Live Rendering Vs iTunes Vs Other software..which is best?

[Pasha]

Hi,

I record at 48K 24bit in Live.
Now the time has come to render to disk.
I can use the render facility in Live to :

1. Render directly at 44K 16bit (CD Quality) and then use iTunes to create a CD
2. Render at 48K 24bit then import in iTunes (without AAC or MP3 conversion) and then use iTunes to create a CD
3. Render at 48K 24bit then use another program (Audacity?) to render to 44K 16bit[/list]


I would like to know, in your experience what method produces the best results, thanks for help!

- Best
- Pasha

[difference]

Why on earth are you recording at 48khz?

You are always going to lose quality in the conversion to 44.1khz no matter how you do it.

Just record in 44.1 in the first place.

[Pasha]

Why on earth are you recording at 48khz?

You are always going to lose quality in the conversion to 44.1khz no matter how you do it.

Just record in 44.1 in the first place.

Sadness. So bit depth is not a problem?

- Best
- Pasha

[jesQuick]

Sadness. So bit depth is not a problem?

- Best
- Pasha

I think iTunes will leave the bitdepth at 24... It does that with mp3´s anyway..

And you would want to use a dither plugin when rendering from 24 to 16 bits as well...

[Pasha]

Now if I want to revert back all to 44k/24bits I have two ways:

Use Live Rendering or Record again at 44K 24Bits. Most tracks were recorded
from external MIDI modules or VSTi so I do not see any problems here. It will be a lot time consuming but especially with multiple outputs VSTi it's only a single multi-track recording run.
What to do with guitars and vocals? it's possible to play a track in Live recorded at 48K 24bit and at the same time record (in real time) on another track at 44K 24bit?

Any answer will be appreciated.

- Best
- Pasha

[jesQuick]

Now if I want to revert back all to 44k/24bits I have two ways:

Use Live Rendering or Record again at 44K 24Bits. Most tracks were recorded
from external MIDI modules or VSTi so I do not see any problems here. It will be a lot time consuming but especially with multiple outputs VSTi it's only a single multi-track recording run.
What to do with guitars and vocals? it's possible to play a track in Live recorded at 48K 24bit and at the same time record (in real time) on another track at 44K 24bit?

Any answer will be appreciated.

- Best
- Pasha

Thats a good question I would like to get an answer for as well. As far as I can see Live is not concerned with bit depths and so forth... Its possible to drag all kinds of files in and Live doesnt care... Its the complete opposite in fx. Protools. Protools will not accept any other formats than those chosen for the particular session. It will convert all other formats...

So whats up with Live... Does it convert in the background or what happens when you drag in a 48 kHz file in together with 44.1 files. Anybody knows this!?!?

Cheers

[Pasha]

Now if I want to revert back all to 44k/24bits I have two ways:

Use Live Rendering or Record again at 44K 24Bits. Most tracks were recorded
from external MIDI modules or VSTi so I do not see any problems here. It will be a lot time consuming but especially with multiple outputs VSTi it's only a single multi-track recording run.
What to do with guitars and vocals? it's possible to play a track in Live recorded at 48K 24bit and at the same time record (in real time) on another track at 44K 24bit?

Any answer will be appreciated.

- Best
- Pasha

Thats a good question I would like to get an answer for as well. As far as I can see Live is not concerned with bit depths and so forth... Its possible to drag all kinds of files in and Live doesnt care... Its the complete opposite in fx. Protools. Protools will not accept any other formats than those chosen for the particular session. It will convert all other formats...

So whats up with Live... Does it convert in the background or what happens when you drag in a 48 kHz file in together with 44.1 files. Anybody knows this!?!?

Cheers

I have tested yesterday. I took one track recorded at 48K 24bits and piped through another track, monitor in and recorded at 44K/16Bit. It worked fine. I also discovered that some of my songs were a mix of 44k and 48k recordings with Live playing it smoothly, even if I suspect some CPU cycle was dedicated to resample.

Cheers

[kent_sandvik]

You should really use something between that dithers from 24-bit to 16 bit, Ableton does not do it, so you need a third-party tool such as Izotope Ozone, or if you use WaveBurner you could also dither. The actual CD burning is then a pure 16-bit operation.

