Was SACD a great idea doomed to failure by sheer bloody stupidity?

[Peter Galbavy]

It's nice to see companies/labels like the LSO making all their releases hybrid SACD. It must cost more to press the discs but I expect once you are set up for recording, mixing and mastering in DSD then it becomes a small incremental cost. In fact all their stuff seems to be cheaper in simple disc-for-disc terms to their notional competitors.

While I buy SACD and some DVDA when the fancy takes me, my "music room" is currently Redbook and vinyl only. I did look at the cheaper Sony SACD player (£150 or something) but I am worried that now I am spoilt by a Caiman for Redbook CD replay that the analogue out only low-end SACD player would actually sound worse. So, SACDs get the CD layer ripped as FLAC and the discs themselves gets occassional play in the 5.1 setup for the surround mix.

This is one of the things that goes against SACD and DVDA - the lack of an open digital output stream that can then be dealt with by the listeners specific equipment. While having DSD over HDMI in the later standards it still means you are at the mercy of the DAC in your AV processor.

[Stratmangler]

This is one of the things that goes against SACD and DVDA - the lack of an open digital output stream that can then be dealt with by the listeners specific equipment. While having DSD over HDMI in the later standards it still means you are at the mercy of the DAC in your AV processor.

DVD-Audio discs can be ripped on a PC.
You just need the appropriate program with which to rip the tracks.

Chris

[Peter Galbavy]

DVD-Audio discs can be ripped on a PC.
You just need the appropriate program with which to rip the tracks.

Yep, and once I have an SB Touch so that I can handle FLAC files > 24/48 I will do exactly this.

[twelvebears]

Just to butt-in slightly, the hoped for Depeche Mode bargain SACDS are not unfortunately, so it looks like they are out of production and that the older more popular albums like Violator, Black Celebration etc are going to cost me a packet.....

[Stratmangler]

Yep, and once I have an SB Touch so that I can handle FLAC files > 24/48 I will do exactly this.

Just google dvdaexplorer.

Chris

[Themis]

Yep, and once I have an SB Touch so that I can handle FLAC files > 24/48 I will do exactly this.

You probably mean 24/96...

[DSJR]

Who claimed that ? Not my findings at all...SACD played back on a good to great SACD player beats CD almost every time. My Marantz SA7 playing SACDs eats my Moon Andromeda playing the same CD. Now playing a CD, its the other way round. The Marantz is destroyed by the Moon Andromeda. I have yet to hear any SACD player better a dedicated CD player playing CDs (not heard the latest Wadias..I suspect they are fantastic on both). The SACD format sounds fantastic to my ears (and others)...DVD Audio did too (I have a Toshiba SD900-E and Pioneer 868-AVI for playing DVD Audio, also my MSB Link Dac decodes DVDA too. The Toshiba is fabulous imho on DVDA crap on CD except HDCDs, which it can decode).

I have owned 3 SACD players...Sony SCD777, Marantz SA11 and the Marantz SA7.

I suggest Dave you go listen to some SACD players playing SACDs and then compare similarly priced dedicated CD players playing the same CDs and then write what you just just have...I am pretty sure you won't. SACD will be better every time by a huge margin, or if the disc is less well mastered, then only slightly better; but still better. Those are my findings..9 out of 10 times.


Regards D S D L

Well, argue that with Linn!!!!! Like I said, this was their honest (?) opinion at the time and they should know, shouldn't they???

What exactly do you find better about SA-CD?


By the way, you supporters aren't using a "one player fits all" are you? The CD replay part will always be inferior because it has to be...

Anyway, CD, DVD-A and SACD are pretty much obsolete now as downloads take over slowly but surely......

Any audio on Blu-Ray?

[MartinT]

Well, argue that with Linn!!!!! Like I said, this was their honest (?) opinion at the time and they should know, shouldn't they???

You're joking, right?

By the way, you supporters aren't using a "one player fits all" are you? The CD replay part will always be inferior because it has to be...

Why? The Ayre C-5xe MP is a superb CD player. In what way is it inferior?

[Spectral Morn]

Well, argue that with Linn!!!!! Like I said, this was their honest (?) opinion at the time and they should know, shouldn't they???

What exactly do you find better about SA-CD?


By the way, you supporters aren't using a "one player fits all" are you? The CD replay part will always be inferior because it has to be...

Anyway, CD, DVD-A and SACD are pretty much obsolete now as downloads take over slowly but surely......

Any audio on Blu-Ray?

Hi Dave

If you had said Linn, and not by the way you typed implied you agreed with what the unknown they had said(maybe you do agree ? What players have you done comparisons with ?)...I would not have taken issue with you, in quite the way I did. However anything Linn says these days I would view as marketing spin. Linn say CD is finished, so we all agree....like hell we/I do. "We will never do CD..its crap"....yeah right, Linn did it when it suited them. So they are going down the multi-room server road, fine let them...and make no mistake embracing PC audio/servers is about multi-room, not quality 2 channel imho...for the most part.

Sick of hearing about bloody downloads.

SACD is more spacious, more natural, more dimensional, more like good analogue imho, it makes CD sound two dimensional imho.


Regards D S D L

[twelvebears]

You're joking, right?

Why? The Ayre C-5xe MP is a superb CD player. In what way is it inferior?

I think the point Dave was making is that the CD bit of an SACD player is inferior.

Just to respond to that, on my SCD777ES, yes as a stock machine the CD is not as good as it could be but that's something easily addressed by a decent DAC and/or some mods, which make it pretty damn great at both...