SACD on its way out?

Hardly! SACD is going strong while in fact DVD-A/DualDisc might be the one to go.

http://www.highfidelityreview.com/news/news.asp?newsnumber=12377501

Was it ever IN?

Sacd seems alive and well. As an example, see Elusivedisc.com.
jndean

I agree SACD is going strong.DVDA might be the one to go.

SACD is doing just fine.Gary.

SACD format is growing and here to stay for awhile. Want to hear the best possible digital format playback ; SACD is a no brainer choice.

BMI

I was at my local Best Buy recently and it was obvious that they weren't restocking DVD-A titles after they were sold out. The SACD racks OTOH appeared to be fully stocked. I have a universal digital setup and would like to see both formats succeed.

Considering you can pick up new Hybrid SACDs of Dylan & Stones for less than ten bob each, what's the problem? And RCA Living Stereo Hybrids are such a deal at 12. This is good news for SACD, trust me.

I was the one that said that. I haven't heard that SACD is "on the way out" though. What I opined is that SACD is an attempt on the part of the music industry to stop copying and downloading (no digital out on SACD, right?). In the meantime, if you look into home studio and regular studio recording technology, the clear trend is towards "high-rez" (higher sampling rates, longer word lenths). For now, people are mostly using the high rez for the master and then "dithering" it down to "redbook" (regular CD), but, if they want to, they can burn a DVD-A at the higher resolution - AND THESE CAN BE PLAYED ON ANY DVD PLAYER! So, my point is really my own prediction, but it seems to me that with DVD players everywhere, and high-rez recordings doable by anyone, there's going to be a lot of momentum towards DVD-A. Just a prediction, folks!

Based on everything I've seen and heard the chances of SACD outlasting DVD-A is pretty good. DVD-A seems to be floundering while there are serious efforts on the part of companies like Harmon International to incorporate SACD into integrated automobile systems.

The titles available in both formats are limited, but SACD far outnumbers those available (in the store anyway) on DVD-A.

What is the source for this rumor? It might have come from that guy who bought the DVD-A player, there was one, wasn't there?

I believe dual disc has actually been the final death-knell for DVDA; I've cringed over and over again as DVDA cheerleaders on another web-site have discovered that the sprinkling of dual disc new releases, (when not delayed), has chosen to use the real estate on the CDs for purposes other than DVDA. SACD, though targeting a specific listener, will always have the hi-rez that this crowd wants. Ironically, I would have wondered if SACD was dying two years ago, but now 60+ labels have taken the ball and run with it. It's never going to be adopted by the teenie boppers, and it does very little to help masters with PCM origins, (still and improvement), but if you like acoustic music of whatever type, you are in for a treat.

I spent 5 years with Sacd, & after 10 minutes with a five grand tubed phono stage pre-amp in my rack all I can say is Hi-Rez Who, What, When??? Bye Bye Sacd! Bye Bye Dvd-Audio! Either way both formats will not be missed by me! Sony/Phillips keep trying!

Hi Musicslug - a couple of corrections:

First of all, a high-resolution master is not "dithered" down to 16/44.1 Redbook, it is "decimated." Dither in the digital context is the process of deliberately adding noise to the digital signal. Decimation is the down-rez process used to make a RB-compatible dataset from a higher-resolution dataset.

Secondly - the actual DVD-A data, which is MLP-encoded PCM, is, contrary to your assertion, NOT playable on any DVD player. DVD-Audio data is only playable on a DVD-Audio player. Many pre-recorded DVD-Audio discs are backward compatible with standard DVD-V players, because the discs also include Dolby Digital data and/or lower-resolution LPCM in addition to the DVD-A data. The backward-compatibility is DVD-V, not DVD-A.

So, it would be rather pointless to record something in DVD-A format if you don't have a DVD-A player on which to play it back.

I wouldn't bet any money on your prediction of DVD-A momentum. Seems to me that DVD-A is essentially dead in the water at this point.

You got it Rex

I got my hands on one of those dual discs a few weeks ago. First of all, they are expensive; about $30.00. The disc would not play in the truck, on my Xindak SACD2, in any of my 4 computers or a philips 963SA. However, it did play on an old sony DVD player that I use for whole house background music. Go figure.

