SACD

[Marc]

[....]
I understood that SACD will never replace/kill CD, in fact it's supporting CD format thanks to hybrid discs. I didn't believe stupid magazines, I figured it out myself. That's why I have a healthy attitude in this matter.

Good for you!

It's stupid to think SACD is useless because it is not the successor of CD. I feel pitty for you since you take advertisements that seriously. [....]

Thank you. That's very kind.
BTW: I don't think SACD is useless, and I never meant to say that. Even if you were the only person in the world who liked it, I would still say: it's useful.
About taking advertisements seriously: the idea of advertisements is to take them seriously. That's why companies put a lot of money in it.
With all I have said about this topic, I never said anything about taking them seriously myself. Like I said: I don't have SACD. So, one could conclude, I never 'bought' the screaming advertisements. And, as I was saying: most of the people didn't. The companies who advertised seriously hoped they would, though. That was a mistake. Now they have to cool down and be modest about the sales of SACD and other inventions. These are all consequences of economical and financial matters. Not because the (SACD-) idea is bad, in quality terms of speaking.

About the general seriousness of the advertisement business: in the past, present and future we have seen and will see that companies can get in huge trouble or even get bankrupt because their advertisement and marketing strategies do not work. People get fired, misery in families, useful research is stopped, etcetera. So, in a way, it's a very serious matter.

Believe me, Sony wasn't happy with the fact that, after their MiniDisc finally had beaten the Philips DCC, they almost immediately got beaten themselves by the CD-Recordable. And, of course, Philips wasn't happy with the (economical) failure of the DCC, only about 10 years after their Video 2000 was beaten by VHS. A lot of people got fired because of that, and a lot of research money was wasted.

But these things have got nothing to do with my personal attitude in advertisement matters. I myself happy with stereo (sometimes even with mono), and do not really care about multi-channel. And I do not use mp3 myself, even though it has been hugely advertised. So, it might be an idea to leave your well-meant pity for someone else. For instance: for all the hifi companies who were seriously hoping or reckoning, after beating the DVD-audio, that SACD would really succeed the stereo CD. And, because of that, put a lot of effort and money in research, marketing and advertising.

[Marc]

[about the Bach/Walcha box set]

Oh, yes, the monointegral. I own it myself, and I would not like to be without it.

This is the set I have ... [including pic]

Sent both of you a PM, because it's not really a SACD matter.

[71 dB]

Good for you!

Thanks! 

Thank you. That's very kind.

I apologize for being nasty. I just have been reading this kind of SACD critic for years and it kind of gets tiresome after a while...

BTW: I don't think SACD is useless, and I never meant to say that. Even if you were the only person in the world who liked it, I would still say: it's useful.

Oh. I misundertood you. I'm sorry.

About taking advertisements seriously: the idea of advertisements is to take them seriously. That's why companies put a lot of money in it.
With all I have said about this topic, I never said anything about taking them seriously myself. Like I said: I don't have SACD. So, one could conclude, I never 'bought' the screaming advertisements. And, as I was saying: most of the people didn't. The companies who advertised seriously hoped they would, though. That was a mistake. Now they have to cool down and be modest about the sales of SACD and other inventions. These are all consequences of economical and financial matters. Not because the (SACD-) idea is bad, in quality terms of speaking.

Aren't you contradicting yourself here? First you say people are supposed to take advertisements seriously. Then you say you didn't in case of SACD. I meant you took seriously the writing on music mazagizes stating SACD will replace CD. Music magazines write these kind of articles to make people interested and to buy the magazine. That is their motivation, not to increase the knowledge or understanding among the readers. "SACD will render your CD collection obsolete!" on magazine cover must have sold many copies. Now we have the same thing with DVD/Blu-ray. 

About the general seriousness of the advertisement business: in the past, present and future we have seen and will see that companies can get in huge trouble or even get bankrupt because their advertisement and marketing strategies do not work. People get fired, misery in families, useful research is stopped, etcetera. So, in a way, it's a very serious matter.

This is of course true but it doesn't remove the fact that most marketing is about mental images rather than facts.

Believe me, Sony wasn't happy with the fact that, after their MiniDisc finally had beaten the Philips DCC, they almost immediately got beaten themselves by the CD-Recordable. And, of course, Philips wasn't happy with the (economical) failure of the DCC, only about 10 years after their Video 2000 was beaten by VHS. A lot of people got fired because of that, and a lot of research money was wasted.

