Audio Technology - Issue 14
It's the sum of all the parts It's late at night and I'm real tired. I'm in the middle of relocating my studio, and getting a 5.1 DVD mastering system together. I haven't spent too much time thinking about anything else for months - haven't spent time sleeping either... I feel a little less than whole.

This relocation should be fairly straight forward: move, then buy Pro Tools...
ProTools? Them's fightin' words Rick. Apparently it's okay now, you just call it Tools. Anyway, everyone keeps telling me it's the new standard, and there are various ways to get into it, at all levels. I tend to agree, but digital has a wonderful way of being a huge, stupid money pit -one that I'm forced to play in, and I'm sure sick of the sand in my shoes. If you talk ProTools then you've inevitably got to start talking converters. So let's just talk about workstations for now, and I'll get around to those sandy gritty converters in a minute.

I have lots and lots of experience with digital workstations - I've used them all and owned some of the big ones. In my foyer right now I have three AMS Neve workstations that less then 10 years ago cost the original owners $250,000 each - I swapped them for a case of beer. They're 16-bit and they sound fantastic, but they don't have waveform editing and they have limited hard disk space. Now take note of what I said, they are 16-bit and they sound great. Hmm. I have a 24-bit Sonic Solutions system and it sure sounds dandy, and, I'm going to go out on a limb here, I have several 16-bit DAT players and a Sony 1630 mastering system which all sound pretty damn good as well... but none of them will deal with 5.1 DVD. So guess what? I need another digital box-of-tricks in my new studio.

It seems that everywhere I read I am hearing about the 'great relief that at last we have 24-bit/96k and now 'finally digital sounds good'. Well, that's just garbage. It's the same garbage I read about 18-bit converters and then 20-bit. I'm sorry, but most of us have been brainwashed by the numbers. Well-designed audio is (and always will be) well-designed audio, and the current guff about the new high-resolution converters is just a huge smoke screen to cover up other issues.

I currently own an Apogee PSX 24/96 converter, as well as a host of other types. I have a custom switching system and have spent hours A/B'ing every type of converter that comes along, and yes, that includes the one that everybody asks about... the Digi00l. And, my resounding conclusion is that all of the converters that somebody has bothered to put the 'professional' tag on, sound pretty good. The differences between 16-bit and 24-bit/96k are obvious to me and, of course, I have bought the ones that sound the best - because that's my gig, to surround myself with the best equipment and get down to work. But what I'm babbling on about is that converters aren't the be-all and end-all. Workstations have a whole stack of problems that no one talks about, hell, I don't think anybody even understands them. I mean, show me a fluent DSP software designer who can record a grand piano and I will show you the future...

When you A/B most converters they all sound fairly much the same - and they all sound much more similar then any set of speakers I have ever heard; and much, much more similar then any two mixing desks I have ever used; and much, much, much more similar than any mixing room I've ever been in. Don't waste your time worrying about which converters to buy with your new hard disk system, it's a red herring. Nearly everything you do in the digital domain on that workstation will have a bigger, more noticeable affect on the sound than a new set of 24-bit/96k converters. Get some new speakers, buy a microphone, get a new equaliser... do anything, but don't say to me, "it's a pretty good box but I don't know what the converters are like, so I'm getting the XYZ ones". Listen to the damn things. If you can't tell if they sound bad, then guess what?... they don't sound bad. Go find something else to blame for the less than perfect sound - and I can think of a many more useful places to start than the converters. Work up to the converters, plug all the real holes first, then you can join the ranks of the fools like me who must have the best converters every 12 months.

To me, a good record is characterised by how the sounds are blended together - how well they are mixed - and this is the real point of the article I guess: digital workstations and digital mixers, still don't mix sounds together as well as a high-end analogue mixing console. So manufacturers have been selling us new converters for years to cover up the truth about the other (untold) side of the digital story, and that story's about what the workstation actually does to the sound.

Don't you think it's odd to read about all these pros mixing with ProTools on a huge SSL mixing console? They're not doing it for fun - it just sounds better not mixed in the box. What makes digital sound 'cold' is not a numbers game, it's an application of devices game. Every single thing you do in the analogue world will sound more dramatic than forking out the dosh on an expensive digital converter to replace the ones in your digi00l. It's a waste of money. Get some stuff that changes the sound for the better, something even the drummer can hear!

Looks like 24-bit is here to stay... for at least a few more weeks anyway. The question is, what will still be wrong with the sound tomorrow? Have you ever pushed up all the faders of a drum sound on a Neve console? That's the sound you want - the sound of everything effortlessly mixing together.

It's about the sum of all the parts and it's not too much to strive for - the sum of all the parts.                                                         

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