The important thing to take from this is that at HIGH gain settings,
there is little in quality to distinguish between a 16bit and a 24bit
recording. The 24bit recording will absolutely provide more
resolution, that's simple math. Whether you can hear it or not is
debatable, some people will, and some people won't. It will for sure
provide more resolution when 'processing' that sound however, and
this would most likely be audible.
But for LOW level signals, 24bit is very much an improvement, and
it's very easily heard. The best page I've seen on it is actually
Sound Device's page, with very clear examples of a 24bit and 16bit
sound recorded at full gain (there is little difference in the sound
quality) and then both signals recorded at -40dB gain, and then
normalized. You can hear a vast difference.
Except that in nature recording, even when using a high gain setting,
quiet often your signal will still be down in the -40 to -20 range,
if it's something very quiet. In this case, there will be a huge
difference between 24bit and 16bit in regards to the noise floor.
See:
http://www.sounddevices.com/tech/24-bit.htm
On May 13, 2007, at 6:54 AM, Curt Olson wrote:
> Raimund,
>
> Thank you for all your work on noise measurements! I have a followup
> question for you and entire wider brain trust here...
>
> On your page
>
> http://www.avisoft.com/recordertests.htm
>
> You state: " Note that a bit-depth of 24 bit would not improve the
> noise level figures at these high gain settings."
>
> And on your page
>
> http://www.avisoft.com/tutorial_mic_recorder.htm
>
> You similarly state: "Besides the fact that there is no reason to
> worry
> about the Marantz PMD671 preamplifier noise, it turns out that the
> optionally available 24 bit recording format cannot provide any
> significant improvement of the noise performance."
>
> If, as you seem to indicate, there isn't much to loose with 16 bit,
> and
> definitely something to gain (less consumption of blank media and
> battery power, plus faster transfer times afterward), what compelling
> reasons do we have to prefer 24 bit for capturing our original field
> recordings?
>
> Still conflicted after all these years,
>
> Curt Olson
>
>
>
|