As promised, I have started a thread on what I found out over the past month and a half of investigation.
To give you a little history, I had a DSP (Digital Signal Provider or Digital Content Provider) contact me saying the files we had submitted were not hi-rez. First thing I started doing was panic, thinking my equipment was to fault or I had forgotten to switch some settings in the DAW.
The files they were complaining about were solo instruments that we had mastered in DSD. I quickly went to the original file and did a spectral analysis and low and behold, I could not see anything above 18k. Well I knew this was solo instruments recorded at a lower amplitude, so I increased the gain and there it was… content above 30k. The DSP was using MusicScope software to analyze these files and I kept telling them my findings, but they were adamant that it was lower than CD quality!
I told them to check other files that we had sent them that were done on the very same day and they turned out to be true hi-rez files. Of course this was a big loud orchestra with brass instruments, so it was clearly visible on even the most rudimentary software.
The client wanted me to check to see if I got the same findings on all the files they had submitted. We had sent 2 sets of files to Naxos for distribution to 7 or 8 Content Providers, a DSD file and a 176.4 FLAC file. I downloaded 2 albums from each DSP from the US and EU in 176.4kHz FLAC. I was not prepared for what I found!
To begin with, I only checked the first track of each album to keep it simple. I ran a statistics and spectral analysis and this is what I found.
To give you a little history, I had a DSP (Digital Signal Provider or Digital Content Provider) contact me saying the files we had submitted were not hi-rez. First thing I started doing was panic, thinking my equipment was to fault or I had forgotten to switch some settings in the DAW.
The files they were complaining about were solo instruments that we had mastered in DSD. I quickly went to the original file and did a spectral analysis and low and behold, I could not see anything above 18k. Well I knew this was solo instruments recorded at a lower amplitude, so I increased the gain and there it was… content above 30k. The DSP was using MusicScope software to analyze these files and I kept telling them my findings, but they were adamant that it was lower than CD quality!
I told them to check other files that we had sent them that were done on the very same day and they turned out to be true hi-rez files. Of course this was a big loud orchestra with brass instruments, so it was clearly visible on even the most rudimentary software.
The client wanted me to check to see if I got the same findings on all the files they had submitted. We had sent 2 sets of files to Naxos for distribution to 7 or 8 Content Providers, a DSD file and a 176.4 FLAC file. I downloaded 2 albums from each DSP from the US and EU in 176.4kHz FLAC. I was not prepared for what I found!
To begin with, I only checked the first track of each album to keep it simple. I ran a statistics and spectral analysis and this is what I found.
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