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If ABX listening is irrelevant from a business standpoint, then I would suggest simply up-sampling at the last delivery stage... no one will know the difference right?  Why waste time and money?  ... and you can still tout it as 24/192.

However, if you are going to follow *that* statement with various arguments  - that "maybe" - there is some perceived differences with phase or with over-tones - and "real-instruments" interaction, etc....  then ABX testing is the best way to give unbiased perception to those claims.  The most practical instrument we have with human aural perception is the ear... unfortunately the MIND gets in the way with those perceptions ...which is why ABX was developed.

I firmly believe in Number 4 in the following article:
http://www.theaudiocritic.com/downloads/article_1.pdf

At the same time, I do believe that there is information in the very high frequencies that help us with solving specific issues with restoration... like the bias frequency in tape recordings that can be used for time-base correction (wow/flutter)... that’s why Gerzon was advocating to to never destroy the master...

But that’s a separate issue then sound quality virtues - which was what I was referring to...

Cheers!

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Rob Poretti - Sales Engineer - Archiving
Cube-Tec North America LLC
Vox.905.827.0741  Fax.905.901.9996  Cel.905.510.6785 
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-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tom Fine
Sent: August 29, 2014 10:44 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] recording "cleanup" plugins and 192/24

Because HD download sellers such as HDTracks and Acoustic Sounds are selling 192/24 versions, and because audio equipment manufacturers are touting and marketing the "superiority" of super-high-rez digital audio, ABX testing is irrelevant from a business standpoint. My question centers around what post-transfer production tools are available at 192/24. I already have clients requesting 192/24, including having me spec it in documentation for grant applications. No one has specifically requested DSD yet. 

Aside from Don Cox's comments about potential usefulness distinguishing ticks and pops from musical content, I'm wondering if a higher sampling rate allows for truer capture of tape hiss? I would think that the bias trap rolls off HF somewhere before 96kHz, but maybe not? I'm not saying any human can hear any of this ultra-HF information but I am saying that it interacts with frequencies in the human hearing range, just as sub-sonic information does (which is why one has to be very careful how one works with rumble on disk transfers, blanket high-passing can really screw up other frequencies because it removes phase-cancellations and boosts or cuts harmonics of the sub-sonic frequencies). 

I have seen demonstrations where a later-era tape machine, for instance an Ampex ATR-100, can record and reproduce frequencies far above the human hearing range. Richard Hess has discussed ultra-HF overtones captured in his organ recordings using less-than-later-era tape recorders. 

If you want to hear why Nyquist doesn't work with real musical instruments, listen to triangle or sleighbell tones anywhere above -12dBfs on any CD recorded or transferred at 44.1kHz. One almost all such CDs I've heard, there are clearly digi-swishies (sound somewhat like flangeing and phase-shifting) in the very top primary tones and harmonics. And I certainly cannot hear the alleged upper end of CD reproduction, my hearing tops out around 16kHz these days, in a quiet room. 

Back to 192/24 (or even higher resolutions), I think it's here to stay and I'm wondering when the mainstream production tools will catch up, or if what I was told by two top mastering studios reflected the fact that they have out-dated versions of the tools?

-- Tom Fine

On Fri, 29 Aug 2014 10:09:12 -0400, Rob Poretti - Cube-Tec <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
I would argue that this is true up until 24/96.  I've done a LOT of
> restoration and 24/96 will let you visually distinguish stuff  (if you 
> are zooming in enough) that you can’t actually HEAR.  Conversely, I've 
> never heard problems at that sample rate, that I could not see...  
> Admittedly low frequency thumps often do not show on simple waveform 
> displays but are easily show on time/spectral displays.
>
> Regarding some earlier comments on the sound quality virtues of  24/96 
> versus 24/192:  if someone has a link to a paper or presentation, that 
> performs a proper ABX test between the two ... and showing conclusive 
> results, please post it here...
>
> Thanks!
>
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> _/_/_/
> _/
> Rob Poretti - Sales Engineer - Archiving Cube-Tec North America LLC
> Vox.905.827.0741  Fax.905.901.9996  Cel.905.510.6785 
> _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
> _/_/_/
> _/
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List 
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Don Cox
> Sent: August 29, 2014 10:36 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] recording "cleanup" plugins and 192/24
>
> On 29/08/2014, Eric Jacobs wrote:
>
>
> > I m not sure that there is that much more information present at >
> 192/24, and the algorithms from Cube-Tec perform equally well at
> > 192/24 as they do at 96/24. It can be argued that there is more >
> spatial information (two-channel or multi-channel) available at
> 192/24 > since the human brain can perceive very small L/R 
> differences, but > many listening systems and rooms are not up to the 
> task of reproducing > those spatial differences faithfully (i.e. due 
> to room reflections).
> > For the most part, I m just as happy with a 192/24 as a 96/24 >
> recording. The leap from 44/16 to 96/24 is huge, but the leap from
> > 96/24 to 192/24 is more incremental. The chief limitation for many 
> > recordings is not the media or the format, but the recording itself.
> > The main advantage of higher sample rates is that they make it 
> > easier to
> distinguish clicks from music. 
>
> So they could be very useful when digisizing from disc, but only if 
> you have a cartridge with at least some response up at those ultrasonic frequencies.
>
>
>
>
> Regards
> --
> Don Cox
> [log in to unmask]
>
>