I have been following the professional audio industry for 30 years and
there is hype, occasionally.  I read an interesting analysis about the
24-bit/96-kHz issue the other day (I just have to remember where) in
which it was pointed out that this "improvement" is not addressing one
of the main problems with converting between the digital and the analog
domain.  In order to work with a sample frequency of 44.1 or 48 kHz you
need a steep filter at around 20 kHz.  A steep filter gives you all
kinds of problems with impulse responses, delays, etc.  By using 96 KHz
you could employ a filter that is less steep, but unfortunately that is
not done according to the article, everything is just scaled up.  So you
have a bandwidth up to 40 Khz, but still a lousy filter.

Dynamic range is another issue.  There is a debate among digital
recorder manufacturers about 20 versus 24 bits.  The reason is simple,
and has to do with the thermal stability of your AD converters, in the
same way as there is a limit for audio (pre-)amplifiers, which can
achieve a S/N ration between 120 and 130 dB.  120 dB is around 20 bits,
24 would theoretically give you 144 dB, but you will never achieve that
in the analog domain, unless you remove the last DA stage.