How low can you go?

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More like closer to 23bits with the ES9038 PRO (140db DNR) although I haven't read the datasheet, but you don't have any reason at all to use less bits than what's available.
Actually, you want to use all bits in order to have the minimum quantization noise possible. If that noise is less than the rest (source, digital processing and analog circuit noise), that's even better.
 
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You missed my point. Because of noise, with the best affordable hardware the 3 least significant bits do not mean anything. Sure you can use them, the trouble is that they do not make sense. This is the real world, there are limits to actual technology.
Quantization with respect to values (here, presumably voltages) does not create noise independent in a probabilistical sense. It is better described as distortion that might be perceived even if below the floor of (real) noise.

I strongly recommend reading a book.
 
You missed my point. Because of noise, with the best affordable hardware the 3 least significant bits do not mean anything. Sure you can use them, the trouble is that they do not make sense. This is the real world, there are limits to actual technology.
That is wrong, there is NO technology limitation, that prevents you from creating and reproducing extremely low noise music in the "real world".

Reproduction: you can have a 140db DR (23bits) capable hardware today. It is feasible with a pair of DACs like those I mentioned, or other custom solution, and with an extremely low noise amp, my ES HP amp included.

Content creation:
There is NO "technology limitation" whatsoever, to create extremely low noise synthetic music (electronic music), 24bits or more.

Also, if you record 20 instruments or people individually at 114db DR each, (orchestra, chorus, etc), after mixing them you can easily reach 140db.
Now imagine capturing a large orchestra of 150 instruments. You can definitely reach full 24bits dynamic range and more (although not necessarily in the whole duration of the song).
 
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@mchambin
With oversimplifications and outdated "facts", you can never burst any "bubbles":
Yes, you read that correctly: a 24-bit recording has 256 times the number of potential amplitude steps as a 16-bit recording. 256 times?!?!? Doesn't that seem like a rather excessive amount?
Does an analog recording that has an infinite number of steps (no steps) seem like insanely smooth for your ears?
But wait…isn’t the background noise in a quiet room 30dB?
Not necessarily. At countryside, especially in the night people can often have a completely quiet room. Or in your basement, or in your car in an isolated area, etc.

And it depends on the noise. It's one thing to have thermal noise that is purely chaotic, and another thing to have noise coming from human artifacts. You might have 30db mostly low freq. noise or with some spikes here and there, and yet being able to distinguish a higher pitch sound at 1db, because masking doesn't work at very different frequencies.
So you can’t actually hear the difference between the dynamic range of a 16-bit recording and a 20-bit recording unless you turn the volume up high enough above the 30dB background noise that it would cause permanent hearing loss. And actually listening to the dynamic range of a 24-bit recording (144dB) would cause permanent hearing loss.
Try an isolating-type of headphones.
Most of the arguments on that page, just collapsed.
So why on Earth would they even create a digital music recording format that can't even be listened to?!?!?!?!?
If you want to hear the LSB on a recording
You don't want to hear the LSB on a recording, that would be mostly digital quantization noise, you want the last LS bits more as a medium, as a smoothing factor, rather than as information themselves, to use along with a high sample rate in order to approach the smoothness of an analog waveform which is considered ideal.
That said, 23bits DR seems feasible.
Based on a 2.5V output on a DAC (higher than average), below are the voltages power supply noise must be below in order to hear the LSB:

16-bit LSB noise floor voltage = 76uV
18-bit LSB noise floor voltage = 19uV
20-bit LSB noise floor voltage = 4.75uV
24-bit LSB noise floor voltage = 0.3uV

For a reference, a common LM317 regulator, the quality used in most commercial electronics, has about 150uV peak-to-peak noise, and the world’s lowest noise power supplies (we’re talking NASA, not audiophile) have about 5uV of peak-to-peak noise.
Even a 5-euros chip like LT3042 has 0.8μV RMS (2.2μV pp) output noise at its whole operating range in current and voltage which is a huge difference from the 42-years old regulator that was mentioned as a ..."reference"! And it's ridiculously easy to design a proper low noise reg for such low power devices. That is simply a non-issue.
 
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The maximum signal to noise ratio in the real world is around 124dB, which works out to roughly 21-bits worth of data.

The great audio myth: why you don’t need that 32-bit DAC
My previous post was just to show you how pompous, oversimplifying absolutist claims have usually no ground -let alone the hypocrisy. I won't bother with them anymore.

I suggest you stop blindly believing and parroting their traffic-attracting slogans, and copy-pasting their links, and instead do your homework to acquire the required knowledge first, then try to defend each argument, yourself. That's the purpose of a forum/chat community anyway. Unless you are paid to spam, or you are a web bot...
 
I suggest you stop yourself. I have enough of these personal attacks that prove how shallow are your technical arguments.
Game over !
I wouldn't consider someone who even bothers to read and reply to the links you copy-paste, as "personally attacking" -are you the same person on that blog? If I have "swallow arguments", where are your arguments to prove them as such?
 
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