And that passage is what is shown in your graphs? Of course it sounds like music - the level is way above -96 dB.
With shaped dither, you can easily reach 120 dB. That is precisely what DSD does, too. Remind me again, what is the bit depth of DSD?
But, in any case, how many 24-bit recordings have you come across with more than 96 dB of dynamic range?
Even with noise level of eg -50dB it would be possible to hear a tone at, let's say -60dB. Wideband noise can not mask harmonic tone at same or somewhat lower level.
Agree - as long as we remember it is "somewhat" - see my posting above about 16 bits and 120 dB. I haven't come across a commercial recording from any of the major labels that would come anywhere near 90 dB, and I have measured a lot of them.
People with cassette decks and vinyl players are very happy with the equivalent of 12 bits...
AM radio was all the rage once upon a time, yet it's 21th century now and technology for hi-res recording/playback is increasingly affordable and I can't see reason why not exploit it when convenient.
Sure, no-one is automatically wrong. In this case though its clear to me that William Thompson was a far better scientist and engineer than he was an epistemologist.
No you cannot reach 120dB with only 16 bits. Dither only has influence on the least significant bit (or the LSB-1) and can give you maybe extra 3dB (half of 6dB that a bit gives you). Noise shaping is a different issue but when talking about 16/44 there is no where to push the noise to. DSD pushes noise outside audible range to ultrasound frequencies but you have no such luxury when your total bandwidth is 22kHz and it's pretty much all in audible range.
Considering how easy and cheap it is to do these days, yes, why not use 96/24 - but only to have that nice, warm feeling that we know we are way beyond audible limits.
It is actually trivially easy to prove you wrong. Have a look at this file: 1 kHz tone at -105 dB.
It is a 1 kHz tone at -105 dB (16 bit / 48 kHz). According to you it shouldn't contain anything (apart from dithering noise), right?
Well, funny enough:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Guess what? It is still there, audible, at -105 dB.
Its not all equally audible though, which is where it seems to me Julf is coming from. So its quite possible to get >96dB perceptual dynamic range at 16bits and 44kHz by clearing noise out of the 2-4kHz band where the ear is most sensitive and shoving it above 10kHz where the ear's sensitivity is rapidly falling off (according to Fletcher-Munson).
I'm hearing this with my amp's volume pot at 40% via max 2V rms source.. Should I really decrease the gain of my amp (which is an old Sansui R70)?
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Yikes, I guess you haven't been 'around' for as long as I have, but diyparadise started as a hack who created poorly laid-out, poorly grounded, poorly decoupled DACs, with poorly thought out (passive IV just copied from the 1543) IV (1543 =/ 1545)
Not sure where he's at now ...
Abraxalito's comment "A decent DAC chip (i.e. a multibit one)" hits the nail on the head for me also, in regard to listening to RedBook CD
If you want to listen to "redbook" CD be it 16bit 44.1 or 24bit 96 , you can't go passed a well implemented R2R Multibit dac chip with a good I/V stage, like PCM1704/1702 and others like them.
"Single Bit" "Bitsteam" "Delta Sigma" and 4 or 8 bit Bitstream like ESS just don't do it, like a proper R2R Multibit can.
My views and experience
Cheers George
If you want to listen to "redbook" CD be it 16bit 44.1 or 24bit 96 , you can't go passed a well implemented R2R Multibit dac chip with a good I/V stage, like PCM1704/1702 and others like them.
"Single Bit" "Bitsteam" "Delta Sigma" and 4 or 8 bit Bitstream like ESS just don't do it, like a proper R2R Multibit can.
My views and experience
Cheers George
How long ago was that? If he's made all the mistakes in this particular narrow field of audio then by Niels Bohr's definition he makes the grade of an 'expert'.
In any case my linking to someone else's page doesn't constitute my own personal endorsement of everything a person says on that page. I just found his perspective interesting and in many ways it mirrors my own, not in all though.
Look at the pics of his designs - he's got trafos in there, can't be all bad can he? I found his page because someone over on Soekris' thread mentioned 'Discreet Monica' which was a DAC I'd never heard of before. He seems to have some low level distortion problems with that, noticeable on piano note decay so I reckon he could use some DSP next to help linearize his discrete DAC....
Hi George,
Have you ever paid same amount of care and attention for building an output stage for some non-R2R dac from AKM, Cirrus Logic, Wolfson?
Here is a former National Semi engineer's thoughts on this:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/solid-state/132471-national-opamp-inflation-18.html#post1900712
Regards.
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It take it audioman54 hasn't taken time out to listen to what a transformer does in the output stage of a DAC (or an input stage of an amp for that matter) preferring to rely on the usual objectivist objections over 'linearity' and 'distortion' which I'm tempted to term 'prejudice' I had those concerns myself for many years until I tried trafos.
I had those concerns myself for many years until I tried trafos.
For memory.
Even Martin Mallison designer of the ESS Saber dac, which are 4 or 8bit and bitstream combined, in this video or another promo one he did somewhere that this chip has finally surpassed Delta Sigma dacs and has almost reached the performance of true multibit dacs doing redbook.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JYjHKv2_OqQ
Cheers George
Unless you have noise issues (hum or hiss), there is no real need - but being able to use more of the range of the volume control wouldn't hurt.
Hi ... just to say that i could not resist
and i bought this one ...
24bit 96K USB 2 0 SA9023 OPA2132 CS4398 DAC USB to RCA Headphone | eBay
It uses the same Cirrus Logic CS4398 dac chip present in the very nice sounding:
I am not so naive to think that the dac chip is everything, but still it must be a very good one if high end pro equipment use it, am i right ?
Any advice/suggestion/opinion ?
Thanks a lot. Regards, gino
and i bought this one ...
24bit 96K USB 2 0 SA9023 OPA2132 CS4398 DAC USB to RCA Headphone | eBay
It uses the same Cirrus Logic CS4398 dac chip present in the very nice sounding:
- Korg dsd recorded 2000
- Prism Audio Orpheus interface
I am not so naive to think that the dac chip is everything, but still it must be a very good one if high end pro equipment use it, am i right ?
Any advice/suggestion/opinion ?
Thanks a lot. Regards, gino
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