AES San Francisco 2012
Workshop W8
Sunday, October 28, 9:00 am — 11:00 am (Room 132)
W8 - The Controversy over Upsampling—Boon or Scam?
Chair:Vicki R. Melchior, Technical Consultant, Audio DSP - Lynn, MA, USA
Panelists:
Poppy Crum, Dolby Laboratories - San Francisco, CA, USA
Robert Katz, Digital Domain Mastering - Orlando, FL, USA
Bruno Putzeys, Hypex Electronics - Rotselaar, Belgium; Grimm Audio
Rhonda Wilson, Dolby Laboratories - San Francisco, CA, USA
Abstract:
Many “high resolution” releases on Blu-ray, DVD, and also some HD downloads are created by upsampling Redbook or 48-kHz data, a practice that draws frequent and quite vehement outcries of fraud. Yet at the same time upsamplers, both hardware and software, are commonly marketed to consumers and professionals now with the promise of boosting redbook sonics to near-equality with high resolution. What's going on? A panel of experienced mastering engineers, DAC, and DSP designers looks at the long-standing controversies and claims behind upsampling, as well as its uses in audio. The issues relating to down/up conversion go well beyond headroom and relate directly to hardware and software implementation, the design of low pass filters, consequences of signal processing, and mastering considerations related to the production and release of modern high quality discs and music files.
