In reviewing the discussion on this thread (which I initiated) to date, it seems like most audiophiles concede that the general public determines what will be available in the audio world and unless high end formats like SACD are adopted by this general public, they will not be viable.
I find this viewpoint to be curious in light of the fact that manufacturers of high-end, esoteric gear with absolutely no appeal to the masses, have flourished for years. This proves that there is a viable "high end" market and not everything needs to be reduced to mass market quality to be economically viable.
I think the issue at this point is that Sony wants to recapture the dominance it had with the CD patent (which is expiring) through the SACD standard, and companies are reluctant to relinquish a new standard to them for the price they are demanding. On the one hand, I don't blame them, but audio quality will suffer if we don't make some higher resolution format economically viable.
I, for one, am willing to pay more than standard CD prices for a format that produces sound more like analog but I'm also dangerously close to throwing in the towel and just going back to vinyl if we don't start seeing some high end audio companies begin to produce SACD compatible players
