Ok despite personal prejudices for or against, I've spoken with grammy winning engineers who say that 96k is the default in their studio because there *is* a different, especially with processing. My only point being people are using it whether you like it or not - I don't want to get into whose right or wrong on that, except to say if it's a worthless exercise nobody can hear, why did VSL record in 96k in the first place? I also do absolutely hear a difference between 96k material and 44.1. Even if the tracked material was 44.1, processed in 96, and dithered down, there is a difference, and certainly with original material in 96, processed in 96k, and delivered to 96k, there is a difference. It's also a great thing to be able to release music in 96k. If Vienna releases their library in the full 96k glory - I think that would be used by a lot more people than you would think. Again, prejudices aside, 96k is the new default standard and is spreading through more and more pro digital studios around the world, and for a good reason. Again, even when delivering to 44.1, processing in 96, with source material at 96, makes sense. I think over larger mixes especially, it would make a difference.

Edit: A big point for the end user if you sell your music to the public, or to a studio for that matter, is marketability - 24/96k is HD and if your source, processing and delivery are 24/96 then your production is HD.

It's an interesting debate, taking the next technological step forward.

Reminds me of those who insist they must have a 64 bit DAW.

The very engineers you mention, probably did most of their Grammy Award Winning work in Pro Tools.

It's 4th quarter 2012 and Pro Tools is still a 32 bit DAW.

For the record, I'm with you on this. I'd love to hear the information we're missing at 96k.

On the other hand, it's probably not necessary.

Do you feel your work, your music, suffers at the current 44.1 rate?

I have this argument with a good friend of mine all the time - even as recently as a few weeks ago. I said I need more instruments / channels for what I'm trying to do, etc. He says "we didn't have none of this stuff in the 80's, we just made music".

The thing is, if I were to have listened to him since we started having this argument about 12 years ago, I would have one keyboard, I certainly would never have bought the Vienna Library in the first place (what an outrageous expense, and certainly overkill). I definitely don't need the computer I have, without which I couldn't do the projects / mix sizes I do. As a matter of fact, whatever was wrong with my Apple G3 500mhz?! (I do miss the cool blue and white casing I must admit I should have kept it just for that). Oh, and without question I would be still on 16bit/44.1 from beginning to end. I remember that argument like it was yesterday: "you can't hear the difference". I remember another guy saying "Cher's hit single was mixed on a 16/44.1 pci PC interface" "yeah, you can't tell the difference". But I went with my ears and got an external 24bit interface. I upgraded my machine so I could mix in 24bit.

I know of a hit single that a guy did in his basement, literally, with a soundblaster card on a Pentium in the 90's he was famous for it. There are people making it on "Americas Got Talent" jungling stuff and a girl on Britains Got Talent won by training her dog. hehe.

A large portion of professional engineers are now using 96k in the studio. I don't believe it's a marketing gimmick, because I can hear the difference.

And if there's no point to it, why did Vienna spend the extra money to do it in the first place, in a time when it wasn't commonplace, when they released it in 44.1... They obviously thought there was a point to it (and I agree).

Then there's the issue of future proofing your work. Maybe delivery is 44.1 today, in two years, it's 96k and they want a re-release. Easy. There's so many reasons to do it, but the main one is that this is now becoming the industry standard baseline, even if your delivery format is 44.1.

Will I stop using VSL if they don't go to 96k? Of course not... but my reason for posting was just to say, IMHO, *it is time* :)

Anyway, about my friend... my point is, he always says my music sounds great... I never point that out to him.

@Another User said:

I'd love to hear the information we're missing at 96k.

Humans can't hear frequencies higher than ~20kHz (usually even less, if you're are older than 20). Everything below 20kHz is already stored in a 44,1kHz audio file.

LazyPeon, I think it's fairly well established and if you look into it properly you will see the point of 96k, at least for the majority of people is not to record frequencies above the audible range. 96k still has a filter on it the same as 44.1. Maybe you should look into this before arbitrarily arguing any case for or against. There is plenty of good documentation and excellent articles explaining why people do hear a difference.

