pcm vs. dsd. what do you thank?

forget what the specs say!Does eneyone on this forum thank dvd-a sounds better than sacd. I thank sacd kill dvd-a by a long shot.

 

Well, when they market mature SACD and DVD-A players with full bass management and timeing adjustments and we know the mature players are properly setup and we have disks mastered from the same source, we can start to form an opinion on this subject.

 

It can be and it will be. This will require players that output hi-rez SACD or DVD-A digital audio output and a receiver that can apply digital bass management and timing adjustments and successfully convert all that into a high quality analog output. The irony is that by the time such players and receivers hit the street the players themselves will sport full bass management and timing adjustments from their analog outputs. Still, full digital output and receiver management will be more conventient since one setting for Dolby Digital, DTS, CD, SACD and DVD-A will do. Today you either go without (SACD or DVD-A) or apply the basic adjustments in the player and full adjustments at the receiver for non hi-rez sources.

Even if you have just stereo SACD or DVD-A you may still want bass management to send the very lowest bass into your sub, something that you can't do today unless you utilize an integrated stereo/sub system with its own crossover provisions.

 

As for the original question, I prefer the sound of DVD-A over SACD. Not by a huge margin, I just have a preference for DVD-A. To me, hi-rez PCM sounds closer to analog than DSD. Just my opinion.

As for bass management, who cares? A proper multi-channel system uses five identical full-range speakers placed equidistant from the listening position. Bass management (and other DSP fluff) is strictly a lo-fi feature that compromises the integrity of the presentation. Would you use bass management in a stereo system? Of course not! Would you use two different speakers in a stereo setup? Of course not! Would you have the left speaker closer to you than the right in a stereo setup? Of course not! Then why would you do these things in a multi-channel system? Perhaps if you bought some pre-packaged "home theater" setup at Best Buy...

People do these things then complain about multi-channel... it just boggles my mind.

Subwoofers are a different issue, though, but I don't think that bass management through digital signal processing is the place to address it. I agree that the notion of subwoofers being non-directional is ludicrous.

 

Because an HT receiver does this in the digital domain , to a digital input signal, and currendly hi-rez output from nearly all players is only analog (i.e., the digital-to-analog conversion is done in the player). This means that all speaker inputs receive a full-frequency range signal. You can do some bass management of a two-channel high-rez input , depending on how you have your system set up for handling bass frequencies (e.g., if the signal goes through your subwoofer's filters before routing to your satellites). Or you can buy something like the Outlaw box, which does outboard bass management as an add-on device. AFAIK it does *not* do time management, though, for surround sound setups.

Richard is 100% right, I think. Unless you can compare SACD and DVD-A and CD on properly configured systems, *using the same master tapes and mastering chain*, comparisons aren't particularly useful.

 

Bass frequencies *below a certain point* are nondirectional. You can make your sub 'directional usually' by setting the crossover at the high end. The bass frequencies in many recordings is summed to mono, btw, especially on LPs.

Bass management isn't 'DSP fluff', it's essential for proper sound reproduction in sub/satellite systems -- unlike 'theater mode' 'jazz club mode' and other DSP functions (which *are* inessential fluff, IMO).

There are inherent problems with full-range speakers, in that optiomal positioning of the woofer from front and side walls is usually not the same as for the mid/tweeter. This is a problem subwoofers address very nicely. THe main problem with subs is integrating them smoothly with the satellites, which usually requires a test disc of some sort (though doing it 'by ear' until it sounds good to you, is also an option).

FWIW, Tom Nousaine, who has published in Stereo Review etc., has done extensive studies of subwoofer positioning w/respect to excitation of room modes, and finds that for most rectangular-shaped rooms, corner positioning using a *single* sub is optimal.

 

The point I was trying to make is that sub/satellite systems do not represent a "proper" surround system, in my opinion, so the "special needs" for these crippled systems can be effectively ignored as nothing more than white noise generated by the masses who bought into the Bose (and similar) marketing hype.

