Missing the point. It's also humorous that eleven years after this thread started, page one made a reference to DSD DACs. But eleven years and 80 pages later someone decrees that isn't what the thread is about. I thought this thread was about SACDs. Who cares how you play them but a spinner fanatic claiming that anything else should be excluded from the discussion can be responded to with some of his own style of stupid rhetoric. I also find it humorous to see the my car doesn't have a CD player threads. Or the annual, CD player options are drying up, what's a good option threads. Welcome to the 21st century.
I have heard Andreas Koch recommend recording at 256. For playback 128 might be the sweet spot. I am happy with 64 regular SACD’s.
One might not need a screen to play back sacd discs indeed, but the tray mechanism and/or the laser head can die on him and that's a pain. Like on the Sony SCD-1? Once the reading mechanism goes you have a multi thousand dollar doorknob. Again, it's good to have both the rips and discs at our disposal. One can pick whichever one wants.
I am sick of the thread crapping and thread hijacking from rippers who complain that SACD manufacturers are putting too much music on physical SACDS and thereby making it too hard to rip them! News Flash: this thread is about physical SACDS. If you are only concerned with rips, start a rips thread.
It doesn't bother me. What I find to be nonsense is the decrees of what can be discussed in an 11 year old thread that has been all over the place, now placing rules as if it was 1990. You guys are looking for someone to tar and feather. I'm done with this, but I'll keep enjoying my ever growing collection of SACDs.
Humbly disagree My Marantz SA KI Ruby upsamples and converts Redbook CDs to DSD at 11.2MHz and I've been amazed at the sound!! I've been listening and buy more CDs these days they are dirt cheap and sound great. Just got the 1987 Grateful Dead American Beauty disc cranked that one up so good! Gives my 70s vinyl press a run for its money and then some even the crappy mastered brickwalled CDs are more listenable on this player... Trust me I was surprised truly... Don't knock it unless you give the high end Marantz players a listen you won't be disappointed
I agree 100%! Since having the Marantz SA-KI Ruby in my system I'm playing more "run of the mill" CDs than ever. With the SA-KI Ruby CDs just sound so good! For the longest time when listening to my main system it was just SACDs, XRCDs or "audiophile" CDs. But now I'm enjoying all of my stereo disc collection. I have my Oppo 203 connected to the SA-KI Ruby via coaxial to play ripped CDs and SACDs on a hard drive connected to the 203. I can use my display to navigate the files with ease. I also have a WiiM Mini connected to the SA-KI Ruby via optical for streaming Qobuz. This is all made easy with two different activities with a Harmony 688 remote. I find the back and forth between those that only play discs and those that prefer downloads, ripped or streaming music interesting. I enjoy playing both discs, ripped SACDs and streaming from Qobuz. This morning I'm playing Neil Young's early albums in order on Qobuz. The sound quality at 192/24 is excellent and saves me from digging out the CDs or the discs in the Archives I set. I really don't understand how some are so against one or the other format(s) when both offer such great options.
I think because everyone want to be listening to what is the “best” sounding format… This to me is an ego thing… it’s hilarious
Continuing our gradual move back toward the thread topic, I have to say that I've never bought as many SACDs as I have this year. Good stuff, both new and from the collectors' market. Would love to see a few things in 2023: An affordable SACD of Return to Forever's "Romantic Warrior". There has, to my knowledge anyway, been only one SACD release of this title, in Japan many years ago. The price these days for a copy is way out of my range and, from some of the things I've read, the sound quality is no big whoop. A desert-island classic album, I would say, and well-recorded enough that an SACD could really shine. This may be a bridge too far, but I would love to see SACDs start being included as part of the super deluxe editions of classic albums. 2023 will see (okay, maybe I should say "may see"...) box sets by ABC and The Who and, no doubt many other great albums. A superbly done SACD of "Lexicon of Love" or "Who's Next" would be beyond great!! Continued success, both of Dutton Vocalion rock & jazz reissues, as well as the Sony Japan quad reissues of classic titles. Other wishes on people's list?
Yeah if you are into Jazz the amount of SACD that’s coming out is great! With the reissues it’s not just vinyl it’s also coming with an SACD that says a lot that there clearly there is a market.. So it’s great!
I’m most excited about future Sony Japan quad reissues, as well as quad in general which makes updates from DV interesting to watch.
I fully agree that Return to Forever should be reissued on SACD but I have my doubts. This albums is a bit of a conundrum. It was fully remastered around 2008 or so for a 2 CD retrospective collection. The entire album was included. But the remaster was done in the days of overdone compression. There is also a MQA version on Tidal which sounds to me to be a less compressed version of the same 2008 remaster. Assuming the situation won't change, that is probably one's best bet for now. Amazon, unfortunately, only has the HD version which I find overly compressed. The SACD has a good pedigree, Mark Wilder. But in all cases, one can really hear the 70s sound. Every so often things just seem "saturated" to me and the electronic drums sound a bit dated. But it is what it is. In other words, if we ever see another SACD release I hope somebody like our host gets the assignment. But I don't have overly high hopes for the SQ being overly stunning. I think MQA is a bit of a joke, and would prefer a regular uncompressed UltraHD version of the album (24-96 or better). But I must admit I can't really hear the compression so there's that; the engineer in me just likes to have things uncompressed since bandwidth is no longer truly scarce. MQA likes to pretend it isn't compressed but it simply is. Sort of like the way MFSL was selling vinyl as AAA which in fact DSD sources were being used a lot of the time. But then again we SACD fans benefit from that approach. With regards to Who's Next, yes an SACD release would be good but lets face it what we will get it a BluRay. Now there is a very good Japanese SACD which I think Lukpac thinks is the best available version of this (and I usually defer to him). But I actually like the HDTracks version. Methings they both come from the same sources, but the SACD emphasizes the high end and the HDTracks has bit more EQ to the low end. I love hearing John whack away at the bass so that's my druthers. Both are really good, and I expect that Pete will give final approval to the next go round so almost surely it will be as good or better. Just to clarify matters, I have owned all of these versions at one time or another. And yet I still hope for another shot at getting this one as good as it can be. By the way the original vinyl has the very same limitations, so it is not a digital vs analog issue.
I love the idea of including SACDs sort of like how other deluxe sets have included DVD in the past As for wishes, I'd very much like Van Morrison's catalogue done to its best once and for all, SACD would be a fine format for that to happen. Early Kinks too maybe?
A nice Moondance transferred from original analog tapes would be choice. Having said that the hi res versions currently out (I have HD Tracks) sound very good.
My thought is that most of my issues are related to some of the original recording and instrument choices. The format is unlikely to surmount the sound of electronic drums for example. I think the SACD being discussed here sounds better than the CD, but neither the SACD nor the LP can overcome some of the underlying choices that were made at the time. It is still great music, just has a certain 70s jazz fusion dating to it. I have a similar objection to the time period of Anderson Bruford Wakeman Howe when Bill Bruford was playing electronic drums. It sounds very dated to me now and I wish he had used a regular analog (non electrified) drum kit.
I use this thread to keep up to date with the latest SACD releases and news since I think no dedicated thread exists (and starting a new one just means burying it in a tornado of threads titled sth like Songs where the singer uses the word "You") And yeah, don't really care too much about physical digital media, I'd love it if more DSD digital downloads became available and not just for niche classical recordings
