[Mr.Radar]

The disc that comes with the Benchmark DAC1 (IIRC) is only a DVD-V disc with a 24/96 PCM audio track (because almost all DVD-A players don't allow digital output from DVD-A discs for copy protection reasons).

 

[Welly Wu]

DVD-Audio cannot be decrypted and de-compressed. Furthermore, it can only work using very limited and specific hardware/software products. Why not consider getting an inexpensive (< $100 USD) DVD-Audio/Video player instead of trying to frustrate yourself over using it on your computers? DVD-Audio was not meant to be used on personal computers.

 

[Glassman]

yes, there is currently no way of playing DVD-A on computer except for Creative Audigy2 cards which are such crap that playing DVD-A on them is of no help.. get yourself Panasonic S75 DVD-V/DVD-A player, according to reviews this is one amazingly good player and I'm sure you will find it for under $150..

the only way to play DVD-A is opening some stand-alone DVD-A player, taking data from it's DAC's serial digital inputs, hooking up digital transmitter there and record it using computer's digital inputs, this way I'm going personally..

 

[roadtonowhere08]

Be sure to post pics, that should be interesting...
You and that guy from Norway should team up to do a little "patching" so we can rip DVD-Audio to our computers. Personally, I am really starting to loose hope for either DVD-Audio or SACD. Copyright protection, my butt.

 

[PYROTAK]

windvd is seriously a super buggy dvd player lol.

not that that has anything to do with the playback of dvda discs.

 

[Stephonovich]

Yes, DVD-A (and SACD) use watermarking technology. Without the watermark, it won't play. And, suprise suprise, burners can't replicate it. The company that does these is called Verance. Read their FAQ here. Explains quite a bit.

Anyway, it's just a matter of time before someone breaks it, or finds a way around it. They always do. It's just that right now, high-rez media is rather a niche market. Not enough hackers (I mean that in a good way, not the spin the media puts on it) working on it currently.

(-:Stephonovich

 

[richx]

Computer DVD-ROM drives aren't even aware of the high resolution SACD layer, let alone read it. However, DVD-A may be possible to rip in the future ... but right now I'm curious to see if anyone with a Prodigy 7.1 can get a bit-perfect DVD-A copy using the DirectWire™ function?

 

[Jasper994]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Budley007 A standard player will indicate DVD-A and then run DTS or Dolby Digital to digital outputs and "true" DVD-A resolution only to the analog outputs. I think this is how WinDVD works, but again, I haven't tested the output resolution on the Toslink or Coax to say otherwise. It would seem an external DAC would tell you right away, but alas, I don't own one yet.

Actually that's not exactly accurate. If you're reading the DVD-A layer, thus having the DVD-A indicator on, you are actually working with the hi-rez data. What happens though, is that the software is downmixing to output digitally at 16/48 as per the DVD-A standard.

To the best of my knowledge, the only way to currently rip a DVD-A is to get a DVD-A player with a very good set of DAC's and run the analog outputs into a soundcard with very high quality ADC's and record it. I mean, any DVD-A player and would work and you could use any soundcard that could record at the bit depth and sample rate of the DVD-A but quality will suffer if you're not using really good gear.

Oh, hehehe Glassman beat me to it... oops.

 

[roadtonowhere08]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jasper994 Actually that's not exactly accurate. If you're reading the DVD-A layer, thus having the DVD-A indicator on, you are actually working with the hi-rez data. What happens though, is that the software is downmixing to output digitally at 16/48 as per the DVD-A standard. To the best of my knowledge, the only way to currently rip a DVD-A is to get a DVD-A player with a very good set of DAC's and run the analog outputs into a soundcard with very high quality ADC's and record it. I mean, any DVD-A player and would work and you could use any soundcard that could record at the bit depth and sample rate of the DVD-A but quality will suffer if you're not using really good gear. Oh, hehehe Glassman beat me to it... oops.

In addition, multi-channel DVD-Audio would require a card with multiple professional ADC's... what a pain. There are so few QUALITY titles in DVD-Audio (excluding classical ones, in which there are many titles that are NOT protected from what I heard) that it is not even worth it, IMO. I pretty much gave up on DVD-Audio since I would rather have excellent 2 channel music than average 5.1 surround. I heard that the E-MU will be able to output 96/192khz WDM audio with the next driver update. NOW the race is on to crack DVD-Audio using software. At least I will be able to reap hi-rez 2 channel audio if a "patch" is released.