That's what a free enterprise economy is about. Would you like to have communism instead? Anyway, this thread is about SACD, not people getting fired.

But these things have got nothing to do with my personal attitude in advertisement matters. I myself happy with stereo (sometimes even with mono), and do not really care about multi-channel. And I do not use mp3 myself, even though it has been hugely advertised. So, it might be an idea to leave your well-meant pity for someone else. For instance: for all the hifi companies who were seriously hoping or reckoning, after beating the DVD-audio, that SACD would really succeed the stereo CD. And, because of that, put a lot of effort and money in research, marketing and advertising.

The good thing with the free enterprise economy is that we can choose. You have chosen stereo/mono. Good. I have chosen a 5-channel system so I can enjoy the surround sound of my DVDs, multichannel SACDs and stereo CDs (naturally in stereo mode). Why we are even arguing over this is beyond me.

[Marc]

71 dB,

Thanks for reacting!
I'm off to the family right now, so my answer has to be short.
In fact (sic! ) and in general, I think we do not really disagree. Indeed, I was talking about 'economical seriousness and facts' (this is hugely important for the hifi industry), and not about the real hifi/sound seriousness and facts.

Don't worry, btw: I'm not a communist. But I'm also not in each and every way a strict believer in free enterprise economics. In fact (sic again!), I think I am not a believer in anything at all.
If possible, I make my own decisions (or at least I make myself think I do), and, of course, in a communist society this is (as practice has shown) impossible.

Have a nice Easter with loads of brilliantly sounding multi-channel music! 

[71 dB]

71 dB,

Thanks for reacting!
I'm off to the family right now, so my answer has to be short.
In fact (sic! ) and in general, I think we do not really disagree. Indeed, I was talking about 'economical seriousness and facts' (this is hugely important for the hifi industry), and not about the real hifi/sound seriousness and facts.

Don't worry, btw: I'm not a communist. But I'm also not in each and every way a strict believer in free enterprise economics. In fact (sic again!), I think I am not a believer in anything at all.
If possible, I make my own decisions (or at least I make myself think I do), and, of course, in a communist society this is (as practice has shown) impossible.

Have a nice Easter with loads of brilliantly sounding multi-channel music! 

I didn't think you are a communist.  It's just that the world is what it is and that defines how to live in it. I do my part for the better tomorrow (voting and supporting the green party and speaking for important social chances) but one man can't do much, at least with the resources I have.

Thank you Marc and enjoy Easter with your family!

(I did listen to Beethoven's 2nd Symphony by Minnesota Orchestra/Osmo Vänskä on BIS today. The music doesn't appeal to me that much but the multichannel sound/performanse is awesome!)

[Marc]

(I did listen to Beethoven's 2nd Symphony by Minnesota Orchestra/Osmo Vänskä on BIS today. The music doesn't appeal to me that much but the multichannel sound/performanse is awesome!)

Ha! Not a bad orchestra. Heard them once live in Sibelius' Violin concerto and Mahler 5, in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, and I really liked it!
About SACD again, but now in a more personal way: I live in a small flat appartment, and my living room is just large enough to 'accept' my (small but very satisfactory) stereo set. And I also don't want to disturb my neighbours! 0:)
Which means that, especially later in the evening, I use headphones. Not too loud though, to spare my ears. I want to hear the birds sing for as long as I can. 0:) 0:)

[nut-job]

Ha! Not a bad orchestra. Heard them once live in Sibelius' Violin concerto and Mahler 5, in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, and I really liked it!
About SACD again, but now in a more personal way: I live in a small flat appartment, and my living room is just large enough to 'accept' my (small but very satisfactory) stereo set. And I also don't want to disturb my neighbours! 0:)
Which means that, especially later in the evening, I use headphones. Not too loud though, to spare my ears. I want to hear the birds sing for as long as I can. 0:) 0:)

The fact that music is now transmitted essentially in computer files (whether explicitly or as CD/DVD/SACD/etc) makes possible a level of flexibility that is regrettably not taken advantage of.  For instance, it is not ideal to listen to a recording mixed for speakers on headphones.  A real (using a dummy head microphone setup) or reconstructed "binaural" recording is ideal, in which each of the two channels contains exactly what each ear would receive if it were in the room where the recording is made.  Such recordings are strikingly "surround" on headphones but don't sound right on speakers.   Too bad each recording isn't supplied in a surround mix, a stereo mix, and a binaural mix.