I believe dual disc has actually been the final death-knell for DVDA

Boy, I would think DVD-A already has enough confused format offerings. Hopefully they will get their act together and make sure everything is clearly marked on the front covers.

hi Rex,
thanks for the info.
first of all, I actually own a SACD player - and like it...
my post reflected conversations I've had with people in the recording biz, not my personal experience, so I think I should explain what I think I'm hearing from them:
with a minimal investment, a person can now record in high-rez format and make discs that a DVD player can play back. my guess then is that these aren't technically DVD-A's at all, but something else entirely. so, to amend my prediction, I'm still predicting the demise of SACD, but it's not in favor of DVD-A, but copy-able, high-rez (using DVD copying technology...), DVD-player-playable discs.

You can use recordable DVDs and lay down stereo LPCM tracks up to 24/96k, which is certainly "high-rez." One potential problem with this is that most consumer-grade DVD-V players won't process 24/96k, so the player does a down-rez to 24/48k. Still "high-rez," but...

The DVD-V spec does not allow for hi-rez lossless multichannel. For the recording industry, this does not seem to be a problem. The recording industry has discovered that many people think that 5.1 surround sound in Dolby Digital is better than CD-quality sound (especially since they've been led to believe that MP3 is "CD-quality").

As to the demise of SACD in favor of a copyable hi-rez format, again I would not bet on your prediction. One of the primary reasons the record companies adopted SACD and DVD-A and now Dualdisc is because all three formats offer copy protection of hi-rez data (and Dualdisc also allows the CD side to be copy-protected as well).

Yes, actually hi-rez DVDA is watermarked so that it can't be copied in hi-rez. Also, with dual disc, it seems as though the producers must choose between hi-rez or video. The new "Donna's" hi-rez dual disc only has 10 minutes of video.

That's funny Audiobugged, I found that a tubed SACD player will run circles around old school vinyl and all it's hassle.

Web magazine AudioRevolution.com foten has good news articles but they tend to be DVD-Audio biased (even though they now include SACDs in their reviews). Just read some of the articles in their news archives such as the battle between OneDisc and DualDisc (both competeting DVD-A/CD dual-sided discs!) declaring SACD as a failed project.
http://www.audiorevolution.com/news/

quoted from 10-23-04: Musicslug
>I was the one that said that. I haven't heard that SACD is >"on the way out" though. What I opined is that SACD is an >attempt on the part of the music industry to stop copying >and downloading (no digital out on SACD, right?).

perhaps...
but lets not overlook that this different technology (DSDvsPCM) actualy does sound better. Thats a big factor.

>In the meantime, if you look into home studio and regular >studio recording technology, the clear trend is towards >"high-rez" (higher sampling rates, longer word lenths). For >now, people are mostly using the high rez for the master >and then "dithering" it down to "redbook" (regular CD), >but, if they want to, they can burn a DVD-A at the higher >resolution - AND THESE CAN BE PLAYED ON ANY DVD PLAYER!

well...not exactly
with $90 software you can author/burn your own DVD-A discs, but you need a DVD-A hardware player to play them back on. Not all DVD players support DVD-A.
you can burn 24/96 PCM onto DVD-V discs via the $40 "audio DVD creator" software that would be universal.

>So, my point is really my own prediction, but it seems to >me that with DVD players everywhere, and high-rez >recordings doable by anyone, there's going to be a lot of >momentum towards DVD-A. Just a prediction, folks!

right..anyone can burn high resolution DVD-V discs that have up to 24bit / 96khz PCM on them..this is true. And they will play in virtualy all DVD decks....but who is doing this outside of a small group of people? I mean, your average consumer joe does not have a bunch of master 24bit .wav files laying around.

I also hope both formats coexist peacefully and continue to develop. One day, digital will equal analog. I think DSD technology is a step in the right direction over the many decade old PCM digital standard. I like the idea of a new approach to digital music.

High-rez is alive but gasping for breath: Shipments of Super Audio CDs and DVD-Audio discs reached approximately 600,000 units, divided almost equally between the two formats.

Source may be RIAA report on first 2 quarters numbers shipped.Here's a block of text from Stereophile article with link to complete text.Which also carries a link to RIAA text.

a statistically insignificant slice of the 289.8 million units shipped in all formats, but is incontrovertible evidence that many music lovers care about quality. SACD appears to be losing ground to DVD-A. The 300,000 SACDs shipped in the opening months of this year were fewer than half the 689,000 that went out in the first six months of 2003; for DVD-A, the same 300,000 were three times the 100,000 shipped in that period.

Good news is CD sales regaining ground.
Stereophile Article