Uniform quantization noise requires about 60 dB signal-to-noise to stay masked

Evidence

However, even if an adaptive quantizer is used, then, because of the uniform spectrum of the quantization noise, the overall noise becomes unmasked if the signalto-noise ratio falls below about 60 dB. This corresponds to 10 bits of quantizer precision. In order to do better, we need to arrange for the noise to be shaped so that it is less perceptible. — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 2665

Categorization

• QUESTION: The 60 dB / 10-bit threshold is a specific engineering figure — worth verifying how it maps onto modern lossy codecs like MP3 bitrate settings.
• XREF: This quantified masking threshold connects to the book’s larger theme of perceptual noise thresholds from earlier chapters. — connects to: Shaping quantization noise to sit 13 dB below the signal renders it inaudible; Quantization always injects noise that lowers audio signal-to-noise ratio — David Howard, Jamie Angus, coustics and Psychoacoustics, 2651; Loud-signal masking of weak signals enables bit-saving adaptive quantizers — David Howard, Jamie Angus, coustics and Psychoacoustics, 2657 (+1 more)
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 2665

Related

• Shaping quantization noise to sit 13 dB below the signal renders it inaudible (similarity 0.92)
• Masked audio components below the masking threshold need no bits transmitted (similarity 0.91)
• Quantization always injects noise that lowers audio signal-to-noise ratio (similarity 0.89)
• Loud-signal masking of weak signals enables bit-saving adaptive quantizers (similarity 0.89)
• Non-uniform quantizer spacing exploits masking and signal statistics to cut noise (similarity 0.87)
• Nonuniform quantizers reduce perceived noise by spacing levels of rare louder signals farther apart (similarity 0.86)
• Scale-factor precision trades quantizer utilization against side-information bit cost (similarity 0.85)
• Masked threshold rises once noise bandwidth exceeds the critical bandwidth (similarity 0.84)
• Uniform masking noise can substitute for threshold-in-quiet across all frequencies. (similarity 0.84)
• Quantization noise drops by 6 dB per added bit while hearing spans 130 dB (similarity 0.84)
• Each added quantization bit yields 6dB SNR improvement (similarity 0.83)
• Non-uniform quantization reduces audible noise by spacing levels by probability. (similarity 0.83)
• Psychoacoustic noise shaping achieves an effective 120 dB SNR on CD audio (similarity 0.83)
• Quantizer levels need not be powers of two when entropy coding is used (similarity 0.82)
• Digital noise can be shaped to hide where hearing is least sensitive (similarity 0.82)