A bit of text-based sparring. It's kind of fun eh?
E Q and other useless things. That was good.

Seeing as how I work in a studio pretty much every day of my life, I think we can talk about this from a somewhat mutual level of understanding. We're recording at 24 bit 44.1, and I have noticed no discernable difference between that and 24 96. I've never tried 196. I send my mixes to Nashville to be mastered because that is something I do not want to get into. I've invested enough time in the producing and mixing etc to then try to tackle the nuance of mastering.
The person I use to master is named Tom King, and he has told me that my mixes sound every bit as good, and sometimes better, than Nashville products he's got. And this is no slouch of a mastering engineer, I can promise.

He sends back 24 bit and regular CD quality masters for me. And try as I might, I cannot tell the difference. And that is real world experience. From my ears. So to my real world experience, 196k will do me no good but eat up hard drive.

Now I'll go join the ranks of Sherriff who's feeling bad 'cause Ed's pissed with him.