Bleedink
Well-known Member
Not sure if this is good news or not:
http://www.stereophile.com/content/dolby174-upsamples-apodizes-truehd
http://www.stereophile.com/content/dolby174-upsamples-apodizes-truehd
Dolby True HD Upsampling for Blu Ray releases
- Thread starter Bleedink
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LizardKing
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
Sooooo - for surround music are most people recording at 96 Khz or higher already - I assume so right?
leevitalone1
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
This is Kals article, but if you just look down on the page it says it is for every player capable of 96.
LizardKing
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
Thats not my question - I'm asking if most audio music content is already recorded at 96khz or higher making this technology redundant.
The article mentioned that "most studio content is recorded at 48kHz".
I was always under the impression that most rock & pop studio sessions are recorded digitally at 44.1k (either 16 or 24-bit) the last nigh-on 30 years, whereas 48k is the more usual sample rate for film/tv/video material.
The 96k/24bit (and various other hi-res sampling rates & resolution bit depths) of SACD and DVDA are used in the transferring of analogue tapes to digital with the intention of capturing as much of the original analogue recording as possible.
Hence why I asked in the "New SHM-SACD" thread on here, what the exact point is of the Queen SACD's of any of their albums after 1984's "The Works"..??
From '85's "A Kind of Magic" onwards all their studio albums are just bog-standard digital recordings of the time, so unless they utilised the multi-channel facility of SACD (one can dream..) they may as well just be CD's. The first 10 years' worth of Queen albums, that I believe were transferred from the analogue masters at 96k/24-bit, should have been reissued on DVDA if they were to be released in hi-res at all..!! Preferably having been remixed into 5.1 first! (Sigh..)
Dire Straits "Brothers in Arms" is another case in point. The 5.1 of that may as well have been a DVDV! The SACD is particularly pointless, as the original recording is just 44.1/16 digital.
Donald Fagen's "The Nightfly" DVDA is a bit of an interesting anomaly though. I recall there were cries of scamming and up-resing from the CD when it first came out but in the case of the eventual 48k/24-bit DVDA, there was a valid reason for that being its "Advanced Resolution" track.
The Nightfly was a very early digital recording created on 3M machines that recorded at 50k/16-bit! Apparently it was transferred at 48k/24-bit to avoid dithering effects etc when using sample rate conversion. I believe in that instance a 48k digital recorder was connected straight to the analogue out of a 3M machine that played back those 50k/16-bit masters.
So it's not always, always, always as straightforward as it should be.. I recall Ryan Adams was one modern-day artist who at one time was very passionate about recording on analogue tape, so much so that it prompted Elton John, a fan of Adams' sound, to have his latest studio album of the day (2001's "Songs from the West Coast") recorded on analogue. That album was rumoured to be another of his upcoming SACD's, albeit 2-channel DSD.. but along with the rest of the Elton SACD's that never happened.. that never happened either!
These are among notable exceptions however and its my belief that most studio recordings of rock & pop material are made at 44.1k/16-bit or 24-bit.
The 96k/24bit (and various other hi-res sampling rates & resolution bit depths) of SACD and DVDA are used in the transferring of analogue tapes to digital with the intention of capturing as much of the original analogue recording as possible.
Hence why I asked in the "New SHM-SACD" thread on here, what the exact point is of the Queen SACD's of any of their albums after 1984's "The Works"..??
From '85's "A Kind of Magic" onwards all their studio albums are just bog-standard digital recordings of the time, so unless they utilised the multi-channel facility of SACD (one can dream..) they may as well just be CD's. The first 10 years' worth of Queen albums, that I believe were transferred from the analogue masters at 96k/24-bit, should have been reissued on DVDA if they were to be released in hi-res at all..!! Preferably having been remixed into 5.1 first! (Sigh..)
Dire Straits "Brothers in Arms" is another case in point. The 5.1 of that may as well have been a DVDV! The SACD is particularly pointless, as the original recording is just 44.1/16 digital.
Donald Fagen's "The Nightfly" DVDA is a bit of an interesting anomaly though. I recall there were cries of scamming and up-resing from the CD when it first came out but in the case of the eventual 48k/24-bit DVDA, there was a valid reason for that being its "Advanced Resolution" track.
The Nightfly was a very early digital recording created on 3M machines that recorded at 50k/16-bit! Apparently it was transferred at 48k/24-bit to avoid dithering effects etc when using sample rate conversion. I believe in that instance a 48k digital recorder was connected straight to the analogue out of a 3M machine that played back those 50k/16-bit masters.