[Marc]

The fact that music is now transmitted essentially in computer files (whether explicitly or as CD/DVD/SACD/etc) makes possible a level of flexibility that is regrettably not taken advantage of.  For instance, it is not ideal to listen to a recording mixed for speakers on headphones.  A real (using a dummy head microphone setup) or reconstructed "binaural" recording is ideal, in which each of the two channels contains exactly what each ear would receive if it were in the room where the recording is made.  Such recordings are strikingly "surround" on headphones but don't sound right on speakers. Too bad each recording isn't supplied in a surround mix, a stereo mix, and a binaural mix.

Apart from all the advantages or disadvantages of the level of recording quality, or the (dis)advantage of speakers or headphones, I just have to turn to headphones from time to time, especially when I think the neighbours' children are asleep .... of course without causing hearing damage or headaches for myself.

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

No interest in SACD. Also not in spatial goodies like 2.1, 5.1, 7.1, 32132165465.1.
I love listening to the outdated, crappy and Grammophone like format named "Stereo Compact Disc". I reckon the CD->SACD improvement (if both are mastered well) is just a fraction of the improvement Dolby C->S. No new Hardware please!

Another side of the coin is audio files: Gimme the best available, no matter if I won't be able to distinguish to a 44.1.

I'm way more interested in Audio flexibility enhancements (files, conversion and distribution in LAN) and such.

BTW the audio source is the least of my problems--- I have a parquet floor and biiig windows....

My guess is: Distribution of physical music media is at it's end, there'll never be an increase of sales again.

[71 dB]

No interest in SACD.

Yet you decided to post in this thread. 

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

Yet you decided to post in this thread. 

Yes, I remember when I bought a record in my record shop 20 years ago and thinking "maybe one day we'll have small cubes as physical media, which will not have to spin or move". - - 10 years ago we had Compact Disc changers in cars. Today, we're in heaven, we have audio files and can put them whereever we want. From the convenience point of view SACD would be a step back.

[nut-job]

From the convenience point of view SACD would be a step back.

And, above all, classical music is convenient.  0:)

[DavidRoss]

BTW the audio source is the least of my problems--- I have a parquet floor and biiig windows....

Google "rug" and "drapes."

[Tapio Dmitriyevich]

Google "rug" and "drapes."

Not allowed; my wife is the interior master . Next life, maybe.

[71 dB]

I'll bump this thread because I discovered something interesting resently.

Listening to multichannel SACDs with headphones

Mostly I listen to my SACDs with 5 speakers, but what about headphones? Hybrid multichannel SACD discs usually contain 2.0 downmixes, both high resolution SACD and low resolution CD -layers. One would think 2.0 SACD layer is good for phones.

I play my SACD-discs with my Cambridge Audio azur 650BD Blu-ray player. For downmixes of multichannel sound it has 2 options: Stereo and Lt/Rt. Stereo downmix is mono-compatible and doesn't even try to conserve rear/front information. Lt/Rt (Left total/Right total) is a more complicated way of downmixing multichannel sound into 2 channels. It encodes information about what happens in the rear channels so that a Dolby Pro Logic decoder can extract multichannel sound from just 2 channels. This is old news and it's what surround sound used to be back in the 90's before DVD. The point here is that Lt/Rt does different downmix than normal stereo downmix. For those who don't fear some math, the matrix equations for Stereo (Lo/Ro) and Lt/Rt downmixes are:

Lo = L + 0,7 * C + att * Ls
Ro = R + 0,7 * C + att * Rs

Lt = L + 0,7 * C - 0,7 * (jLs + jRs)
Rt = R + 0,7 * C + 0,7 * (jLs + jRs)

L = left channel
R = right channel
C = center channel
Ls = left surround channel
Rs = right surround channel
j = imaginary unit and means phase shift of 90 degrees here.

Enough with all that math, what is my point? My point is that for acoustically recorded music like classical music it seems that Lt/Rt downmix of multichannel sound gives very nice results when listening with headphones. The sound has similar airy feel than multichannel sound from speakers. Crossfeeding is strongly recommended as always. The end result is pretty stunning.

With electronic music with who knows what unnatural phase effects Lt/Rt downmixing doesn't work!