Apple and other digital retailers are planning to offer 24-bit audio to consumers. It should be an easy sell; recording studios use 24-bit, it’s how the music was mixed, and it’s how the consumers should hear it. Right? Wrong.

24-bit audio might be the staple of recording studios, but there’s a reason it should stay there. 24-bit has a really low “noise floor” — that hum you hear if you turn a silent amplifier up really high. With 16-bit, the noise floor is slightly higher. While that might be a problem in a studio where you’re boosting sounds to be clear and loud, it’s irrelevant to the end listener who is given the fully mastered and noise-free version already. Even CDs are 16-bit, and the sonic quality of a CD is an accepted definition of consumer-worthy HD quality.

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