Do I need dither with analog gear?

[amagras]

Since I started recording with 1073s, 1176s and other analog pieces I started to differentiate the background noise these monsters make and noticed that music (and even silence) sounds delicious with it, even in the cases when is more noticeable than the standard noise produced by dithering.

Is there a reason to use a dither in a song that was recorded using analog gear after processing in Pro Tools?

Thx

[Southsidemusic]

We never use dither when recorded thru our SSL4000G+ or our outboard gear. I have never seen anyone here do that either and frankly we almost never used it when we run ITB so i doubt that you have to do anything to the sessions.

[JFreak]

You only need dither when you change bit depth

[AvidProToolsUser]

Two good articles on dither:
http://productionadvice.co.uk/when-to-dither/
http://productionadvice.co.uk/when-in-doubt-dither/

[amagras]

Thank you all, good read.

So, forgetting about analog hiss for a moment, what happens when I print or commit a track in Pro Tools? Should I dither? I always use 32 bit but some old sessions are still in 24 of course. I'm not clear on how Pro Tools handles that. There's an option to activate dither in preferences but no idea.

[Bob Olhsson]

Originally Posted by JFreak

You only need dither when you change bit depth

True but most people don't understand that even a .1 dB change in level kicks the bit depth up to infinity so in practice the only time not to dither is when you're cloning a file.

It's like this: dither adds 3 db. of noise you can hear through while not dithering adds 10 dB. of distortion that masks all low level detail and leads to crunchy "digital" sound. Those are the only two choices.

[jryser]

Originally Posted by AvidProToolsUser

Two good articles on dither:
http://productionadvice.co.uk/when-to-dither/
http://productionadvice.co.uk/when-in-doubt-dither/

Extremely helpful.



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