1 bit or 24 bit recording?

[anthony]

My Pioneer PDR-04 standalone CD recorder collapsed and I decided not
to go with the quoted repair bill of $900 Australian (about $850
US) ..... a tad more than the unit cost about eight years ago.
I just picked up an as-new secondhand PDR-609 as a far more economic
replacement. Just one thing though -- the 04 unit said it used 1-bit
mastering for analog to digital conversion. This newer unit says it
uses 24-bit technology. Should there be any discernible difference? Is
this a cost-saving cutback or what? Interested if anyone has been able
compare these two models.

[Sonnova]

On Tue, 13 May 2008 08:02:23 -0700, anthony wrote
(in article <g0cah...@news3.newsguy.com>):

Both make 16-bit, 44.1KHz sample rate Redbook CDs. How they do it internally
is pretty much a matter of choice, and advertising their methodology as a
"feature" is merely marketing. In other words, all things being equal, there
should be no difference in the resultant CD.

[dpierce.ca...@gmail.com]

On May 13, 11:02 am, anthony <anthonyjhcnos...@netscape.net> wrote:
> Just one thing though -- the 04 unit said it used 1-bit
> mastering for analog to digital conversion. This newer unit says it
> uses 24-bit technology. Should there be any discernible difference?

If there is, it indicates that at least one of them is broken.

There is no intrinsic difference in the resulting output
if both are competently implemented, sometimes a
tall order in the realm of high-end audio, regretably.

[Walt]

anthony wrote:

> ... the 04 unit said it used 1-bit

> mastering for analog to digital conversion. This newer unit says it
> uses 24-bit technology. Should there be any discernible difference? Is
> this a cost-saving cutback or what? Interested if anyone has been able
> compare these two models.

My hunch is that the difference is more marketing than engineering. "1
bit" converters were all the rage about a decade ago. Then
"oversampling" became the next big thing. It's very possible that it
uses both 24-bit oversampling and 1 bit A to D converters.

Either way, you wind up with a 16 bit PCM 44.1k redbook standard CD.

The main thing to keep in mind is that AD and DA conversion is readily
quantifiable and it's relatively easy for the engineers to determine
whether it's being done "right" or not. As such, it's basically a
"solved" problem and any competent implementation should do it the same
as any other.

//Walt