SACD Player - Page 2

The latest Rockbox application in an old IPod sounds darn good with 16 bit. There is no support for any higher resolution but somehow the basic sound of the program as well as the volume increase does the trick. I feel the technology is around but due to cost vs profit we should not expect a Sony or other major player come to the 24/96 court anytime soon. I could be wrong? The chips to make this stuff are coming down in price so let us see. The future is bright!

 

You're absolutely right in regards to bad marketing - some cheaper Sony Universal Players that do play SACD, don't even list it as a compatible format. But Super-Audio discs are actually more expensive to record and manufacture because of the surround layer, which is obviously useless for headphone listening. Regardless, just go to http://www.ps3sacd.com/sacd_bd_players.html for a complete list of SACD compatible universal players, in all price ranges. The list does not include though any SACD-only players from Marantz, Esoteric, Luxman, Denon, EMM Labs, Cary and many others.
 

 

 

Edited by Arnaldo - 4/30/11 at 6:50am

SACD has taken over the role of reel-to-reel. Not mainstream by any means, but profitable enough to survive. Though I love vinyl, I find SACD more practical and I'm a huge fan of classical and jazz.

I might get myself in trouble here, but I've been trending digital for about a year. Used CDs are turning up for $1-$2 and I try to buy one new SACD each week. Good used vinyl is getting harder to find as it becomes trendier, too. New vinyl prices are often more than SACD, too. I'll keep the turntable, but I've been playing more silver discs recently.

As for SACD players, I've been hugely happy with the Marantz SA8001 I've had for several years. Its measurements are impeccable and it sounds wonderful. Used ones have been turning up in the $400 range. There are several other Marantz models, too. I'd buy any of them, but will keep the SA8001 until it dies. If it ain't broke...

Speaking of portables, there was some noise about the Korg portable recorder awhile back. It does hi-rez. I've been tempted to buy one, but have held off so far. If you want portable hi-rez, it might be worth looking into.

SACD's role as a niche market may actually guarantee its survival past that of RBCD. While the general buying public is slowly abandoning RBCDs in favor of downloads, the audiophile/classical crowd will probably stick around with physical formats such as SACD for the foreseeable future. Anyway, I've been trying as well to keep using my Sony SCD-XA5400ES SACD player until it dies, although I'm always in of fear of getting infected with the upgrade-bug that's been going around...

 

 

Edited by Arnaldo - 5/3/11 at 9:53am

I completely agree. There's a particular fetish for physical media. RBCD, cassette, and many other formats are completely ignored.

But vinyl has something special about it. I like to think SACD is similar. People compete over rare OOP SACDs on eBay and I really like those cases with the rounded corners. Like vinyl, I get excited when certain pressings come out and feel compelled to buy them because it might be my last chance to get one at a reasonable price.

Though I'm not a fan of encryption, I think that it has something to do with SACD's success. It limits availability, so people go after them the way they do with vinyl. Probably not what Sony intended, but the constraint keeps the market alive.

The only downfall I see is if 24/96 files become a more mainstream product. If I could download (legally, of course) hi-rez and feed it through a music server into a nice DAC, it'd be tempting.

Truly portable hi-res (meaning battery power & fits in less than two hands) has few solutions & none close to perfect at this point, imo. Pro-type portable recorders capable of 24/96 are in the middle pricerange, but suffer from less-than-stellar UI's for music playback & limited to WAV files. Apple lossless players have potential, but seems limited to the Touch/iPad & 3rd-party developers. Players that use the FLAC format container are probably farther along than the others, but true hi-rez playback (including full 24/96 analog output) is limited to the HiFiMan 801, I believe.

 

They say you have to suffer for beauty. I guess this includes beautiful music.

Though the X3 is supposed to be able to play high-res FLAC files, so that could be interesting.  Digital S/PDIF output too.