[Calanctus]

mikeg, thanks for sharing your impressions. It's a bit rare to hear someone who finds such a big difference between CD and SACD; possibly, your system is excellent, or you have great ears (seriously--there are differences between listeners as to how well they hear)--or you just know how to USE your ears well.

For me, in my system the difference between CD and SACD is a small incremental improvement: SACDs have a relaxed sound to them, with some kind of additional 'richness' in the sound that's hard to define further (maybe it is the 'tonal colour' that some reviewers refer to). They don't really seem to have more detail, to my ears--just an ease and an extra dollop of 'pleasingness'. Not very scientific, but that's what I'm hearing!

By no means am I finished upgrading. I look forward either to improved SACD players at reasonable prices, or to biting the bullet and getting a used Meitner rig or something similar, to hear a bit more of SACD's potential. So it may be that I'll finish by hearing differences as dramatic as the ones mikeg describes.

 

[tom hankins]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tortie I on the other hand have a hard time telling my regular Norah Jones CD vs its SACD counterpart. Is this because of my source?

Probably not. I've spent alot of time recently trying to tell difference between sacd, vinyl, and good redbook and they are soooo close. Over all the good sacd was amazing....but it was hit and miss. In a collection of over 120 sacd's I was dissapointed in how many were not at all that good. If any one is going to buy all sacd I would recommend they do some research because they might get better with a good redbook recording of the same thing.

 

[bangraman]

In my case it's depended on the recording. Some I can clearly hear a difference on, and the redbook equivalent recording was awesome on some of those. So to say it was an improvement on that is something.


But on others the differences are somewhere between greatly reduced (detectable only in the 'audiophile worship pose'... i.e. sitting cross-legged 1.5m directly in front of your source with a face like a constipated siamese cat) to nonexistent.

 

[Oddball]

lol, audiophile worship pose. That's good...

As someone who doesn't know much about SACD and hi-rez in general, I'm getting the impression that I should wait a few years until I jump in. After all, I'm the kind of person with the kind of budget that can only afford a redbook OR SACD source. I hear that in the DVD-A vs. SACD battle that SACD is winning though.

 

[gpalmer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikeg In comparison to the sound of the SACDs, the sound of the Redbook recordings of these symphonies is like comparing very inexpensive small speaker systems to very expensive high quality ones.

I have to disagree with you on this. I think it is possible to get good sound out of the hi res formats cheaper than it is to get it out of the redbook format but when you get into high end redbook playback it sounds pretty darn close to the hi-res formats. Not quite as good as the very good recording on SACD or DVD-Audio, but very, very close...

 

[mikeg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by gsferrari OT - When did you get a HD-600 mikeg ?? is it a new purchase you made to compare with your HD-650??

Sorry for my error; i.e., I meant to say HD650, and not HD600. Please note that I entered the correction.

 

[gsferrari]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bangraman But on others the differences are somewhere between greatly reduced (detectable only in the 'audiophile worship pose'... i.e. sitting cross-legged 1.5m directly in front of your source with a face like a constipated siamese cat) to nonexistent.

HA HA - thats a good one!!

 

[mikeg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by marios_mar The sound is more real, more alive, more detailed, fat and warm.

A perfect description of what I found.

 

[mikeg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Calanctus mikeg, thanks for sharing your impressions. It's a bit rare to hear someone who finds such a big difference between CD and SACD; possibly, your system is excellent, or you have great ears (seriously--there are differences between listeners as to how well they hear)--or you just know how to USE your ears well.

Unfortunately, the quality of my system exceeds the quality of my ears. I did, however, really concentrate on the music; i.e., I played the same track/s of these symphonies dozens of times before reaching my conclusion. BTW, the SACD version of these symphonies sounds substantially better on the K1000 than on the HD650 and RS-1. As for these other headphones, I like the RS-1 better than the HD650 for listening to the SACD version of these symphonies.

 

[mikeg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tom hankins Probably not. I've spent alot of time recently trying to tell difference between sacd, vinyl, and good redbook and they are soooo close. Over all the good sacd was amazing....but it was hit and miss. In a collection of over 120 sacd's I was dissapointed in how many were not at all that good. If any one is going to buy all sacd I would recommend they do some research because they might get better with a good redbook recording of the same thing.

Sorry for my ignorance, but I'm not really familiar with Norah Jones. I assume that her recording involves a single singer, with a few accompanying instruments. Differences between SACD and Redbook may not be readily apparent with this type of music. I used large orchestral classical works in my comparison, with music produced simultaneously by perhaps 50 or more instruments of all types, all playing simultaneously.

 

[kartik]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikeg Sorry for my ignorance, but I'm not really familiar with Norah Jones. I assume that her recording involves a single singer, with a few accompanying instruments. Differences between SACD and Redbook may not be readily apparent with this type of music. I used large orchestral classical works in my comparison, with music produced simultaneously by perhaps 50 or more instruments of all types, all playing simultaneously.

Not at all. In my rig, I've noticed that SACDs are far less harsh than redbook in general. Unfortunately, the only proviso is that while many of my cds are just average (or below average recordings) I've been very picky about the SACDs I buy (Mostly Telarc). Nonetheless, in my rig I find SACD far less fatiguing than redbook. Can't speak to vinyl until Todd actually ships out my Scout.

 

[mikeg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by kartik Not at all. In my rig, I've noticed that SACDs are far less harsh than redbook in general. Unfortunately, the only proviso is that while many of my cds are just average (or below average recordings) I've been very picky about the SACDs I buy (Mostly Telarc). Nonetheless, in my rig I find SACD far less fatiguing than redbook. Can't speak to vinyl until Todd actually ships out my Scout.

A couple of years ago Head-Fi member "matt" brought his vinyl rig to my home, and I listend to some of his records. The sound was amazing; perhaps even better than SACD. But, I don't really want to get involved with the more complex cleaning, storage, and handling requirements of vinyl; i.e., I too damn lazy.

 

[tortie]

Welly,

No, I seldom use upsampling these days. I usually listen without any upsampling.

Tom,

Thanks for the response. This certainly erases some doubts of mine.

Mikeg,

Yes, its mostly vocals and not orchestral. Thanks for the tip, i'll try to find an SACD version of "A beautiful mind" and try to compare both.

 

[tom hankins]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikeg Sorry for my ignorance, but I'm not really familiar with Norah Jones. I assume that her recording involves a single singer, with a few accompanying instruments. Differences between SACD and Redbook may not be readily apparent with this type of music. I used large orchestral classical works in my comparison, with music produced simultaneously by perhaps 50 or more instruments of all types, all playing simultaneously.

I've never heard the Norah Jones sacd either. My listening was also done with mainly classical, jazz, and some pop type music. We had a total of 23 cds that were the same recordings, sacd, redbook, and also recorded on vinyl that we used to compare the three formats. We listened to other sacd's also but mainly the ones we could compare directly to redbook and vinyl.
My comment on the Norah Jones CD was that if it was the same or close to the redbook CD it was probably because the recording, and not the eqiupment used. I don't find the sacd's to be very consistent in there quality.