Question about mono? Go easy on me

[Joey222]

I notice when I convert a stereo track to mono and then back to stereo it doesn't sound the same at all. I have an idea why. My question would be, is there a way to convert a stereo track to a mono track back to stereo with losing any panning or stereo field? Go easy on me, remember I'm just a programmer trying to understand your world

Would be FANTASTIC! to not only give me a yes or no answer but go into detail and tell me why?

[Nig]

I would think not. Once you convert to mono all the stereo information is lost. Bit like when you convert a wav to an mp3, you cannot go back to wav.

Also, IIRC, when you make a track mono it will be half the size of the stereo version.

[Nystul]

When you sum a track to mono you are literally taking the left channel and right channel and adding them together. At that point there is no way to distinguish what was originally on the left channel and what was on the right. What you have lost is the difference between the two channels. In M/S processing, the stereo track is converted into a different 2 channel format. The mid channel is just like a mono track... left and right channels added together. The side channel has one channel subtracted from the other (or to put it another way, the phase of one channel is inverted and then they are added together). That side channel has the information needed to distinguish what part of the mono track came from the left and what came from the right. But if you just have a mono track, then that information has been discarded.

[BertKoor]

is there a way to convert a stereo track to a mono track back to stereo with losing any panning or stereo field?

Nope, that's impossible to do without the information from the side channel.

My question: why would you convert to mono in the first place if you want to retain the stereo information?

[DotNoir]

If you have to process mono track, can you process two separate mono tracks? Since that's what left and right channel basically are. Separate the channels, process them separately and make them a stereo channel again? Probably not the solution you were after,, but that popped to my head.

[whyterabbyt]

Would be FANTASTIC! to not only give me a yes or no answer but go into detail and tell me why?

why?

because when you add 2 and 2 you get 4. but when you add 1 and 3 you also get 4. or you could have added 4 to zero. Or 1.5 to 2.5.
etc, infinitely etc.

when you have 4, how can you tell what two numbers were added together to make that 4?

[kritikon]

I'm with Bertkoor here...I can't see any real world use or requirement for taking a stereo track down to mono and then back again. Why would you want to do this?

I can see why going to mono in the first place, and even for pseudo-stereoizing a mono track, but to do both to the same track gives no benefit to anything. Whatever it is you're trying to achieve, it sounds like you're overthinking it.

[Megiddo]

Simply, as others have said, no.
Stereo = L(eft)+R(ight) (2 channels)
Mono = C(enter) (one channel)

What you're getting by doing that is:
Stereo => Mono is like
L+R => C

Mono => Stereo is like
C => C+C (2 Channels having the exact same content)

My question is: Why would you want that?
If it's for saving disk space, you could compress it with (WinRAR has good compression algorithms for wav files)
If it's for processing them separately, you could do what DotNoir said OR route the track to 2 different mixer channels panned hard left/hard right in your DAW.
If it's for testing mono compatibility... you shouldn't worry that much about it, unless it's a song aimed for the clubs which sometimes have weird audio settings.