Cakewalk Dithering - Can You Really Hear a Difference?

[Craig Anderton]

This is a subject that comes up a lot at workshops and seminars. Cakewalk offers five different types of dithering when you export - Rectangular, Triangular, and 3 different Pow-r types. Often, there's confusion about which type to use for different types of material, or whether even to use it at all.

 

 

So, I investigated dithering pretty deeply, and wrote an article that includes audio examples of a file exported as 16 bit undithered, 24 bit undithered, and with the three Pow-r dithering types, as well as Triangular dithering (which you'll never use after you hear the Pow-r versions).

To make the dithering audible, the audio examples are normalized to a level where you can hear the results of dithering very clearly. I hope this clears up some of the mystery around using dithering in Cakewalk! 

Edited June 13, 2020 by Craig Anderton

[mark skinner]

Thanks Craig ,  another Fantastic article , so much clearer now.  But , what if you are uploading a 24 or 32 bit file to a streaming service like Sound Cloud. If you add decent dithering is it retained by them or is it redundant if they apply their own dithering.  Thanks ..   mark

[Craig Anderton]

Most of these services accept 24-bit files, which have sufficient resolution that dithering isn't really needed. With FLAC files, the audio will come back the way you sent it. If the streaming service applies data compression, then all bets are off because that process affects the sound anyway.

Where dithering remains more relevant is with creating CDs, which are inherently 16-bit. Granted, the CD is on the wane as a format. Still, about 50,000,000 of them were sold in 2019, and they're still the main way to sell music at merch tables. So prepping audio for 16-bit reproduction still matters, and of course, Cakewalk lets you burn CDs

Edited June 14, 2020 by Craig Anderton