Sorry if that seems cruel and unforgiving, but surround sound demands more than what these lo-fi solutions offer. DSP in any fashion is a band-aid solution not required by a healthy system.

 

Your first sentence here is a distortion of what Mr. Nousaine actually says. As for the rest, since I'd be interested to see what he says in reply to your claims about single subs in a corner, I'm going to relay them to him.

 

It's neither cruel nor unforgiving -- it's simply wrong, IMO. Also, bass management and DSP are not the same thing. Bass management can -- and before the boom in home theater , was -- be done entirely in the analog domain. It's done in your full-range speakers by the crossover.

 

? I don't get the logic here, sorry. Bass management can be done in analog or digital domains (unless you *define* bass management to mean, digital bass routing). It's simply a subset of 'frequency management', which is what nearly all multi-speaker speaker systems do. I certainly don't dismiss them!

I've sent your last comments (unattributed) re: your setup and the necessity of two subs, to him and will relay the reply if any. Alternately, since he frequents rec.audio.high-end, you could likely hear from him directly, yourself, by posting your critique of his findings there, if you have Usenet access.

 

Well, for those who have no appreciation for high-end audio, it boggles their minds that anyone would go to such lengths for stereo! As I've indicated elsewhere, any particular channel in any multi-channel environment (count stereo as well) is equally important and should be treated with the same amount of care in all areas of consideration. I mean, it makes sense to me to carry over the approach in stereo to any number of channels. Once you reach that high level of dedication and resource allocation, then ideally, no one channel should ever be compromised. The number of channels becomes irrelevant!

The subwoofer, though, is an anomaly. I agree with your approach to dealing with the subwoofers and appreciate what you've done. I'm sure you've attained some pretty spectacular results in that regard! Sadly, I'm living with a single subwoofer, only because of space considerations. It is one of the concessions I've had to make with my system. I have my subwoofer set to cut off at around 40 Hz. I don't know at what level it becomes non-directional, but I can identify the source with my eyes closed. I have found that the lower I set the cut-off, the less noticeable the source becomes. It's not terribly noticeable, so I don't let it bother me. I have played with numerous placement configurations and have found one that works best given my room layout.

 

I tend to lump DSP and bass management together since in most modern receivers or players, both are done in the digital domain and (I'm guessing) via the same processor. I don't have experience with any analog "bass management" devices (discounting tone controls or crossovers) so I can’t comment there.

Now, I'm not an advocate of true "full range" speakers or anything, so I won't go there, but when you start talking about speaker crossovers in the context of our discussion, I feel you're splitting hairs.

Just to clarify my position, I'm talking about DSP/Bass Management in a multi-channel environment via modern receivers/players performing this task in the digital domain. My assertion is that it is simply not needed in a proper multi-channel setup.

The term "proper" is open for interpretation, and I hear you saying that you have no problem with satellite type speaker setups, and perhaps a setup where the rear channels are significantly different from the front speakers. All I'm saying is that I do have a problem with these types of multi-channel setups. A big problem. That's just me. I'm not wrong and you're not wrong. We're both just opinionated. Aren't we all?

 

Somewhat apropos of discussion of one vs. two subwoofers, here's a thread about a problem that can occur with a two-sub configuration, called 'suck out'

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&[email protected]

 

You could play anyy number of acoustic or classical discs, but never will acoustic jazz or classical discs outnumber pop/rock discs, and therefore my claim that many LPs have summed-to-mono bass stands. ;>
In any case what 'bass' directionality you may be hearing in those instances is are the overtones , which are at higher frequencies. The bass could still have been summed to mono.

I've seen 80 Hz cited as the point where bass frequencies becomes nondirectional. I've noted this phenomenon using pure test tones and my subwoofer..it's easy to do. Above a certain frequecy the sub becomes easily localized. Below, it ceases to exist as a point in space.


bass directionality is discussed in

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=g...en&lr=&[email protected]

and surrounding posts...whihc include some interesting 'objectivist' posts on why two subs *are* to be preferred in some cases!