 

[Budley007]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jasper994 Actually that's not exactly accurate. If you're reading the DVD-A layer, thus having the DVD-A indicator on, you are actually working with the hi-rez data. What happens though, is that the software is downmixing to output digitally at 16/48 as per the DVD-A standard. To the best of my knowledge, the only way to currently rip a DVD-A is to get a DVD-A player with a very good set of DAC's and run the analog outputs into a soundcard with very high quality ADC's and record it. I mean, any DVD-A player and would work and you could use any soundcard that could record at the bit depth and sample rate of the DVD-A but quality will suffer if you're not using really good gear. Oh, hehehe Glassman beat me to it... oops.

Me stands corrected. soz

That would make more sense with the downward compatibility for standard DVD players. Good call.

 

[Elec]

I think it's a bit cynical to suggest that the Audigy2 is utter crap and not worthy of DVD-Audio. I wouldn't build a DVD-Audio system around one but if you already have an Audigy2 and want to use it for DVD-A titles, why the hell not? On mine, DVD-Audio does sound noticeably better than redbook, although I'm sure it's not near the full quality you'd achieve with an expensive standalone DVD-Audio capable player.

The recording industry has been very careful with the hi-rez formats in regards to digital output. The reason is that if they allowed unhindered digital output, they'd basically be giving you a studio master to do with as you please. Which is something they desperately want to avoid. Anyway, for the lazy/determined among us, nearly every DVD-A title has identical content in Dolby Digital on the video layer/side. Which means you can bust out your favorite ripper on the .vob files, demux and decode the audio, and go to town. It won't be full DVD-A quality, but it should be at least as good as redbook in case you want to do something silly like listen to music you purchased in your car which doesn't have a DVD-Audio player.

 

[commando]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AnimeEd but is DVD-A rip-able?

Anything that ends up analog can be copied. Direct ripping might be a little harder though.

 

[NightWoundsTime]

As with the person who said their M-Audio Revo showed 96khz output, my Terratec will play the higher quality audio. The control panel switches from 48000 to 96000 as I change the option on WinDVD for the higher quality conversion.

As I've opined before at Hydrogenaudio, WinDVD claims that ONLY the creative audigy card will work because it's the only readily available "consumer" card that does high resolution audio. The Terratec, Revo and such are pro cards and not something the general public will purchase. With WinDVD I believe the high resolution option will work with any card able to receive the signal.

Just my opinion, I could be wrong. At Hydrogen they wanted me to do all these rediculous tests to prove my theory and I told them that I could hear the difference and that's all I cared about.

 

[roadtonowhere08]

Quote:

Originally Posted by NightWoundsTime As with the person who said their M-Audio Revo showed 96khz output, my Terratec will play the higher quality audio. The control panel switches from 48000 to 96000 as I change the option on WinDVD for the higher quality conversion. As I've opined before at Hydrogenaudio, WinDVD claims that ONLY the creative audigy card will work because it's the only readily available "consumer" card that does high resolution audio. The Terratec, Revo and such are pro cards and not something the general public will purchase. With WinDVD I believe the high resolution option will work with any card able to receive the signal. Just my opinion, I could be wrong. At Hydrogen they wanted me to do all these rediculous tests to prove my theory and I told them that I could hear the difference and that's all I cared about.

That is because the DVD you were playing was not protected, so the resolution was not downsampled. I could be wrong, but that is what it sounds like. I have a few un-flagged DVD's and they play just fine, some of the more commercial ones are flagged and downsampled.

 

[breez]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elec nearly every DVD-A title has identical content in Dolby Digital on the video layer/side. Which means you can bust out your favorite ripper on the .vob files, demux and decode the audio, and go to town. It won't be full DVD-A quality, but it should be at least as good as redbook in case you want to do something silly like listen to music you purchased in your car which doesn't have a DVD-Audio player.

I wouldn't be so sure of the "at least as good". Dolby Digital is lossy compression vs. lossless Redbook CD-Audio.