On Feb 7, 2004, at 12:32 PM, Paul Haneberg wrote:
> ----- Original Message -----
> I still am not a fan of higher sample rates. Most higher sample
> rates sound
> better because the lowpass filter is at a higher frequency so there
> are less
> phase artifacts in the audible range, not because the sample rate is
> higher.
> IMHO there is no useful information contained in the sound above 20Khz
> because you can't hear it. What you don't hear on higher sampling
> rates is
> the high end phase smear caused by the filters in the converters. The
> higher rates make the sound seem to have more air or to be crisper,
> but
> again this is just the lack of phase smear.
Rupert Neve would disagree with you. I went to a evening talk at my
local pro audio shop where he talked about this subject. He tells this
story about a client he had when he was building consoles that was
complaining about the new board he just got. He couldn't tell what was
wrong but something was really bugging him. They checked out every
component on the board and couldn't find anything wrong. Then he
figured out that the high end slop for this board was different than
previous models. Seems they rolled off the high end at a lower
frequency than the earlier models. The roll off was still above
hearing range.
I can't remember the numbers but the roll off was way above our normal
hearing range. He is a strong believer that there is a lot of content
up there were we can't hear that does seem to make a difference on the
overall sound.
Having said that, my personal feeling is that it really depends on the
material you work with. Classical music with all the dynamic range and
tonal timbers would seem to be content that would benefit from 192k
sample rate. For the music I produce and write, I really doubt that it
would matter that much. The other thing is that I'm not even close to
being able to convert my studio to work with anything above 48k. I
also agree with you that the quality of the converters is the key
factor.
- chris