As for 48kHz versus 44.1kHz, it's really not a big deal, the downsampllng is just fine, but dithering is somewhat important, you could live without it, of course, but most professional mastering efforts involve dithering at some point. --Kent

[Michael-SW]

Didn't we talk about this last week?

My advice is still to do everything in 24 bits up until the absolute last moment. Only convert to 16 bits when preparing files for CD burning. You want to keep the 24 bit masters for your archive, but the 16 bit files you can throw away after burning if you want to save space.

Personally I use SoundForge to dither and convert. I have no idea how iTunes handles 24 bit files. I wouldn't trust it to do dithering, but who knows?

[Pasha]

Didn't we talk about this last week?

My advice is still to do everything in 24 bits up until the absolute last moment. Only convert to 16 bits when preparing files for CD burning. You want to keep the 24 bit masters for your archive, but the 16 bit files you can throw away after burning if you want to save space.

Personally I use SoundForge to dither and convert. I have no idea how iTunes handles 24 bit files. I wouldn't trust it to do dithering, but who knows?

Yes. You're right.
Although linked to my previous post this new one was more an 'How to' request. Now that I'm stuck with the material I already recorded I have the problem to create the mix down to be burned on a CD. It's a year work so I wanted to be sure.

So far my understanding is :

1. When all tracks are recorded at 44K 16bit the resulting rendered file directly from live can be burned without problems
2. When tracks are recorded at 44K/24bit or 48K/24bit, Live internal rendering to disk might not be enough to produce a good output, better to render to disk at the same sampling rate / bit depth and then use an external tool to dither and down sample.

Pls let me know your thoughts.

- Best
- Pasha

[Nod]

1. Render directly at 44K 16bit (CD Quality) and then use iTunes to create a CD
2. Render at 48K 24bit then import in iTunes (without AAC or MP3 conversion) and then use iTunes to create a CD
3. Render at 48K 24bit then use another program (Audacity?) to render to 44K 16bit[/list]

None of the three Pasha. I tend to export at 24 bit/88.2K (for CD) and 24bit/96K (for DVD) - the internal processing of plug ins and softsynths does sound better. You can then convert to 'standard formats' ( 16bit/44.1k or 48k ) using this utility:

http://www.lcscanada.com/audiomove/

[Pasha]

1. Render directly at 44K 16bit (CD Quality) and then use iTunes to create a CD
2. Render at 48K 24bit then import in iTunes (without AAC or MP3 conversion) and then use iTunes to create a CD
3. Render at 48K 24bit then use another program (Audacity?) to render to 44K 16bit[/list]

None of the three Pasha. I tend to export at 24 bit/88.2K (for CD) and 24bit/96K (for DVD) - the internal processing of plug ins and softsynths does sound better. You can then convert to 'standard formats' ( 16bit/44.1k or 48k ) using this utility:
http://www.lcscanada.com/audiomove/

Thanks!
How this utility compares to Audacity?
When you say 'export' you mean using Live render to disk?
You record the tracks at 24 Bit at which sample rate?

- Best
- Pasha

[Nod]

Thanks! How this utility compares to Audacity? When you say 'export' you mean using Live render to disk?

Hi Pasha - yes the Live render to disk. The Audiomove converter is substantially better than Audacity - with a good set of ears you should really notice bit depth/sample rate conversions on such things as the stereo imaging, high frequency transients, verb tails & delays and vocal sibilance as well. Once you've resampled to the sample rate of choice you should then apply dither to avoid bit truncation before changing to the final bit depth.

You record the tracks at 24 Bit at which sample rate?

Depends on the project - if I know what my final ouput medium is when I start the project then I'll set the project up specifically for it. For example if my final format is for CD then I'll work at 24 bit/88.2 kHz & if I'm working for DVD then it's 24 bit/96kHz. The reason for this is that the final destination format sample rate should, for the absolute best quality, be easily divisible during any sample rate conversion. Standard CD is 44.1kHz - precisely half of 88.2. Standard DVD is 48khz - precisely half of 96kHz.

