Who should do the Dither/downsample?

[papadosio]

Ok, lets say Ive got a mastering plugin in live's master track. The plugin has its own dithering and downsampling options. So does Live in the Render audio/video dialog box. If im trying to convert my 88.2 32bit down to 44.1 16bit, who should do the Downsampling and Dithering?

Since Live is acting as the "DAW" i imagine if you dont make the settings "44.1 16bit" in the Render audio/video dialog box, then it wont downsample/dither even if the plugin in the master track is set to these settings.

So i guess my real question is should i set the plugin to the bit depth and sampling frequency i want AS WELL as the Render dialog? or should i strictly only do dithering and downsampling with the Render dialog box only.

[33tetragammon]

Ok, lets say Ive got a mastering plugin in live's master track. The plugin has its own dithering and downsampling options. So does Live in the Render audio/video dialog box. If im trying to convert my 88.2 32bit down to 44.1 16bit, who should do the Downsampling and Dithering?

Since Live is acting as the "DAW" i imagine if you dont make the settings "44.1 16bit" in the Render audio/video dialog box, then it wont downsample/dither even if the plugin in the master track is set to these settings.

So i guess my real question is should i set the plugin to the bit depth and sampling frequency i want AS WELL as the Render dialog? or should i strictly only do dithering and downsampling with the Render dialog box only.

you should do only one of those you mentioned,so either in the DAW or in the mastering plugin.dithering should be done ONLY ONCE!!!!!
and make sure dithering is the ABSOLUTE LAST thing you do to your audio(so no limiting etc after that).

also ,if you really want to hear what your dithering really does to your audio,use a good pair of studio headphones,put a gain plugin(like the Sonalksis Free-G or Live's own Utility plugin) before the mastering plugin,lower that to about -40dB,and also put one after the mastering plugin,and raise it's level 40 dB or more,up to the level that you can hear it well.now just test and listen which dithering sounds best.after you found the dithering which sounds best to you,delete the gain plugins(obviously).
and make sure your tracks have enough headroom left below o dB before you start mastering,because 32 bit has huge headroom that 16 bit doesn't have,so your 16 bit master might sound awful if all the tracks are slammed at 0dB in 32 bit.

[Tarekith]

Honestly when it comes to dithering, probably either option is fine, it'll likely come down to which sounds better. And I doubt you (or most people) can hear a difference anyway. What's the mastering plug in you're referring to?

[papadosio]

Ive been using psp vintage warmer 2 then ozone 4's limiter and up until now ive never used its dithering or downsampling capabilities. I didnt relize a plugin was able to chenge the outputed file type from live.

[Tarekith]

It doesn't change the output type, it just places the dither noise at the right place so when you convert to 16bit out of the DAW, it's where it should be. It'll still be a 24bit file (or whatever the bit depth was originally), it just has dither noise where the file will be after Live gets rid of those last 8 bits.

The Izotope MBIT+ dither is one of the best out there too, I'd use that over the POW-r dither in Live. FWIW.

[33tetragammon]

The Izotope MBIT+ dither is one of the best out there too, I'd use that over the POW-r dither in Live. FWIW.

yes,same here,i use Ozone 4's MBIT+ almost everytime i master,but i always turn the "auto blanking" off,it creates a click when the music is around the point of silence.