The highs will be cut off and the bass will be nonexistant or even distorted. A lower bit depth such as 11kHz will produce a very flat, undynamic sound, not unlike that coming out of a transistor radio. Since most music has a wide dynamic range, then the sound needs to be recorded with this in mind. So a lower depth of 8 bit can sound nearly as good as 16 bit, but without the doubled file size. Since music is continuous with no noticeable pauses or gaps similar to what you'd find in voice, hiss and muddiness can often be masked by the nature of the sound. Music - For better sounding music, the bit depth is not as important as the sampling rate.
Keep in mind that this will double your file size. If your talent has a deeper voice or tends to fluctuate in range, then a range of 11kHz can be achieved by recording at 22kHz. So if you establish that the frequency range does not need to go any higher than 5,000Hz, Nyquist's Theorem says to record the sound with a sampling rate of 11kHz. The human voice is pretty much mid-range. There is no booming bass or higher highs. Recording voice does not require the same frequency range as music. You can usually make the tradeoff in sampling rate, by cutting it down. But 16-bit audio files are twice as large as comparable 8-bit sound files. Voice - For voice, a higher bit depth to eliminate hiss and muddiness is preferable to achieve a clean sound. Instead, weigh the differences each provides. While it is easy to assign a blanket bit depth and sampling rate to all of your sounds, your sound quality might not benefit from this strategy. Now that you've had a crash course in digital audio, you need to apply it to your piece.
#Compress sound file in goldwave full
A sampling rate of 44.1kHz is commonly used to achieve a full dynamic range - CD audio quailty. If you want your sound to have a range of 20 - 20,000kHz, then you need to record it with a sampling rate of at least 40,000Hz.
Nyquist's Theorem says that you need to record your sound at a sampling rate of double that of the dynamic range you are trying to achieve. A range of 20 - 20,000Hz is the general rule of thumb although this can vary somewhat among individuals. Anything above 20,000kHz cannot be heard by humans (while sounds below 20Hz cannot be heard per se, they can be felt assuming that your sound system can output at that frequency). Keep in mind that the human ear can hear things in a range of approximately 20-20,000Hz. You need to consider what your needs are. Generally, a higher bit depth is recommended for voice in order to keep your sound "clean". If you are recording voice alone, there will be gaps and pauses between words and sentences which can accentuate any noise in your sound. Sounds recorded at 8 bit typically have more noise (hiss) than sounds recorded at 16 bit. The higher bit depth, the more detail and less room for noise or muddiness. So a sound recorded at 16 bits and 44.1 kHz is actually a sound that has been sampled 44,100 times per second and each sample has a bit depth of 16 bits.īit depth is the detail of the sound samples. At each of those intervals, that particular place in the sound is recorded. Sampling rate - The number is measured in kHz, but is actually the number of times per second that the sound is sampled. This gives greater accuracy and, more importantly, less noise. The higher the bit depth, the more detail each sample has of the sound. As a developer, you need to be aware of two crucial elements and how they affect your piece.īit depth - This is the detail of any particular sample. This means that a replica of the sound is being recorded as opposed to analog which makes an actul copy of the sound wave. But first, you must realize what each factor means when recording sound.įirst, sound recorded in a computer is digital. Too often, movies use a blanket 8-bit 22kHz sound format when that may not be appropriate. In order to get the best quality sound for the smallest file size and performance hit, you must consider what the content of the sound is.