SA-CD/DVD-A?

It's really no different that reel-to-reel tapes. It's mostly a high-end niche. I imagine SACD and may DVD-A (dualdisc?) will remain audiophile niche products for the forseeable future. This means players as well as audiophile media (software). If it really bothers you, invest in vinyl instead (unless you prefer newly recorded classical music, then stay with CD and SACD). And given the two titles you selected, and fact that they aren't classical music (IMO), you may be better served by the vinyl format.

If everyone had a crystal ball there wouldn't be these sorts of debates twice a week over ont he hirez board on the audio asylum forums.

Yeah, I had been holding off on either format to see where they would go ... and my CD sound was actually pretty decent overall, so there was little motivation.

I recently bought a cheap universal and modded the hell out of it (Toshiba SD4960). Amazingly it replaced my aging CD rig and gave me the benefit of SACD and DVD-A playback as well.

Now this Toshiba is a cheap transport and player overall, so I don't expect that it will last forever (engineered obsolescence through mechanical breakdown will undeniably be its post-mortem). So when I buy an SACD I make sure it is a hybrid, so I can play the CD portion in the future if SACD goes the way of the Betamax. I'm sure Redbook CD will still be around for a long time.

As for DVD-A, haven't delved into that due to the many, many incompatibility problems. Had a couple of loaner disks from friends and some play, some don't.

Enjoy,
Bob

DVD-A incompatibility problems? I too have an inexpensive all-DVDs player, a Pioneer ...563. It plays every DVD-A and SACD I've purchased and sounds good enough for now. The classical stuff I buy sounds great.

I prefer DVD-A over SACD slightly but I can't tell you exactly why...maybe I have a slight aversion to the monster company $ony.
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