User Manual

WAVELAB
Master Section 10 – 231
The Dithering pane
The Dithering pane allows you to add dithering to the signal before it’s sent
to the audio hardware or to a file on disk. You can choose between Wave-
Lab’s internal dithering algorithm, Apogee’s renowned UV22HR algorithm
or any external dithering plug-in of your choice. First, some theory:
What is dithering?
Dithering is a method for reducing quantization errors in digital record-
ings. In the case of WaveLab, dithering is applied when reducing the
number of bits in a recording, for example when moving from 24 to 16
bits, and when applying processing.
The theory behind this is that during low level passages, only a few bits
are used to represent the signal, which leads to quantization errors and
hence distortion. To the ear, this is perceived as “graininess” during low
level passages in a recording.
When “truncating bits”, as a result of moving from for example 24- to 16-
bit resolution, such quantization noise is added to an otherwise immacu-
late recording.
By adding a special kind of noise at an extremely low level, the quantization
errors are minimized. Indeed, the added noise can be perceived as a very
low-level quiescent hiss added to the recording. However, this is hardly
noticeable and much preferred to the distortion that otherwise occurs.
• The reason for the dithering block to be last in the Master Section is that
the output level must not be changed after dithering a signal.