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From the Process menu, choose Bit Depth, and then choose Bit-Depth Converter from the submenu.
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Choose a preset from the Preset drop-down list or adjust the controls as desired:
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Choose a bit depth from the drop-down list.
Increasing a file’s bit depth cannot improve the quality of the existing audio, but does allow higher resolution for processing.
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Choose a setting from the Dither drop-down list if you’re decreasing the file’s bit depth and want to add dither noise to mask quantization noise. For example, if you want to burn a 24-bit audio file to an audio CD, dithering will produce a cleaner signal than a simple bit-depth conversion.
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Setting |
Description |
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Half Rectangular |
Eliminates distortion caused by conversion to a lower bit depth, but the noise level is dependent on the signal. This setting uses a maximum dither noise amplitude of 0.5 LSB (least significant bit). |
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Rectangular |
Identical to Half Rectangular, but with a maximum dither noise amplitude of 1 LSB (least significant bit). |
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Triangular |
Eliminates distortion caused by conversion to a lower bit depth and eliminates noise floor modulation by producing a slightly higher noise level. |
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Highpass Triangular |
Eliminates distortion caused by conversion to a lower bit depth and eliminates noise floor modulation by producing a slightly higher noise level. Noise is shifted to higher frequencies than standard triangular dithering. |
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Gaussian |
Does not perform as well as rectangular or triangular dithering, but may be suitable for some material. |
In general, Highpass Triangular with noise shaping produces the most favorable results.
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Choose a setting from the Noise shaping drop-down list to apply noise shaping to your signal. Noise shaping lowers the perceived noise floor of the signal by shifting most of the noise into the upper frequencies of human hearing.
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Setting |
Description |
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Off |
Does not apply noise shaping. |
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High-Pass Contour |
Moves noise into high frequencies.
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Equal Loudness Contour |
Distributes noise equally into high and low frequencies. |
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Click OK.
For more information about using processing dialog controls, click here.
Right click the Bit Depth box on the status bar and choose a new bit depth from the shortcut menu.
Bit-Depth Converter |
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From the Process menu, choose Bit Depth, and then choose Bit-Depth Converter from the submenu to convert sound files to different bit depths.
Because the signal-to-noise ratio decreases when you decrease the bit depth of a file, you should maximize the volume of the sound file using the Volume or Normalize functions before performing the conversion.
For more information about using processing dialog controls, click here.
What do you want to do?
Set the bit depth for playback only
