Topic: 24bit to 16bit

[jk labs]

Just a quick comment.

Brute force conversion from 24 bits down to 16 by just chopping off the 8 lowest bits, should not result in your problems: the 16 most significant bits would remain the same.

But if the program you are using is applying dither to the trunacation process it could attempt
to add a little bit of "noise" to an already full scale 16 bit sample. Half the time that "noise"
is positive and the full scale sample "overflows".

I think, with some reservations due to a hasty read :-), that the problem here is how your
program deals with adding a small value to a full scale sample. Ideally it should remain full scale
(no change).  It sounds as if your program has a diffrent policy on what to do with overflows.

Any chance we could see a display of the samples?

[creekfreak]

used wavelab, dithered it down to 16bit/44.1, no issues this time, just starting using it, but wavlab is damn cool

[caymanreview]

[creekfreak]

yes, very  ..thanks again...+T

[Marc Nutter]

Simply put, the digital world allows 6 db of dynamic information per bit.  So, a 16 bit recording allows 96 db of info, while a 24 bit recording allows 144 db.  Sooooo... when folks say you don't need to push the levels in 24 bit recording, this is simply because even if you're peaking out at -18 db you're still capturing 126 db of info which is still a higher resolution than a perfectly set 16 bit recording. 

You should still shoot to set levels perfectly as the more detail in the recording the better, but if it's a question of setting levels higher and potentially clipping the recording vs setting levels conservatively I'd go with a conservative set. 

Perfectly said.
Oh course, since many of our recordings are being transferred to 16-bit without level adjustments, only dithering, peaks around -6db for what most of us record are still quite nice.

Still, I'm with you.  It's better to be a bit low than the clip.

Marc