What's the old male joke about size? Hmmmm, probably not worth repeating :)

We audiophiles are remarkably susceptible to bigger numbers. Take sample rates for example.

Upsampling can improve the sound, but it cannot restore information that was never recorded. A 44.1 kHz file already contains every frequency it can hold; creating more samples merely calculates new points between the existing ones.

Which sounds a bit like drawing extra mile markers and claiming the road got longer.

Except that playback is not only about the information in the file. It is also about what the DAC must do with it.

Every DAC reconstructs the original waveform from those samples. That requires filtering, and filters have consequences: phase behavior, ringing, timing errors, and computational noise. A good upsampling algorithm can move that work to a better filter and hand the conversion stage a signal it processes more gracefully.

The added samples are not new music.

They are a different route through the DAC.

That is why two mathematically correct methods can sound different even though neither has uncovered a hidden cymbal or invented another octave. One implementation may sound open and natural. Another may turn the same recording flat and aggressive.

So, does upsampling 44.1 kHz make sense?

Absolutely—when the new path through the converter sounds better than the old one.

Just don’t confuse a larger number with a longer road.