Yup- might seem counter intuitive but people always ask why record at higher sample and bit rates if it is just going to end up at 44.1/16 anyway. Well it is like photos too- if you have more detail to start with you get a batter picture when the de-res happens. This gets us into the world of dithering which is a whole other topic but entirely relevant-

http://www.digido.com/articles-and-demo ... ither.html

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/may07/a ... p_0507.htm

@IIIII - Interesting about the cassette observation. I usually just notice it rolling off the highs, and adding a nice subtle hiss.. but nothing strange when bringing it back in. I'll try 96khz and see if I notice a difference. I really do have a janky ear tho (otosclerosis), so I might not be able to tell the diff, lol.

@OM - Yeah, I hear ya. I usually left sampling to 44.1khz, but use 24bit for the lower noise floor.. that way I don't worry about the recording level nearly as much.

I can't find the video about it but, i found one that explains how sound resonates different when recorded digital, or something along those lines,

i think it has to do with the loudness, he used an oscilliscope and shows a DB meter, when you record digital at - 6 db, the amplitutde will actually clip on a digital vu meter, suggesting that -6 db is almost to loud, I record at -16 for the noise floor and hiss is no issue, just old bad mixes that are haunting me, some ametures will argue that you should be grabbing the waves as full as possible, this is wrong, capture them as full sounding as possible. when recording digital, keep your levels cool. i dont have hiss problems anymore finally figured out the sigan to noise on the mfp01.

Ya I used to have an RME interface (still do for sale- http://www.flickr.com/photos/31694691@N ... 940532966/)
And it had a utility that could show converter errors or something. It is along the lines of what you say where digital has a set limit of what it can resolve and handle at certain dB and analog will tend to compress or distort in a more pleasing way. Would love to see that vid if you ever find it. The problem I run into here on the forums at least is when I record everything with lots of headroom etc. and make sure there are good dynamics after mastering compressor it sounds so much softer than the other entries I feel at a disadvantage!

This is an incredible site and resource-
Dither:
http://www.digido.com/articles-and-demo ... ither.html
Really interesting on digital/analog metering levels and his proposed "k-system" to retract ourselves from the loudness wars:
http://www.digido.com/how-to-make-bette ... art-2.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpGAi4az3ns

this dude makes mic volumes for 20 bucks, it increases
the impedence and changes the resonant frequency of the mic.

resonant frequencies for mic's are pretty neat. my mXL 440 came
with a pamphlet with the whole MXL series. it shows all the curves.
a little unrelated, the usb MXL curve looks intense, most of them
90% of them wouldn't work with my voice. The curve looks like one
of the $5,000 neumans or something. they also got these mic to usb converters with phantom power, for the usb,

the AT 2020 USB has a bad reputation on being too sassy. I noticed
it with the regular condensor, but i was just recording too loud. it is pretty
much my go to mic, it always sounds different, and is challenging to use.

this dude is off the hook too.
http://www.youtube.com/user/SpeakerFreak95

[img]
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G ... attern.gif
[/img]

something in my mind tells me that is the most perfect response you will get, that is the v67g condensor, the usb I saw. was even flatter !


bac k to dithering, when I record anything from my tascam 24 track digi to tape , hiss overpowers the recording, unless you max all the faders and master volume then set the gain on the tape recorder to almost 0. (lowest)
then this sounds like radio music, kind of soft and not as intrusive and 'bangin' then a straight up digital mix. it's almost not usable, but if your after
the soft digital radio analog sound try that, i think it's all the dither noise overpowering the whole mix so you have to go louder then it, ha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2YdMwehSOM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9qyuV9dRDo
talks about crazy stuff half way thru.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdlK3fFKmk8
talks about spikes at about 20 minutes



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE4wVwoFdYg
gain staging.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGFy-s-mG70
loudness war.

still nothing really much why downsampling to
22.5 k is almost un noticibale, enough to be used
as a simple hiss filter. i do it sometimes on
32 bit 192k mixdowns and there is almost NO difference
other than the placebo effect of it being cheaper
because it's a lower sample rate.

also, I have been using earbuds and it is way better
than any cheap big ear phones, when the ear buds stab your brain
that means something is bad, then guess what,
your mix is magically sounding normal. ive heard it
before switch between earbuds and speakers and
NEVER trust any other cheap big headphones.

OH SHIT, THE sample rate is 22.05 k. oops. not 22.5

adding all those youtube to my watch later- thanks- will def check them out as soon as I have time

Also- ya if it sounds good to you, it sounds good! A lot of the hi-fi talk is addressing things most users might not hear or ever have to deal with. But someone has to think about it to fully understand.

Maybe you could make 2 examples so we could hear what you are hearing. I def can hear 32KHz much less 44.1. There is also the issue of what you start with. If you start with higher res when you downsample you have more accurate picture to draw from and resulting picture is actually more accurate.
Thant would be an interesting experimaent- record ecaxt same sound at 44.1 and at 22.05 and see if you can hear a diff vs downsampling a 44.1 file.

Nerd land. I love it here. The pursuit of answers to curiosity is great.

C