Less rounding errors in any calculations that need to be made results in better audio quality. Yep it's utterly anal & almost nobody would ever notice the difference - but I ain't doing this to satisfy anyone else

[Pasha]

Thanks! How this utility compares to Audacity? When you say 'export' you mean using Live render to disk?

Hi Pasha - yes the Live render to disk. The Audiomove converter is substantially better than Audacity - with a good set of ears you should really notice bit depth/sample rate conversions on such things as the stereo imaging, high frequency transients, verb tails & delays and vocal sibilance as well. Once you've resampled to the sample rate of choice you should then apply dither to avoid bit truncation before changing to the final bit depth.

You record the tracks at 24 Bit at which sample rate?

Depends on the project - if I know what my final ouput medium is when I start the project then I'll set the project up specifically for it. For example if my final format is for CD then I'll work at 24 bit/88.2 kHz & if I'm working for DVD then it's 24 bit/96kHz. The reason for this is that the final destination format sample rate should, for the absolute best quality, be easily divisible during any sample rate conversion. Standard CD is 44.1kHz - precisely half of 88.2. Standard DVD is 48khz - precisely half of 96kHz.

Less rounding errors in any calculations that need to be made results in better audio quality. Yep it's utterly anal & almost nobody would ever notice the difference - but I ain't doing this to satisfy anyone else

Thanks for the explanation Nod.
My sound card isn't capable of 88.2 kHz and 96 kHz creates huge files and taxes my cpu a bit more, so I have decided to record at 44kHz 24Bits. I'll then export to the same sample rate bit depth using Live render to disk then I would apply 16 bit depth using the program you suggested. If you have any other dithering suggestion I'll be happy to know.
I've tested yesterday two different approaches first using only Live for rendering and second rendering outside Live with Audacity. Today I'll compare with Audiomove. It seems that by using Live render to disk only, I lose some of the high band clarity while audacity is closer to the original played in Live I haven't noticed any stereo mess up.
Thank you so far, your posts were very helpful.

- Best Regards
- Pasha

[Nod]

Thanks for the explanation Nod. My sound card isn't capable of 88.2 kHz and 96 kHz creates huge files and taxes my cpu a bit more, so I have decided to record at 44kHz 24Bits.

24/44.1 should still be absolutely fine Pasha - assuming your recording chain/imported media is good quality the results will reflect that.

I'll then export to the same sample rate bit depth using Live render to disk then I would apply 16 bit depth using the program you suggested. If you have any other dithering suggestion I'll be happy to know.

There really isn't that many 3rd party options available on the dithering front - most of the time the algorithms are licenced into apps (such as POW-R and MBIT). However I did find that Mda-Vst have one such plug for both Win & Mac.

http://www.mda-vst.com/

Just apply the dither to your 24 bit master file and then use Audiomove to alter the bit depth to 16 bit. Essentially it's avoiding very low level rounding errors to your audio during bit depth alterations - so you achieve a very low level of 'smooth' noise rather than 'rough' truncations which are far more audible. Dithering typically applies the noise to the bottom 'two bits' so, in the case of 16 bit/44.1kHz which has 96dB dynamic range, your looking at an overall 'noise floor' of approx -84db after dither/bit change has been applied - as each bit is 6dB. This may seem overally techy in an age where most recordings have RMS levels smashed beyond belief, and the average listener probably isn't going to care, but we aren't the average listener

I've tested yesterday two different approaches first using only Live for rendering and second rendering outside Live with Audacity. Today I'll compare with Audiomove. It seems that by using Live render to disk only, I lose some of the high band clarity while audacity is closer to the original played in Live I haven't noticed any stereo mess up. Thank you so far, your posts were very helpful.

Glad to help out mate - as regards the issue of Live render vs resampling vs third party it's really a personal choice. Personally if I'm knocking out a quick mix I quite like the sound of the Live engine - however if I'm shooting for absolute top drawer quality, overall mix control whilst keeping the CPU managable in real time I'll import the stems into Nuendo. Anyways best of luck with your masters Pasha....