[akart]

Yes, this thread about the same point. There is no doubt that SACD stores more information about the recording than the CD does - so, yes, no doubt the SACD is superior. There is no doubt in my mind about this. The reason why I started this thread is because I was thinking about getting the Music Hall 35.2 CD/HDCD player, and I started doing a bunch of research on HDCD. I think consensus seems to be that even though the differences are not audible (if mastered exactly the same way), HDCD/SACD is better because they are mastered better - which is a very fair point.
 
PS: I did not know you could not rip SACD ... But I think you can rip HDCD (not sure though).
 
This is probably not a question for the sound science forum (?), but are more titles available in HDCD or SACD ? And are HDCDs mastered with better SQ or are SACDs (generally speaking) ?
 
Thank you very much,
akart
 
Quote:

akart, my understanding is that SACD really is superior to Red Book. The contentious part is whether or not a human can distinguish the two.

That doesn't bother me too much. For me, SACD is sort of a guarantee that the disc was mastered by someone who knows what they're doing and that the disc isn't brickwalled. I have a few that are a little hot, but nothing as bad as what is on a lot of CDs. If it costs me a few dollars extra to get a great disc, I'll pay up.

My biggest gripe is that we cannot (yet) rip the hi-rez layer. I'm planning a move to a music server for Red Book (too many discs

), but will need to keep a rack out for SACD. I'd love to put all the discs in storage and be able to feed SACD to a DAC.

 

[akart]

Also, while playing an SACD, can we get a digital out? I guess there's an internal DSD-to-PCM converter or something like that, since as far as I know an unencrypted DSD bitstream is not allowed out of the player according to the standard ... If not, it would basically render an external DAC useless since one would have to used the analog outs.
 
Wonder what's the fidelity of the DSD-to-PCM conversion, and if any quality is lost in the process.

 

[logwed]

Quote:

Yes, this thread about the same point. There is no doubt that SACD stores more information about the recording than the CD does - so, yes, no doubt the SACD is superior. There is no doubt in my mind about this. The reason why I started this thread is because I was thinking about getting the Music Hall 35.2 CD/HDCD player, and I started doing a bunch of research on HDCD. I think consensus seems to be that even though the differences are not audible (if mastered exactly the same way), HDCD/SACD is better because they are mastered better - which is a very fair point.
 
PS: I did not know you could not rip SACD ... But I think you can rip HDCD (not sure though).
 

Yes, you can. As far as digital-out for SACD, I think that I've read that there are some very high-end players that can output digitally from SACD, but they are few and far between.

 

[akart]

On doing more research, I found that on most players when you play SACDs the output can be obtained on the digital out, however this will be in PCM format. I believe only players from Oppo (like the OPPO BDP-93 Blu-ray Player)  offer a choice of whether to output a DSD bitstream or a PCM bitstream (which puzzles me because unencrypted DSD bitstreams are not allowed outside the player according to the standard).
 
Most players therefore use a DSD to PCM conversion when putting out a digital signal. Which brings up the question: Does this conversion affect sound quality, since there is no direct equivalence between DSD and PCM and neither is there a standard for doing this, and therefore the conversion is implementation dependent.
 
Methinks you would destroy the benefits of SACD mastering if one used a crappy DSD to PCM conversion chip. Moreover DSD to PCM conversion is lossy.
 
Quote:

Quote:

Yes, this thread about the same point. There is no doubt that SACD stores more information about the recording than the CD does - so, yes, no doubt the SACD is superior. There is no doubt in my mind about this. The reason why I started this thread is because I was thinking about getting the Music Hall 35.2 CD/HDCD player, and I started doing a bunch of research on HDCD. I think consensus seems to be that even though the differences are not audible (if mastered exactly the same way), HDCD/SACD is better because they are mastered better - which is a very fair point.
 
PS: I did not know you could not rip SACD ... But I think you can rip HDCD (not sure though).
 

Yes, you can. As far as digital-out for SACD, I think that I've read that there are some very high-end players that can output digitally from SACD, but they are few and far between.

 

[c61746961]

I wonder how many of these improved masters were not produced from PCM audio...

 

[xnor]

Quote:

I wonder how many of these improved masters were not produced from PCM audio...

This makes me 

 

[9pintube]

NO CAN DO.........SACD's are Encrypted.......they don't "Do Digital Out"..................Unless that has changed since last week....

