Playing Blu Ray audio discs

[dave2010]

Over the last few years some Blu Ray audio discs have been released, and apparently they sound very good. The latest that I know of is a reissue of Karajan's 1960s Beethoven symphony series - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sinfonien-Blu-Ray-Audio-Karajan-Herbert/dp/B01D2FIN1C/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1468623604&sr=8-3&keywords=Karajan+beethoven+Blu+Ray

I have been tempted to buy this, but I thought I'd check that I could play it. I suspect that my Blu Ray player, which dates from around 2009 can barely do this, or if it can, the sound would be crippled.

Do others here use Blu Ray players to play Blu Ray audio discs? The best results would appear to be to use an external DAC or external AV amp. Some guidance on this might be appreciated. Allegedly a cheapish Blu Ray player will perhaps be good enough, but the outputs need to be fed to more up market kit in order to maintain audio quality.

[struth]

Think the way of extracting the audio signal from the hdmi output and then feeding it to a suitable external dac is the best way, or so i am told. I could be wrong though :lol:
I dont bother tbh with anything past red book tbh although I have some sacd's.

[Macca]

The sound quality advantage will be in the mastering so your old BD player should play the disc fine and you should get the benefit.

In my experience the quality of the transport makes a difference (although precisely why is a subject for debate) and there is no reason why a BD player should be better or worse as a transport solely because it is a BD player.

I have a budget Samsung BDP and have tried it as a transport (with CD) and it was inferior to a couple of other units (CD and DVD players) through the same DAC. But I doubt that has anything to do with the fact that it is a Blu-ray player.

[WAD62]

You should also have a toslink optical out, most blue ray players have this feature...

Just plug that in the back of your DAC

[PaulStewart]

I use my RA-modded OPPO BDP for all silver disc duties these days and the audio quality is really good with great detail and very little of the "glassy-ness" of many digital system. On the OPPO you have a pure audio option, which shuts down the video system and even the display and that gives even better results. It has RCA outputs for stereo audio, as well as a plethora of other options. That said, I have a cheap LG BDP with the TV and that plays audio BDs into the sound bar, via the TV and HDMI and this set up sounds pretty good to.

[m10]

There is a fly in the ointment here -- thanks to industry nervousness/paranoia about copying, toslink and coax S/PDIF outputs on all blu-Ray players are limited to 16-bit and 48kHz. The options to access high-res from BD-Audio are (as far as I can see):

1. Some kind of chipped player that bypasses the copy protection and outputs 24/96 from optical and coax digital outputs (don't know how available this sort of thing is)

2. Any old blu-Ray player (really, any) connected over HDMI to a suitable processor/Pré-amp or AV integrated/receiver (the best are capable of serious audiophile performance IMO)

3. A high end (or at least a nice) player (Oppo, Cambridge, Arcam etc.) that has nice DACs built in

4. An HDMI to S/PDIF converter - there's quite a few of these on Amazon, can't attest to their performance

Personally I'm in camp no.2. I don't have a lot of BD-audio, but I have a small but significant classical selection on SACD. One issue I do have on blu-ray which I think is excellent is the Carlos Kleiber orchestral box-set on Deutsche Grammophon. Very well done, and the albums are in 5.0 as well as stereo.

[WAD62]

There is a fly in the ointment here -- thanks to industry nervousness/paranoia about copying, toslink and coax S/PDIF outputs on all blu-Ray players are limited to 16-bit and 48kHz.


Point noted, do you know if that restriction also applies to the digital outputs from a TV ?

[Clive197]

Not all Blu-ray Discs output HD quality, so be careful.

I own a OPPO BDP-105D which is connected my Cyrus DACXP Signature via both analogue and digital connections, and it's also connected to my TV over HDMI. When I play BluRay audio over s/pdif I can only get 16/48. When played via the analogue output which allow the OPPO's 32bit DAC to do the work, according to the TV (HDMI) I'm still only getting 48k. Am I missing something?

[WAD62]

Not all Blu-ray Discs output HD quality, so be careful.

I own a OPPO BDP-105D which is connected my Cyrus DACXP Signature via both analogue and digital connections, and it's also connected to my TV over HDMI. When I play BluRay audio over s/pdif I can only get 16/48. When played via the analogue output which allow the OPPO's 32bit DAC to do the work, according to the TV (HDMI) I'm still only getting 48k. Am I missing something?

Where does your analogue output connect to?

I presume the TV is only showing the digital spec of the audio signal carried by your HDMI cable, do you listen to your TV speakers or an AV system?

[m10]

Point noted, do you know if that restriction also applies to the digital outputs from a TV ?

Good question, that I don't know the answer to. I can't imagine they'd let hi-res out this way via a loop-hole. I'll do some googling.

[m10]

Not all Blu-ray Discs output HD quality, so be careful.

I own a OPPO BDP-105D which is connected my Cyrus DACXP Signature via both analogue and digital connections, and it's also connected to my TV over HDMI. When I play BluRay audio over s/pdif I can only get 16/48. When played via the analogue output which allow the OPPO's 32bit DAC to do the work, according to the TV (HDMI) I'm still only getting 48k. Am I missing something?

This sounds like a question for Oppo customer services - they have an excellent team who will answer questions like this one through their website. Thoughts -

1. The TV may not be able to handle high-res, so it is down sampling to 48k.
2. The player may be doing this because the TV is telling it that it can't handle 96k.
3. This may, or may not, have a bearing on what the player's DACs are doing

The Oppo manual may shed some light on the machine's behaviour here.

[WAD62]

Good question, that I don't know the answer to. I can't imagine they'd let hi-res out this way via a loop-hole. I'll do some googling.

Did a bit of a test, setting my sky box HDMI out to 'Dolby D', the TV's toslink out to my AV receiver was silent, setting it back to stereo I'm back to stereo sound, probably 16/48...I suppose all I can derive from that is that it's not 'pass through' to the digital out on my TV...FYI A Panasonic TX55CX802

The equivalent toslink output from my sky box to AV processor is 'Dolby Digital' 24/48...iFYI t's an old Yamaha DSP800E so doesn't do 96K

[Macca]

The recording in question is from 1963 so they were unlikely to have (read: didn't) any mics able to pick up beyond 22 KHz and no recording equipment capable of recording beyond about 20Khz so the only possible benefit of having this recording on Blu-ray is if it is an improved mastering. Therefore it won't make a jot of difference if you are listening to it in 16/48, you'll still get the benefit of the improved master.

[coolblue]

For the bluray audio, I use kanex pro audio extractor with my oppo 103 to beresford caiman dac. I use optical input. It works fine.