Techie question about bits and dither

[Joenco]

Hello all,

I'm trying to find my way in bit and renderland.
My goal is finding best 16 bit 44.1 result.

What do I have.

Some tracks with audio and VSTi.
I would like to use render but as for now I record my tracks back in Tracktion with my soundcard.

Now I have following recording options. 16 - 24 - 32 bit.

What would you choose?

1. recording 16 bit (don't know what conversion is used - dither or not in tracktion)
2. recording 32 bit and doing software bit conversion with dither in another application.

Thank you,

[IIRs]

If you want 16 bit results and need no further processing, record at 16 bit. Drop an mda dither plug into the master section (default settings are fine) and make sure th master fader is at unity. (drop another vol / pan into the mix buss if needed.. the important thing is that the dither is the very last thing to change. Also make sure the soundcard is passing the signal with no gain changes.

[IIRs]

of course, your option 2 in ok (24 bit would be fine too) but would mean an extra step..

[IIRs]

if you get everything else right, the only quality differences will be down to the dither algo.. your editor might have better sounding algos than mda dither.. or it might not.

[semiquaver]

You should render at 32 bits. You could then master with compression (and dither) and capture some of the extra detail in your 16 bit master. If you render any individual tracks before mixing be sure to do it in 32 bits.

Another detail: there is a problem in Ts rendering (a known bug) which has a lot less effect (perhaps no effect) in 32-bits.

[Joenco]

Hello,

Just trying to find out what works.
Does anybody know which dither algo is used on the outputs in tracktion.
What is the quality?

Thank you,

[djsubject]

Hello,

Just trying to find out what works.
Does anybody know which dither algo is used on the outputs in tracktion.
What is the quality?

Thank you,

I do not like the Tracktion dither!

but i hear it is getting replaced soon

i would use the MDA dither on the master out like IIR's said

Subject

[Bennett]

For those dissatisfied with T2's internal dither or MDA's, may I recommend the Analog Dither CD by Cranesong.

Cranesong created an audio CD capturing the dither signal from their hardware processor units. You simply mix this signal in as an additional audio track before exporting to 16bit.

Check it out at: http://www.cranesong.com/analogdither.html

[IIRs]

Is this a joke?

[semiquaver]

I like megabitmax dither - if you have ozone (or a friend who has it...) you can render a 32 or 24 sample of it and then mix it in just as Bennet describes w/the Cranesong: Dither is just a sound (noise) you mix into your master at the appropriate level before truncation (wierd huh). The exact level is very important though - take special care w/the Cranesong...

[IIRs]

The exact level is very important though - take special care w/the Cranesong...

Ah, ok. That makes a bit more sense thenn..

[Bennett]

Dither is just a sound (noise) you mix into your master at the appropriate level before truncation (wierd huh). The exact level is very important though - take special care w/the Cranesong...

You are absolutely correct. All a dithering plug does is add frequency and phase adjusted white noise (oversimplified I know).

The instructions with the Cranesong CD indicate a track mix level of -25dB for best results. The folks are Cranesong were particularly helpful with my techie questions and I was impressed with the results.

EDIT:

For T2, I would recommend the following steps:

1. Export your mix in 32bit.
2. Import the 32bit mixdown on one track.
3. Import the Cranesond dither onto another.
4. Adjust the level of the Cranesong to -25dB.
5. Tweak the Cranesong to your mix, keeping in mind the "truncation level" issue for T2's mixing engine.

Voila you are done!

[IIRs]

5. Tweak the Cranesong to your mix, keeping in mind the "truncation level" issue for T2's mixing engine.

Not sure what you mean by that part..

You would have to also make sure the master fader was at unity (though I suppose you could adjust the gain of the dither track to compensate), and you still need to avoid 16-bit renders for the time being due to the infamous bug.. tapeit in the mix buss should work ok.

[Bennett]

5. Tweak the Cranesong to your mix, keeping in mind the "truncation level" issue for T2's mixing engine.

Not sure what you mean by that part..

You would have to also make sure the master fader was at unity (though I suppose you could adjust the gain of the dither track to compensate), and you still need to avoid 16-bit renders for the time being due to the infamous bug.. tapeit in the mix buss should work ok.

The rendering bug = truncation bug, i.e. levels below a certain threshold get removed ~ -75 to -78 dB. We're talking about the same issue.

Technically speaking this means that the dither signal must be higher than this threshold or else it will simply be cut off during 16bit export.

[IIRs]

yeah, but what do mean by 'tweak it to the mix'? what is there to tweak?