 

[Ham Sandwich]

Quote:

Yes, this thread about the same point. There is no doubt that SACD stores more information about the recording than the CD does - so, yes, no doubt the SACD is superior. There is no doubt in my mind about this. The reason why I started this thread is because I was thinking about getting the Music Hall 35.2 CD/HDCD player, and I started doing a bunch of research on HDCD. I think consensus seems to be that even though the differences are not audible (if mastered exactly the same way), HDCD/SACD is better because they are mastered better - which is a very fair point.
 
PS: I did not know you could not rip SACD ... But I think you can rip HDCD (not sure though).
 

 
You can rip HDCD.  It's just redbook CD with magic dithering that masquerades as data that the HDCD DAC is able to decode as special instructions to apply special filtering or processing.  When played back on a normal CD player the dithered codes are just played back as normal CD audio.  When played back on an HDCD player the dithered codes get processed.
 
Part of me would like to get an HDCD DAC.  I like Grateful Dead and a number of their albums are HDCD encoded.  And I've got other HDCD encoded albums.  The problem though is that an HDCD DAC wouldn't work for me the way I currently do digital audio.  All my digital audio is through the computer and I EQ.  HDCD decoding won't work unless the playback is perfectly bit perfect to the DAC.  Digital EQing messes that up, the magic HDCD dither is altered.  So if I wanted HDCD decoding goodness I wouldn't be able to EQ.
 
However you can do software decoding of HDCD.  Part of the HDCD format has been reverse engineered.  The software decoding only does part of the spec but better than nothing.
 
There's three things that HDCD processing can do:
Peak extend: this gives more dynamic range, extending the peaks.  The software decoding can decode this part of HDCD.
Transient filters: I'm not sure what this is supposed to do.  I presume that it allows different filters to be applied to specific sections of the music.  Software decoding cannot decode this part of HDCD.
Gain: Just gain processing.  Software decoding can decode this part of HDCD.
 
Not all HDCD discs do all three forms of processing.  Some do peak extend, some do not.  Some do the special transient filters and some do not.  Some do gain and some do not.
 
What I do for HDCD is rip with EAC to a CUE file and use CUETools to do the software decoding.  dBpoweramp is also able to decode HDCD during a rip but I like CUETools better.  There's also a Foobar plugin that will decode lossless tracks that have HDCD encoding if you want to do the decoding during playback.
 
CUETools tells you what HDCD features were detected.  Peak extend is the only one beneficial for software decoding.  So if a disc has the peak extend I do the software decoding and end up with a 24-bit FLAC.  If a disc doesn't have peak extend I just leave it as regular CD audio.
 
Getting the peaks back after HDCD decoding is neat.  It's a case where the regular CD playback has been compromised and the only way to uncompromise it is to do the HDCD decoding.  If you listen to a "peak extend" processed HDCD on a regular CD player or regular DAC you are missing out.
 
The other part of me is frustrated by all that.  They intentionally squashed the peaks for the regular CD playback.  There is no need for that.  Standard CD audio has enough dynamic range that they don't need to do that.  The mastering engineer made the decision to compromise the audio quality for those who only have a regular CD player or regular DAC.  Most people are going to listen to a HDCD disc on a normal DAC.  Why would they make a decision to make the audio worse for the majority of the people?  So the majority of listeners will end up with a bit of extra dynamics compression that didn't need to be there.  Bastards.
 
 

 

[MrGreen]

It's not a marketing gimmick. It's a technically superior medium. Whether there is an audible difference or not depends on the information. If, for example, the infamous overture that shall remain unnamed is pressed onto a redbook after compression, mastering etc (and probably still some clipping for the cannon fire) and is then copied onto SACD/whatever and sold. Yes, there's obviously no audible difference. However, if a master is done with a dynamic range superior to CD, etc, then there's going to be a difference between the two. For example- if you have a video game for the Xbox 360 and port it directly to the PC with no change. It's going to be exactly the same. If, however, you make it for the pc and then reduce the quality for the 360, then it's going to be different.
 
I would say that, like the PC, there's going to be a larger amount of technically superior pressings for SACD than there are for redbook. However, like the PC, there's going to be a lot of "remasters" that are just overdone/touched up redbook pressings. You see it with vinyl today as well - there are plenty of direct pressings to vinyl from redbook, sometimes with disastrous results because of hte limitations of vinyl.
 
However, the medium CAN be used as a marketing gimmick. Just like "True HD"

 

[Sparky14]

My friend and I did a blind test of SACD, HDCD, and gold CD a few years back. It wasn't a super whamadine published-on-Wikipedia double blind scientific test, so you'll forgive me.
 
