11-Jan-2016, 20:31
Hi, Gremlin.
Just so we're on the same page, the "resolution" in audio is defined by the bit-depth of the audio stream.
And yes, you are right, that is the same as dynamic range. Some people refer to the pair of sampling rate and bit-depth as "resolution", which is why try to avoid the term altogether.
So, regarding the dynamic range: regardless of the volume you are listening at, dynamic range is defined not in absolute terms, but in relative. Moreover, before being amplified, the signal being output from your DAC is hardly audible, but still retains all the dynamic range that has been reconstructed from the stream by the DAC.
And the 24bit signal at peak level will have exactly 8bit more dynamic range than 16bit signal at same level.
So when you reduce the level on the source equipment, you are in fact applying negative gain to the signal, and zeroing out the extra information.
So when you have source signal of 24bit, at -48dB volume, applied at source, what gets input to the Phantom DAC is in fact only 16bit of actual data left, and 8bits of zeroes at every sample. So the DAC reconstructs the signal with lower dynamic range, which is then amplified.
If you cannot discern the difference between 24bit and 16bit, that's fine, and mny people would argue that 16bit is more than enough for anything.
But the fact is that bit-depth=dynamic range is reduced by applying volume control at source. You can probably hear the effect by listening at very low volume to a 16bit source - you will probably hear hiss and noise because the effective dynamic range left intact is very little.
Just so we're on the same page, the "resolution" in audio is defined by the bit-depth of the audio stream.
And yes, you are right, that is the same as dynamic range. Some people refer to the pair of sampling rate and bit-depth as "resolution", which is why try to avoid the term altogether.
So, regarding the dynamic range: regardless of the volume you are listening at, dynamic range is defined not in absolute terms, but in relative. Moreover, before being amplified, the signal being output from your DAC is hardly audible, but still retains all the dynamic range that has been reconstructed from the stream by the DAC.
And the 24bit signal at peak level will have exactly 8bit more dynamic range than 16bit signal at same level.
So when you reduce the level on the source equipment, you are in fact applying negative gain to the signal, and zeroing out the extra information.
So when you have source signal of 24bit, at -48dB volume, applied at source, what gets input to the Phantom DAC is in fact only 16bit of actual data left, and 8bits of zeroes at every sample. So the DAC reconstructs the signal with lower dynamic range, which is then amplified.
If you cannot discern the difference between 24bit and 16bit, that's fine, and mny people would argue that 16bit is more than enough for anything.
But the fact is that bit-depth=dynamic range is reduced by applying volume control at source. You can probably hear the effect by listening at very low volume to a 16bit source - you will probably hear hiss and noise because the effective dynamic range left intact is very little.