@mpower88 said:

[...]. Even if the tracked material was 44.1, processed in 96, and dithered down [...]

Just to avoid any confusion: Dithering has nothing to do with sample rate conversion. It is applied when changing the bit-depth of a digital audio stream (or - according to the text-book - whenever you change the volume of a digital audio signal).

Kind regards,

I believe that if you are going to present the material for listening at 96kHz, then that's what you should mix at. However, if you aren't, it is better to mix at the sample rate that the end product is due to be played at.

DG

Right you are Dietz, my bad I meant sampled down.

But since you're here ;) haha, any *other* comments??

DG, the vast majority of people using this format daily in a professional sense would disagree with you. See my above post. But you're free to your opinion, I'm just saying, for some people, it's worth it. I personally would use it.

@mpower88 said:

DG, the vast majority of people using this format daily in a professional sense would disagree with you. See my above post. But you're free to your opinion, I'm just saying, for some people, it's worth it. I personally would use it.

Of course they disagree, becuase otherwise they wouldn't be using it. However, they are a tiny minority of the people using DAWs, so the majority seem to agree with me. [;)]

However, jsut to expand upon my thinking, the reason I say it's not worth it is because once you down sample you can never be sure exactly what will transfer. By working at 44.1 or 48, you already know exactly what you're getting., there is no mystery. I've also spoken to many engineers about this very thing, and although some agree with you, others agree with me. In fact a couple of them said that they have even made mistakes by trusting that what they hear at 96 is going to sound the same at 44.1, which turned out not to be the case, so it is not cut and dried by any means.

I'm not saying that there is no difference. I'm saying if your eventual format is 44.1 or 48, it is better to work at that sample rate to start with, IMO.

DG

Right, and VSL made a name for themselves by always being behind the times... /sarcasm... [Y]

I don't expect you to agree, but what's your loss? If you don't want it, don't use it. For VSL I would say now is the time it would make commercial sense. They could charge a reasonable premium for the upgrade. It would add to the prestige of the library, etc. even for those who wouldn't use it. Even if I didn't use it today, I would love to be able to re open a project a few years from now, and load the 96K samples and remaster it, then sell that as a HD version, which is a growing market. There's lots of reasons.

Here's some food for thought which I just found:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=SY5hI98HEi0#!

No need for sarcasm. I assumed that when you posted on a public forum you were interested in other people's opinions. I guess that's only true when they agree with you. Carry on then......  [;)]

DG

No but seriously - I guess by what you're saying they made a mistake and were deluded. Sorry but that's what you're getting at. Why do it then? I'm sorry but I get so frustrated with this backwards argument - there's no question there's a substantial and real difference. Now if you're talking about benefits of tracking, versus processing, versus delivery, or two or all of those things, that's debateable, is it worth it in x scenario etc. But I think there's no question, if you have source, processing and delivery, it is far superior to go 24/96 than 16/44. or even 24/44. If you don't agree, you are welcome to disagree, it's just that you seemed to be angling at the notion that it's all a waste of time and/or too complex for too little gain. I think that's a bit naive that's all. By the way, I am talking about delivery in 96. Aren't most HD movies at least 96k as standard? Isn't VSL used for scoring film where a real orchestra is out of budget (and to supplement real orchestras)? I rest my case.

Re those engineers you speak of, that sounds to me like a hardware issue rather than a problem with the format itself.

I did some googling and searching through scientific databases (I work at a university), however, I couldn't access the full text for any studies examining if there's any audible difference between 44.1 kHz and 96kHz. However, the impression I got from forums, audioblogs and the occasional abstract of scientific papers, is that the better the study, the less evidence for any audible difference. It seems that double blind studies of high quality reveal no audible difference, and the sloppier the study, the better the chance of confirming the difference is.

The following article has some interesting things to say:

http://people.xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html