We had the standard redbook version of each disc as well, so we set up identical Sony players (mass market DVD players) playing through the same Proceed pre-amp and amp.
 
SACDs: DSOTM, Aimee Mann's Bachelor #2 and Lost In Space, Gershwin Rhapsody in Blue
We each picked 3/4 SACDs right, and only one (LIS) was not readily distinguishable.
 
HDCD: Mannheim Steamroller Fresh Aire II and V, Blue Man Group Audio, Bee Gees For The Record. My friend got these right 4/4, me 3/4.
 
Gold MoFi CD: Tears For Fears Songs From The Big Chair: We couldn't tell the difference.
 
Interesting to note, we also played what we could on my friends Proceed CDP. It improved everything, especially HDCD playback...so I suspect a high-quality SACD player would be even more revealing.
 
IMO, the SACD/HDCD/DVD-A formats are an improvement, but you need a real hi-fi system to make those differences apparent. Is it worth it to you? For me, in some cases it is...I'll gladly pay for the best possible recordings of my favorites.

 

[Dynobot]

Marketing gimmicks?
 
Sure, as much as the CD itself is/was nothing more than a marketing gimmick.  Perfect music forever, yeah right.  The CD itself has a shelf life and the music is hardly perfect, but what it DID do was decrease cost and increase profit.  Much the same as SACD, HDCD etc.  The first business of any business is to make money.

 

[D. Lundberg]

Quote:

However, if a master is done with a dynamic range superior to CD, etc, then there's going to be a difference between the two.

Yes, but that is a hypothetical situation. I don't believe there are any commercially available recordings with that kind of dynamic range.
And even if there were, they would be completetly useless for most consumers.
 
But, should you need it, you can use noise shaping to extend the dynamic range of a 16bit system at critical frequencies.

 

[davide256]

I have CD's, SACD's and HDCD's. If you can't hear the difference, my sympathy, you need to start shopping for a better system.
 
It is a fact that the SACD industry is a ripoff because they have made it impossible to get  digital out to a DAC other than thru HDMI.  Their little walled garden is likely to come tumbling down with online 96/24 music. No known way to get SACD ripped on to a PC
 
HDCD is basically 20 bit music . Can actually sound quirky on a regular CD player without HDCD decoding. Foobar2000 and the HDCD plugin is nice. DbPoweramp allows you to rip as 20 bit.

 

[Shike]

SACD isn't a gimmick, the question to be a more "is it necessary?" than anything else.
 
IMO, it probably isn't necessary itself.  Unfortunately, it's the only medium besides DVD-A and Vinyl that audio engineers seem to give a crap about.  So odds are when you measure the output from an average CD and its SACD counter-part the waveform will be different, usually with decibel peaks great enough to easily discern them in a DBT.
 
So basically, the mediums themselves cannot be discerned as earlier studies show.  The material on them however can.
 
Unfortunately the copy protection on them would drive me up the wall - I want a digital collection and not have to flip out discs constantly.  This is why my turntable sits unused the majority of the time unless I'm really wanting that extra dynamic range for the recording (and even then I pray I don't have a bad pressing, looking at you Mr. Reznor with your Slip).
 
The only real option then is to do an analog recording on PC, but that takes a lot more time, effort, and quality recording equipment than most of us want to pursue I imagine.

 

[soundboy]

Quote:

Also, while playing an SACD, can we get a digital out?

Yes, you can get digital out from SACD.  But only through HDMI v.1.2 or above outputs.
 


Quote:

As far as digital-out for SACD, I think that I've read that there are some very high-end players that can output digitally from SACD, but they are few and far between.

Almost all of Sony's current single-disc Blu-ray players are SACD capable.  And they can output the native DSD bitstream through the HDMI output.  As of now (i.e. current holiday shopping season), you can pick up Sony's (almost) top-of-the-line S570 Blu-ray player for under $150.00 shipped.
 


Quote:

NO CAN DO.........SACD's are Encrypted.......they don't "Do Digital Out"..................Unless that has changed since last week....

 
As mentioned before, SACD's DSD bitstream can be accessed in its native form with the standardization of HDMI v1.2.  And that was back in 2005 or 2006.  Since then, a number players has that capability....Oppo's discontinued 980, BDP-83 and BDP-80, a number of players from Pioneer Elite, Cambridge Audio, Onkyo (DV-SP506), etc.