I used to use, I remember at the end of the master f/x chain was some kind of dithering processor, i think it was called UV22 or something. When converting to 16-bit, you could TURN IT ON, and it dithers or TURN IT OFF = no dither. Either way it is perfectly happy to convert it to 16 bit for you, and your cd player is perfectly happy to play it. CONVERTING bit depth does NOT NECESSARILY involve dithering, dithering is an extra step.

Just think of dithering as one of those mastering effects to make the sound 'nicer', like compression and eq'ing or something.

Here's a quote from Google:

CUBASE NOTES
After the master fader, you can choose to activate Cubase's built-in dithering facility. VST/32 users get UV22, the dithering algorithm to the stars, ...
www.soundonsound.com/sos/mar02/articles ... es0302.asp - 34k -

It says "choose to activate", that sounds pretty optional to me.

sleepersriddle wrote:
Just like the rest of you, I guess I like to argue just to argue and to be right, so I can't resist beating this dead horse .

Yes, dithering IS OPTIONAL. For instance, in the version of Cubase I used to use, I remember at the end of the master f/x chain was some kind of dithering processor, i think it was called UV22 or something. When converting to 16-bit, you could TURN IT ON, and it dithers or TURN IT OFF = no dither. Either way it is perfectly happy to convert it to 16 bit for you, and your cd player is perfectly happy to play it. CONVERTING bit depth does NOT NECESSARILY involve dithering, dithering is an extra step.

Just think of dithering as one of those mastering effects to make the sound 'nicer', like compression and eq'ing or something.

Here's a quote from Google:

CUBASE NOTES
After the master fader, you can choose to activate Cubase's built-in dithering facility. VST/32 users get UV22, the dithering algorithm to the stars, ...
www.soundonsound.com/sos/mar02/articles ... es0302.asp - 34k -

It says "choose to activate", that sounds pretty optional to me.

Excatly my point.

Let me clearify what I meant.....

If you record 20 or 24 bit audio (anything higher than 16 bit), you must dither or use some process to convert it to 16bit to play it back on a standard CD player. Standard CDs are 44.1khz/16 bit. You MUST put your recorded material in these formats if you want it to playback on most CD players. DIthering (or what ever process you use) is NOT OPTIONAL..again for audio recorded at a higher bit than 16 bits.

Mike Jones
"Your recorded audio must be 16 bit to playback correctly on most CD players. Your recorded audio must be 16bit to playback correctly on most CD players.

This involves some PROCESS of converting audio recorded HIGHER than 16bits to 16 bits.
This involves some PROCESS of converting audio recorded HIGHER than 16bits to 16 bits.

Dithering is one of those PROCESSES. These PROCESSES are NOT OPTIONAL" MIKE JONES!

jahrome wrote:Dithering is one of those PROCESSES. These PROCESSES are NOT OPTIONAL" MIKE JONES!

Good, now that u have changed what you are saying, you now agree with me, and therefore you are now correct. I'm out :p .

I didn't change my position. When I was talking about dithering is not optional, I was referring to audio recorded at a higher bit rate than 16bits. Dithering is not optional in that case and I have stated this several times already. Now if you are recording audio at 16 bit, there is no need to dither. But this isn't what I was talking about.

Dithering is not the word for changing 24-bit to 16-bit, alright?

It's not. Really.

Dithering is an extra STEP in the conversion process that you can OPTIONALLY choose to use OR NOT while you do the conversion.

In cubase, I can TURN OFF the dithering and STILL convert my 24-bits to 16 bit. That makes dithering optional, period.

You are still missing my point and playing with words.

Dithering does change a 24 bit signal to a 16 bit signal. If you record audio at 24 bit you will have to dither to get it to 16 bit.

Now, if you use another process to get that 24 bit audio to 16 bit, that is cool as well. But this process is also not an option. You must do it for the reasons I stated earlier.

I have to add one more thing..although we have strayed from the original topic. The whole idea is to keep the quality of an audio signal as high as possible. Using dithering in your software DAW or if your digital mixer, if supported, is the best way to go in maintaing this quality audio.

Now since I don't use Cubase (I use the more advanced Nuendo 3) can you expalin the steps you take to reduce 24 bit audio to 16 bit for proper CD playback?

Look, I'm sorry I'm the type of guy who will just keep arguing and not let it go. Probably u are too .

Anyway, I respect your skills and contributions to the forum. If I was lookin to buy a 2.5k I'd probably give u a call.

I don't mean to make any enemies here just cause I'm picky about details. FWIW, I believe we agree on the basic facts and we are just arguing about a choice of wording. It doesn't matter at this point, sorry I dragged it out and lets get back to making beats.