So it's not always, always, always as straightforward as it should be.. I recall Ryan Adams was one modern-day artist who at one time was very passionate about recording on analogue tape, so much so that it prompted Elton John, a fan of Adams' sound, to have his latest studio album of the day (2001's "Songs from the West Coast") recorded on analogue. That album was rumoured to be another of his upcoming SACD's, albeit 2-channel DSD.. but along with the rest of the Elton SACD's that never happened.. that never happened either!
These are among notable exceptions however and its my belief that most studio recordings of rock & pop material are made at 44.1k/16-bit or 24-bit.
"Lossless audio is a key distinguishing feature of Blu-ray content. All things being equal, you cannot improve on the quality of lossless audio coding; however, you can improve on the quality of the source PCM content prior to lossless encoding, and this is precisely what we have achieved with our advanced 96k upsampling technology....Studios and authoring facilities that implement Dolby TrueHD with advanced 96k upsampling can elevate the quality of PCM audio prior to lossless Dolby TrueHD encoding, ensuring that consumers get the very best audio performance possible from their Blu-ray playback systems."
I think that pretty well explains it.
As to what frequency most modern surround recordings are at the pcm stage my guess would be up to and including 48kHz. Maybe someone with first hand knowledge can step in and clarify?
I think that pretty well explains it.
As to what frequency most modern surround recordings are at the pcm stage my guess would be up to and including 48kHz. Maybe someone with first hand knowledge can step in and clarify?
most modern surround recordings are 48khz/24-bit.
Kal Rubinson
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
Not really "mine." Written by Jason Serinius, our West Coast scribe.
my understanding is that technically speaking Dolby offered sort of "push one button"
automatized process of remastering, pretty much identical to those can be found in
receivers for "improvement" of mp3 playback.
well, in musical domain it could be acceptable to process with pop genres, which by it's
nature has lot of electronical instruments and accordingly artificially created harmonical
distortion in the sound. but i'm pretty doubt that such technology could be efficient in
improvement of such components of the music like vox or any kind of acoustical instruments
automatized process of remastering, pretty much identical to those can be found in
receivers for "improvement" of mp3 playback.
well, in musical domain it could be acceptable to process with pop genres, which by it's
nature has lot of electronical instruments and accordingly artificially created harmonical
distortion in the sound. but i'm pretty doubt that such technology could be efficient in
improvement of such components of the music like vox or any kind of acoustical instruments
Bleedink
Well-known Member
Recent recordings on HDtracks and Qobuz that claim to be studio masters (Norah Jones, Gotye, Wild Beasts) are ALL done 24/44.1. These are all albums done in the last year and the sites both make extensive claims that these are the native studio masters. I assumed it was a no brainer that they SURELY must be recording in 24/96 because virtually every DVD-A release was...but sadly NOPE. It looks like most of what I see on HDtracks (if they are indeed the Masters) and Qobuz is decidedly at a much lower res than what we would consider high res. Here I am referring to mainstream pop acts that aren't over 60 with their own studios. I've just had this discussion on no less than 3 sites. Lots of folks assume their pop is getting a lot more sampling rates than it is. Anyway for anyone looking for pop stuff in high res the ceiling these days from the majors seems to be a very steady 24/44.1. That's if you use the sampling on the high res sites for comparison. Virtually everything recorded in the last year on the majors that is available as Studio Masters is the same.
While I am not a fan of selling music that has undergone all kinds of who knows what, I found it interesting that the Stereophile scribe (whom we must assume has at least a passing fancy in audio) describes what almost sound like missing dynamics from the original recording. He does limit this assessment to the orchestral piece but it is interesting--but nearly everyone I have ever heard on any audio forum/zine/ect is nearly unanimous in claiming that dynamics can never be restored. Anyone know more about this tech?
While I am not a fan of selling music that has undergone all kinds of who knows what, I found it interesting that the Stereophile scribe (whom we must assume has at least a passing fancy in audio) describes what almost sound like missing dynamics from the original recording. He does limit this assessment to the orchestral piece but it is interesting--but nearly everyone I have ever heard on any audio forum/zine/ect is nearly unanimous in claiming that dynamics can never be restored. Anyone know more about this tech?
I don't see how you can put back, or put in (by up-res-ing to 96/24) what wasn't already there (original being 44.1/16 or 24) in the first place?!?
I'm sure I've heard counter-arguments that all you do is add a load of noise beyond the upper frequency limits of 44.1khz when you upsample..!!
Curious as to how Norah Jones' new album (or indeed any of her studio recorded output) can be aided by SACD/DSD if they're all at 44.1/16 or 44.1/24?!?
We shall have to wait and see I guess?
