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automatic switching bit depth

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RD James:

--- Quote from: EJR on April 08, 2016, 12:56:17 pm ---The 32 bit story makes sense but since i have no desire to use 32 bit (disk space alone is a good enough reason not too) i'm gona leave it at 24 bit.
All my music is either 16 or 24 bit it should not really matter.
--- End quote ---
There is no need to convert your files to a higher bit-depth, JRiver does it on playback.
It's literally just adding additional zeros to the end of a 16-bit or 24-bit signal to pad it out to 32-bit.
It's only once you start processing the signal that outputting a higher bit-depth will make a difference.
If you aren't processing the signal at all, the two are functionally the same. It's sample rate which could potentially affect sound quality, bit-depth does not.
 
Personally I find that, as long as you switch JRiver's dither to TPDF, Volume Leveling only benefits playback and has no negative effect on the audio quality as long as your amplifier has enough gain to make up the difference in playback level.
If you play music at 100% volume, there is the possibility of inter-sample clipping occurring if the DAC doesn't account for it. (many do not)

EJR:
i wasn't referring to converting but to getting music that is 32 bits. (if that actually exists)
since i don't have 32 bit files and don't use digital volume there is no need for me to pick 32 bit.
if i understand correctly 32 bit gets 8 bits discarded anyway.


anyway i don't have to worry about the whole 16/24 bit which good to know :D

cheers!

blowfish:
I have done some experimenting and manually selecting the bit depth manually improves sound quality, however, you may not hear a difference except for those that have high end audio system equipped with the finest cabling and proper set up. I would like to see JRiver set its player to play native bit depth only and switch the bit depth automatically. Forget adding more features until the player works the way it should. Don't get me wrong if you set JRiver manually to 24 bit depth it will still play back a 16 bit file but it will be up-sampled to 24 bits which may only add a bunch of zeros but it causes the music to lose focus and transparency. It's possible that it might sound better on some systems that have a flaw somewhere, but in absolute terms altering the native bit depth does impact the sound quality. Not in a good way. Yes, it is a small improvement but small improvements add up. The better your system the bigger the impact will be.

JimH:
It's hard to know what you mean.

Converting from 16 bit to 24 bit by definition means padding with zeroes.  You can't create something from nothing.

Before you get too far out on a limb, try MC's Listening Test.  It's under the Tools Menu.  Please share the results.

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