Blu-Ray with 24/192 output from coax?

"Now I might have to wait for 3D"

Pardon me for not having read about 3D, what is it?

 

Sometimes I think I'm better off staying with my "old and proven ways". I'll probably be feeding discs into a cd player and spinning vinyl while taking my last breath.

 

I thought the same way you did until a friend convinced me to go with a wireless music server. Having access to your entire music library on a cheap external drive (I use a 1 TB unit costing $150) is nothing short of a fantastic fun ride. I coded up a simple random song playlist generator to "surprise me" with stuff I haven't heard for years - what a blast that is.

I'm a 57 year old R&R music lover having more fun with my music now than I can remember ever having.

I still listen to vinyl, SACDs, and DVD-A occassionally.

Anyway, I suggest keeping an open mind on servers - this part of the industry is really taking off, imho.

 

Hi Simon,

Well, at this point it appears we're getting new formats (or the potential for such) before the "latest and greatest" has even enjoyed wide use.

While the storage potential (and talk of resolution, etc.) goes up, one must wonder just when/if the powers that be will unleash the audio side of things, rather than tie its feet from the start, as appears (to me) to be the case with Blu-Ray.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

Hi reb,

It was intended as a joke but from Simon's links, it seems I may have spoken too soon.

When I wrote the words, I was reminded of things I heard folks say when I was a child and color television was the "new" thing.

I've said similar things about surround sound after experimenting with it for a few years: "I'll go surround when the video surrounds me." ;-}
(I'd rather have two really good ones than 5 or 7 not-so-good ones.)

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

Barry,
Is it not possible to put 24/192 on a DVD-R?

 

I believe it is, but only as individual files. But Barry is interested in the album concept with exactly timed intervals between songs, etc.

 

Hi David,

To my knowledge, it is possible but only in DVD-A format, not DVD-V format (which does not support 192).

I want something playable in widely used machines, which to my mind, excludes now obsolete formats like DVD-A (good as it is).

I thought Blu-Ray machines might provide the answer I'm seeking but as I started looking into them, I found them deliberately hamstrung and this thread resulted.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

Barry,
I just copied this from the PS Aduio web site:

The PWT can read WAV files directly off a DVD and present jitter-free digital audio data to your DAC with resolution up to 24 bit and samples rates as high as 192 kHz. This is a stunning achievement for PS Engineering. The ability of a standalone dedicated transport to read DVD discs is unheard of and the PWT is the only product in the world with this ability.

Here is a link: http://www.psaudio.com/ps/products/description/perfectwave-transport?cat=audio

 

Hi David,

I believe they should have specified DVD-A as (to my knowledge) that is the only kind of DVD that can support 192k rates. The DVD-V spec supports 16 and 24-bit files at either 48k or 96k.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

They are talking about a DVD-R that the user burns from files on his computer. I believe they specified the disc had to be burned in UDF 2.0 format (whatever that is).

 

Is it possible the PS Audio transport can read a DVD-R data disc with straight up 192K24b WAV files burned in to the root directory? Seems like I've heard about other players that can do this.

 

The issue here is that many of us have not embraced BluRay and do not have the intention to do so anytime soon. Perhaps this is why, counting out the DVD-Audio option, a second best presentation would be WAV files on a DVD+R. Yet, I do not get your insistance on the 'singles' mentality in this context. The fact that the album is presented as WAV files does not mean it is still a full work with its silences in place.

Whenever one rips a DVD-A the spaces between the songs are respected because they are part of the end of each track.

 

That is what PS Audio says, and why I ordered one.

 

Hi David,

Ah, I understand. Music files on disk, as opposed to a music disk.

For me, this would be back to the "singles" orientation of current download and files-on-disk schemes. I don't want to lose the "album", where spacing between tracks alters the flow and feel, something I don't want assigned arbitrarily.

Looks like an interesting device though.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

Hi Metoo,

The spaces are separate entities. I have considered making them part of each track as this will preserve the original intent when the album (in file form) is played in sequence.

When tracks are ripped, the silence between them is gone. I saw this directly when a Soundkeeper customer recently sent me files he ripped from the "Lift" DVD-R, asking if they matched the originals. (They did, 100%, to the sample.) But the space following or preceding each track was not in the files.

Perhaps some software attaches these to songs. I haven't seen this but even if true, not all software does, which brings me back to the extracted files being a collection of singles. All the tracks might come from the same album but the way they are laid out (i.e. spacing) disappears and along with it (for me), the feel and flow of the album.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

Barry,
Assuming the listener will play the tracks in order, couldn't you just build the spaces between tracks within the tracks themselves? For example, if you wanted 3 seconds of silence between songs 1 and 2 you could either: include the silence in track 1; or have 3 tracks where tracks 1 and 3 are the songs and track 2 is the 3 seconds of silence.
I'm also a bit unclear about your thinking that a CD is an album. It is also a series of tracks on a disc. how do you see it as different?

 

Hi David,

I am considering exactly that, i.e. including the space as part of each track.

As to CD as album, I am using the term "album" not to refer to a vinyl LP but to a collection of songs and the spacing between them (which describes a vinyl LP too).

A CD, to me, is not simply a series of tracks on disk but a series of tracks with very specific spacing between them on disk. When you play the whole CD, the spacing between tracks was decided on in the mastering room by the engineer and artist. It is not arbitrarily assigned by the playback software or the listener. For example, the space between any two particular songs on "Lift" will be exactly the same every time you play the CD. It is different between different songs and this difference is preserved every time you play the CD.

To explain further, as I see it, the space needed before and after a ballad is different than the space needed between uptempo tracks or tracks where the tempo (or the feel of the song) is very different. If it is too short, the flow and feel of the album are very different. Same if it is too long.

By making the spacing part of each track (I've done this for some other folks' records I've mastered, at their request), I might get what I'm looking for. Must consider this some more.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com

 

When you purchase a CD by a recording artist, you're getting the songs purposely arranged in a certain order for effect. Song sequence on an album (or CD or whatever format) is a process often agonized over, usually between the artist and producer and/or label. It's an important part of making an album. It's about timing and feel, the peaks and valleys created when songs are placed in a series; it's continuity, or a beginning, middle and end. Can be thematic ...

 

This doesn't coincide with my experience. I have authored many DVD-Vs with Audio DVD Creator and the files I have made them with have their own spaces between songs that are respected when ripped back.

Perhaps it has to do with how the "Lift" DVD was authored because just as the option I mention exists I know of people who author DVDs by adding the spaces after-the-fact, much like it happens when burning some CDs. In this case where the spaces are inserted during authoring it is clear that ripped files from the DVD will not contain the spaces.

 

Right. Just ask Alan Parsons or imagine what his albums would seem like if the spaces between the different tracks where different.

 

We are not really talking about song sequence, we are talking about the "space" between songs. That is why, in my earlier post, I said that we had to assume that the listener would be playing the songs in order.

 

Hi Metoo,

I don't know Audio DVD Creator so perhaps it does something with the spaces. Have you created DVD-Vs with different spacing between different tracks on the same disk? Or do all the tracks have the same spacing?

I've mastered a few records and in my experience, spacing is always separate from the tracks it abuts. I am aware some DVD authoring software will build a space into the tracks. This is certainly not the case with CDs.

Best regards,
Barry
www.soundkeeperrecordings.com
www.barrydiamentaudio.com