I'd love to be proven wrong.. but unless the first time around the CD mastering was wonky for all these Norah albums, what's the point?!?
Let's have some more gorgeous analogue recordings in real high res (preferably 5.1, or 4.0/4.1 if they're quad masters, of course!) instead, please..!!
I'm sure I've heard counter-arguments that all you do is add a load of noise beyond the upper frequency limits of 44.1khz when you upsample..!!
Curious as to how Norah Jones' new album (or indeed any of her studio recorded output) can be aided by SACD/DSD if they're all at 44.1/16 or 44.1/24?!?
We shall have to wait and see I guess?
I'd love to be proven wrong.. but unless the first time around the CD mastering was wonky for all these Norah albums, what's the point?!?
Let's have some more gorgeous analogue recordings in real high res (preferably 5.1, or 4.0/4.1 if they're quad masters, of course!) instead, please..!!
Bleedink
Well-known Member
I don't think all her albums were recorded at this rate. I believe just the latest is. It's a pretty 'big' release. One of those 'breakthrough' kinda projects with DangerMouse. The CD version is really loud. The HDtracks isn't bad but it isn't a drastic improvement. It's quieter. That's all I can say about it. I find the tunes catchy. I like them. I seem to be a minority. Don't like the sound quality but it's on par or better than most pop. I don't see this album benefitting from anything but maybe separating the instruments through a multichannel release. But it is so processed it's hard telling what you'd get unless it was completely remastered.
Kal Rubinson
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
If you search for apodizing filters, you will find a lot of info particularly from Meridian and Ayre. It has become a fairly well accepted approach and those of us who use it regularly find it a real improvement without any downside.
http://www.ayre.com/pdf/Ayre_MP_White_Paper.pdf
http://www.meridian-audio.info/public/stereophile_-_april_2009-_808.2[1060].pdf
If you have access to AES papers, the original Craven paper from 2004 is where to start.
Oh! Now that you mention, I've got a niggle in the back of my mind from somewhere (I'll try and find a source now to corroborate!) that her first album, "Come Away With Me" was recorded on analogue tape, for some reason..
maybe at Arif Mardin's suggestion!? It's been a while since I gave it a spin, admittedly but I'm sure I heard what sounded like analogue tape hiss in there at some point when listening through headphones.
So perhaps that first album is salvageable, despite, or in spite, perhaps of its' first SACD release and the fallout concerning its later revealed sonic limitations/source/sample rate.
I've heard snippets of the new album on iTunes and (as is so often the case on there) it sounds overloud and just nasty
It also initially strikes me as not my cup of tea, so I'll hold off at least until there's some feedback on the new SACD's and maybe even then not bother altogether!
ah-ha! here we go!
Stereophile to the rescue!
Come Away With Me was recorded on analogue tape! I didn't dream it!
This excellent article also goes into great detail about the first SACD release.
http://www.stereophile.com/thefifthelement/1104fifth
Stereophile to the rescue!
Come Away With Me was recorded on analogue tape! I didn't dream it!
This excellent article also goes into great detail about the first SACD release.
http://www.stereophile.com/thefifthelement/1104fifth
Bleedink
Well-known Member
Thanks! Actually I did re-reading the article I looked more into what they were doing. I personally didn't see a downside--it actually looked like it cleaned up what they used as reference material (Dolby's own paper), but I haven't heard either of them so I can't really comment. Hey if it improves sound quality I'm all for it. I'm not that much of a purist as long as it makes me respond.
Kal Rubinson
2K Club - QQ Super Nova
I think the meaning of "purist" has changed as we passed from the analog era to the digital era.
Bleedink
Well-known Member
You mean like back in the old days when the band played together at the same time? Didn't that bird fly out the window with Sgt. Peppers? JK. Actually the more I perused the material you referenced the more sense your statement made. I'm no audio guru, certainly no digital audio guru, and assumed it was all sampling rates. Didn't know about all the pre-ringing and stuff that digital brings to the table. Thanks! It was a very interesting read.
High Definition Digest has an article on Dolby's recent Demo Day event where 96k Upsampling and Dolby Atmos were showed off for the Audio Press and Bloggers.
See http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/new...and_Dolby_TrueHD_Advanced_96K_Upsampling/9450
See http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/new...and_Dolby_TrueHD_Advanced_96K_Upsampling/9450
High Definition Digest has an article on Dolby's recent "Fidelity Forum 2.0" event where 96k Upsampling and Dolby Atmos were showed off for the Audio Press and Bloggers.
See http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/new...and_Dolby_TrueHD_Advanced_96K_Upsampling/9450
See http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/new...and_Dolby_TrueHD_Advanced_96K_Upsampling/9450
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