Overal volume changes.. master fader / track inc

[E-an]

Ok so I was just sat thinking today that the mix I was working on was a little too quiet. And I probably thought a little too much but...

Is there any difference in sonic quality between pushing up the master fader by say 3dB and incrementing every original audio track by an amount that will cause the same increase?

Just wondering....

[Corey Shay]

There shouldn't be any difference. The nature of the TDM 48 bit mixer ensures this. Since there are plenty of bits down below the eventual 24 bit output, raising the master fader will simply shift the bits higher, but all values are preserved. In the end the 48 bit mix is truncated back to 24 bits. There was an extensive thread on this subject titled "ProTools Sound Quality" which sparked Digidesign to create a dithered mixer for test purposes. You should be able to download it from the site if you use a Mac.