Changing WAV format without loosing quality

[Giammix]

Hi, everyone!
I'm new to this Forum, I've recently downloaded Audacity because I needed a free and complete audio edito
and people told me this was the best to start with.
I need to change the format of a .WAV file without loosing its quality... Is that possible? Whenever I try to
change the frequency (its kHz number) I always get slowed-down sounds with less quality. What I'm trying
to do is change a .WAV file with these settings:
PCM
44,100 kHz
32 Bit (float)
Mono

...into a file with these settings:
PCM
22,050 kHz
16 Bit
Mono

What should I do?
Thanks!

[kozikowski]

Click on the Project Sample Rate box at the lower left of the Audacity main window.

You know you're going to get significant quality degradation by changing those numbers down. It will sound softer and fuzzier without changing speed. 22050 will not do sparkling, crisp audio.

Koz

[steve]

22050 will not do sparkling, crisp audio.

The highest frequency that you can have at any particular sampling frequency is less than half of the sampling frequency. For example, at 22050Hz sampling frequency, the high frequency cut off will be below 11025Hz.
44.1kHz is considered to be the lowest sample rate that is usable for high quality audio.