[pabbi1]

Try having a conversation about SACD with the folks you work with... it has been a very somber event in my experiences.

ESPECIALLY among the "I'm an audiophile 'cause I've got Bose"

crowd.

 

[soundboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jimmyjames8 That's what I had read somewhere else. I just spent about 30 minutes trying to find something official to quote from, but could not find anything. Sony's online music store shows 227 SACD's in catalog. Whether they are actually available or not is another story. Sony continues to release CDP/SACDP machines but I could not find any new releases of software titles and their SACD website says new releases are planned or pending but no dates given. Some Sony owned titles are starting to be released on SACD by MOFI. Another rumor I read said that would be the new avenue for Sony SACD releases, MOFI. There are plenty of other SACD releases on other labels, especially if you are into Classical music. New releases in SACD of jazz and rock that I am mainly interested in has dwindled down to a mere trickle if at all anymore. Sad. I have 4 SACD capable machines in my house.

Roger Water's opera "Ca Ira" is being released on multi-channel hybrid SACD at the end of this month. On 9/20, Joshua Bell's "Tchaikovsky: Violin Concerto, Op. 35" will also get a domestic release on multi-channel hybrid SACD. In Europe, Super Furry Animals' "Love Kraft" was just released on SACD. All from SonyBMG.

A couple of albums from SonyBMG has also been licensed out to MoFi for release on SACD.

Depeche Mode's next album, "Playing The Angel", has also been announced as a SACD release.

 

[AdamCalifornia]

Some Cds can sound great, e.g. "Is There Anybody There?

But basically CD is a DEAD END. Common, it's only a 16-bit resolution.

See you on the Non-CD

Side of the Moon

Adam

 

[Dusty Chalk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AdamCalifornia Dome Cds can sound great, but basically CD is a DEAD END!

You're assuming we've already gotten everything out of 16 bit that it has to offer, which is an incorrect assumption. The recent (redbook) Peter Gabriel and Rupert Hine remasters are excellent examples of superb CD mastering, and they only came out recently.

Most players don't even have the equivalent of a 16-bit noisefloor.

 

[AdamCalifornia]

Yes, excellent REMASTERING can cause MIRACLES!

But, wait a moment, you've GOT to come back to this nasty
16-bit resolution. PERIOD! You wish, you could stay at 24-bit resolution
all your life. There are other issues as well.

See you on the 24-bit

Side of the Moon

Adam

 

[Dusty Chalk]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AdamCalifornia Yes, excellent REMASTERING can cause MIRACLES! But, wait a moment, you've GOT to come back to this nasty 16-bit resolution. PERIOD! You wish, you could stay at 24-bit resolution all your life. There are other issues as well.

I know this. What I'm saying is, I don't think you've even heard 16-bit resolution, yet. JUST BECAUSE there are other issues. And I'm not talking source, cables, power cords, amplification, or headphones/speakers. I'm talking JUST AT THE MUSIC LEVEL. I don't think you've heard it. Once you've heard all it can do -- AND STILL THINK THERE'S ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT -- then you can start saying CD is a dead end. But 99% of the CD's that are out there don't fully utilize the CD's potential. L, some CD's that you've heard were mastered from MP3s!

 

[TheGhostWhoWalks]

 

[Illah]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cannedheat Wrong! Hybrid SACDs, which most new SACDs are, are playable in teh car, and on the computer, and can be ripped and stored on the iPod. DVD-A's are another issue.

Yeah, but the 'hybrid' part is just a regular CD, not a SACD (i.e. SACD & regular CD on one disc). Again, why not just get the regular CD? I almost went for some SACD's until I realized what it takes to play them. They're useless to me, and I'm pretty much an audiophile!

