[duped]

People should prefer 48k over 44.1 but not for fidelity. It would just make the world a better place if 44.1k audio files died out. The reasons it was chosen are invalid today and we're stuck with it, and now every audio stack needs to be able to convert between 44.1/88.2 and 48/96 which is a solved problem, but has a tradeoff between fidelity and performance that makes resampling algorithms a critical design feature of those stacks.

All because Sony and Philips wanted 80 minutes of stereo audio on CDs decades ago.

[dfe]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCM_adaptor

It's very likely that the 44.1 kHz rate comes from the PCM adaptors that were designed to take PCM audio and convert it to something that a video tape recorder would accept.

I watched a YouTube a few months ago about these adaptors and the presenter did the calculations showing how the 44.1 kHz 16-bit sample rate lines up with the video fields. There was a valid engineering reason for this sampling rate.

However, the stories about one of the Sony executives having a particular piece of music in mind are true, and have to do with the diameter of the disk being enlarged compared to what Philips originally had in mind. By that time the bitrate was already decided.

I still agree that 48 kHz is a better choice today, especially after reading this paper.

[FabHK]

Beethoven's 9th.

> Kees Immink, Philips' chief engineer, who developed the CD, recalls that a commercial tug-of-war between the development partners, Sony and Philips, led to a settlement in a neutral 12-cm diameter format. The 1951 performance of the Ninth Symphony conducted by Furtwängler was brought forward as the perfect excuse for the change,[76][77] and was put forth in a Philips news release celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Compact Disc as the reason for the 74-minute length.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._9_(Beethoven)#Com...

[taejavu]

What _is_ the reason people should prefer 48k over 44.1k though?

[duped]

To avoid the required non-integer resampling in software, as everything but music has basically standardized on 48k, and most platforms default to it.

[TylerE]

All TV and computer audio runs at it, raise for TV/Film purposes 48000 is a very nice round number.

[TonyTrapp]

While audio equipment and algorithms don't care about nice-looking numbers, I think the actually useful property is that 48000 has more favorable prime factors 44100 which can be a useful property for resampling and other tasks.