SACD 2-channel stereo system and a 5.1 surround disc?

I have a sony blu-ray that has settings that let me play SACD's - I run it thru my sony 2 channel stereo receiver and have some great SACD's and DVD and Blu-ray discs (which many in this group would know about) and I love it - however I have steered away from 5.1 surround discs because I only have the two speakers - my guestion is can i still play them? Would I get a benefit over a regular CD still?

 

I'm afraid I can't tell you if you would benefit, or not.

I know that I would never notice a difference between identically mixed and mastered stereo tracks played from a CD and from the SACD layer on an SACD, at the exact same listening level, and for this reason probably 98%+ of all of my SACDs have multichannel tracks, which is the main reason I bought them, rather than the CD version.

So if I were asking your closing question of myself, the answer would be "no."

Jeff

 

You can play them, but you will either just hear the two front discrete stereo channels of the 5.1 mix, or your receiver will fold the 5.1 into a stereo mix. This is debatably OK, some 5.1 mixes are clearer and definitely more open, but the folddown process may produce phase issues and might not sound very good.

 

If you have the capability, you can rip the stereo DSD tracks and play those through the Sony without fear of losing or degrading the signal. When I ripped all of my SACDs, I saved both the stereo and multichannel DSF files - since I have sufficient hard drive and server space to do so.

Jeff

ps. I'm assuming your Sony player can stream from a server (or play those files from a stick) and that you have the ability to then pass that output to your stereo receiver in a way that it can handle. Personally I just make sure my gear is all HDMI capable and never have to worry about it.

 

Does your Sony Blu-ray player have an SACD setting for stereo or multi-channel? If it does then set it to stereo to playback your SACDs. I think most SACD, DVD-V, DVD-A and Blu-ray Audio music discs have stereo mixes. With the DVD-V, DVD-A and Blu-ray Audio music discs you need to select the stereo mix in the discs menu if it's an option.

 

thanks Bill - found the stereo setting and multi is turned off although it said play dolby when available
thanks Jeff yes it has the usb in so I might do as you suggested

 

The big issue is that center channel. How much of the mix was dedicated to the center channel. Are the vocals spread out to the left and right. Then there is the LFE channel. How much of the bass was mixed to that channel?

 

good points and why I need to make sure if I buy a 5.1 that it also has the stereo layer

 

But if there is a stereo mix on the disc then those issues would not be present.

If I'm not mistaken just about all SACDs have stereo mixes. If I recall there were a handful of SACDs early in the formats history that did not have a stereo layer. But that was a rarity. I would assume all hybrid SACDs have a stereo mix as there is a CD layer.

 

The multi channel SACD disc's also have the 2 channel stereo track.

 

Are there any SACDs with a surround mix that don't also have a DSD stereo mix? I haven't seen any that are multi-channel only.

I did just buy a SACD box set of pipe organ music that has an interesting set of mixes. The CD layer is standard stereo for speakers. The DSD stereo is a special binarual headphone mix for headphone listening. The multi-channel is standard multi-channel for speakers. Each SACD has three different mixes on it. Kinda neat. But stereo speaker listeners will be stuck listening to the CD stereo mix instead of high-res.

 

I have one SA-CD that does not have a stereo SA-CD layer: "The Big Picture" with Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra.

 

Such SACDs are rare as hens teeth. Stereo or Mono DSD tracks were supposed to be required as part of the SACD standard. It is the 5.1 as well as the CD layer which are optional as part of the SACD standard.

 

Like most have said there should be a 2 channel layer, I have found that some sacd's sound better than others and some sound worse than the regular Redbook CD version.

 

I have a couple releases where each of the three layers has differing content. Not surprisingly by the same musician.

Here's one example:
Seigen Ono – Comme Des Garçons (2005, SACD)

 

There's a note on the back insert that says

The Stereo program on this SACD appears only on the hybrid CD layer in order to accommodate the over 76 minute multi-channel surround program.​

Jeff

 

Actually, the Scarlet Book did not place any restriction on content initially, and a few discs were made with different content in the three audio areas, or without a stereo SACD mix. Since downmixing was not part of the SACD spec, the latter led to customer complaints, so the Scarlet Book was amended to require a stereo SACD mix (which could be mono, of course).