--Illah

 

[soundboy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dusty Chalk I know this. What I'm saying is, I don't think you've even heard 16-bit resolution, yet. JUST BECAUSE there are other issues. And I'm not talking source, cables, power cords, amplification, or headphones/speakers. I'm talking JUST AT THE MUSIC LEVEL. I don't think you've heard it. Once you've heard all it can do -- AND STILL THINK THERE'S ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT -- then you can start saying CD is a dead end. But 99% of the CD's that are out there don't fully utilize the CD's potential. L, some CD's that you've heard were mastered from MP3s!

I agree with this. If a CD is mastered for sound quality in mind, then I think it can sound very very good. However, and unfortunately, this is rarely the case.

 

[Kirosia]

Too many smileys, brain overloading . . . BSoD . . . .

I never got into sacds mainly because it's hard to find music I like on the format. Same with vinyl and whatnot. (although I'd love to try the old v' one of these days)

 

[Garbz]

Adam some of the finest music I've ever heard recorded comes of a 16bit disc. As for milking all out of this standard, what about SACD? That does have a higher bitrate and sounds fantastic. Current equipment even talking 5 digit players are only just as good as a CD. The source components like the DACs still have quite a bit to go.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Illah Yeah, but the 'hybrid' part is just a regular CD, not a SACD (i.e. SACD & regular CD on one disc). Again, why not just get the regular CD? I almost went for some SACD's until I realized what it takes to play them. They're useless to me, and I'm pretty much an audiophile!

Actually that's the point I was trying to make. The hybrid SACD has a regular Redbook CD on it. So why isn't the market absolutly saturated with SACDs? I mean even cheap SACD players are on the market. There's no reason to pick a normal CD over an SACD (unless the former was mastered better) if they are the same price. And when you talk about economies of scale they do work out to be only a few cents difference.

 

[Oliver :)]

Uhm, we live in a world where people happily buy that overly compressed & exited plastic pop album on a data-carrier not compliant with the CDDA standard and then rip it to 160kbps to listen to it over their pack-in earbuds and they say it sounds great. That is why you cannot buy SACD in brick & mortar much. And so what, what do you want? The High-Res revolution? It's not coming. People do as described above, or they steal even worse quality from the net. They download über-compressed movies in DIVX, burn them, and feel happy presenting them to you at "video night" which you spend counting the most distracting compression artifacts.

The mass consumer does not care about quality, they care about convenience and what the industry tells them to want.

Luckily this is the 21st century & you can have all the technological goodness of this world delivered to your doorstep. There is plenty SACD content available, and since it is niche you are likely to get good quality. SACD Hybrid is way less expensive than XRCD (which just has obscene pricing, I'm sorry. I won't even sample one since I might like what I hear, it is bad enough with MFSL SACDs) and offers high value due to the multiple formats on one disc which all conform to standards (not some Dual-Disc nonsense). So get online and order. General retail stopped caring about informed consumers with decent taste. Heck, you cannot even buy regular chocolate ice cream in some places. Xtrafancy Ch0c with Mogwa Juice Spread is available in high volume. Plain and simple? No go. So if they stop caring, stop giving them your money. Buy elsewhere. Why do I have to explain this to you if you made it to *this* place on your own?

 

[Oliver :)]

Quote:

Originally Posted by akwok ken36 #2!

Bwaaaaa!!!

 

[Oliver :)]

Quote:

Originally Posted by catachresis That Super Audio-thingy isn't natural and it doesn't say anything about it in the Bible. HDCD was good enough for my granddaddy and he had him twelve children and raised every one of them so nobody went hungry. They all used to gather round the Quad ESLs every night and listen to a MoFi pressing of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band's Will the Circle be Unbroken and sing.

RTFLOL!

 

[Oliver :)]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Garbz Actually that's the point I was trying to make. The hybrid SACD has a regular Redbook CD on it. So why isn't the market absolutly saturated with SACDs? I mean even cheap SACD players are on the market. There's no reason to pick a normal CD over an SACD (unless the former was mastered better) if they are the same price. And when you talk about economies of scale they do work out to be only a few cents difference.

No mass demand, but extra costs -> no go. You are talking about the music industry here, never forget about that.