Anyone recording at 192kHz?

[Rupert Limehouse]

Is anyone successfully recording high(ish) track counts in PT HD at 192kHz? I'm not interested in igniting a debate over the merits of high sample rates (although I'd recommend reading what Bob Katz has to say on the subject in 'Mastering Audio'), but rather just if you're managing to do it hassle free?

A little while ago I had a client in who insisted on tracking a rock band live at 192 because it sounded 'analogue'. Although we normally work at 44.1 or 96, we said we'd give it a go as we had done a basic test of a few tracks at 192 which was fine. It turned out to be a nightmare when we found we could record plenty of tracks (20+), but not get more than around 12 to play back without PT packing in. We tried all sorts of stuff including different types of drives, spreading across drives, changing buffers etc and cutting down the number of cards in the system, all to no avail. Time on the phone to Digi both in the UK and the States kind of left me with the impression that no-one was really doing this! (Or at least that the people I was speaking to had never tried it.)

The basics of my rig are:
PT HD5 Accel 7.4.2
Magma PE6R4 chassis
Apogee Rosetta 800 and AD16X with X-HD cards
Intel Mac Pro 2.8GHz 8 core, 12Gig RAM, OS 10.5

More details my setup here

I also posted this at GS where it was suggested that Digi say that track counts are significantly reduced when using a chassis, but the only thing I could find on the Digi site about this specifically said that my chassis is not affected. Someone else said that 3rd party interfaces (Apogee in my case) are well known for reducing track counts, although no-one so far has actually supported this with any first hand evidence! It may help/interest to know that I get the full track counts and more at sample rates up to 96k.

Thanks! (newb)

[mixer]

I know no one using 192.

[crizdee]

Hi,

You should have got a lot more than 12 tracks

I'll do a check later and see how many i can run at 192. basically it should be 1/4 of that of a 48k session!!

But 192 is probably very rare and not many people have real world regular experience with it.

Chris

[studiojimi]

Originally Posted by crizdee

Hi,

192 is probably very rare and not many people have real world regular experience with it.

Chris

i have recorded 2 classical guitar CD where just the guitar was recorded on 1 track

and a folk CD with 2 guitars

the sound was ridiculously good in my opinion

my waves worked for me in thost sessions

more than my dog can tell the difference

whether you can tell it when it get so the mp3 ha ha

is another thread in the making.

i thought a lot of guys do tape transfers to 192 before going lower

i thought i heard that a few years back . . . i dunno.

i usually use 88.2

[crizdee]

Hi,

Just opened a new 192 session and i could only get 36 voices @ 6x DSP

With a Magma PE6R4 chassis, but don't think that makes a difference.

So that would be a max of 36 mono audio tracks. i thought i would get 48

Chris

[Craig F]

I have used 192 a few times for recover of analog sources

I might use it for small arrangements (nothing more that a quartet)
a number of plugs don't work at 192 or they didn't last time I checked

[c-tone]

The most voices you can get at 192k is 36.

I used it to print mixes from an analog console when HD first came out, but I haven't seen anyone else use it.

[Grey]

used it a few times for solo guitar or piano or when cutting string parts
sounds really good but is cumbersome to deal with..ie...file size... conversions...archive..etc

i work mostly in 48k for post sound

does the buying public really notice??

[WernerF]

I know that the OP said that he didn't want to ignite a debate about the value of higher sample rates, but really, there's a heck of a lot of info out there that is the result of opinions offered by experts in the technical aspect of this technology that sample rates make no difference in the sound quality of the recording. They conclude that the bit rate and the quality of the converters is what matters. I only say this because it seems that a client who makes a ridiculous technical demand should be called on the absurdity of that request. We all should keep our, and our clients, priorities in order.

My two cents.....

[Rupert Limehouse]

Originally Posted by crizdee

Hi,

Just opened a new 192 session and i could only get 36 voices @ 6x DSP

With a Magma PE6R4 chassis, but don't think that makes a difference.

So that would be a max of 36 mono audio tracks. i thought i would get 48

Chris

Thanks - good to compare notes, although we also had no trouble opening the session with enough tracks, or even recording them, it was just playing back more than 12(ish) that caused problems.

WernerF - I'm not going to enter the 'does it sound better' debate, but I can't agree more that in this instance it would have been better to persuade the client to cut down to 96k, which would have also meant much better foldback provision (something we had explained to him beforehand - I won't bore you with the details here of why). And I'm sure the musicians would have performed better without all the stress that was flying around. However this was quite a big 'name' producer who didn't seem keen on changing his mind

Cheers,


Rupert.