44.1 vs 88.2 ABX report at AES Options

[2Bdecided]

Here:

http://www.aes.org/events/128/papers/?ID=2252

P18-6 Sampling Rate Discrimination: 44.1 kHz vs. 88.2 kHz—Amandine Pras, Catherine Guastavino, McGill University - Montreal, Quebec, Canada
It is currently common practice for sound engineers to record digital music using high-resolution formats, and then down sample the files to 44.1 kHz for commercial release. This study aims at investigating whether listeners can perceive differences between musical files recorded at 44.1 kHz and 88.2 kHz with the same analog chain and type of AD-converter. Sixteen expert listeners were asked to compare 3 versions (44.1 kHz, 88.2 kHz, and the 88.2 kHz version down-sampled to 44.1 kHz) of 5 musical excerpts in a blind ABX task. Overall, participants were able to discriminate between files recorded at 88.2 kHz and their 44.1 kHz down-sampled version. Furthermore, for the orchestral excerpt, they were able to discriminate between files recorded at 88.2 kHz and files recorded at 44.1 kHz.
Convention Paper 8101

Was anyone at the presentation? Has anyone bought the paper?

Cheers,
David.

[2Bdecided]

I think before you pull out one positive result and say it's interesting, you must go back to this post...
http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index....st&p=714650
...which shows how amazing it would be to have no positive results, considering how many different ways the results are combined.

I'm really not an expert, but it seems that the statistical analysis isn't sufficient.

Another way to make the paper more satisfactory would be to re-do the apparently "good" combinations in isolation, using a pre-defined number of trials. No picking and choosing in this "second round".

Cheers,
David.

This post has been edited by 2Bdecided: Aug 9 2010, 22:47