DVD Audio vs SACD?

SACD may live, but I don't think it will replace consumer CDs for the same reasons mentioned above. At best, I think they'll be able to win over the audiophile market. They may win a larger market, but I don't see that happening for years...maybe decades.

Sony owns many major record labels...their own, Columbia, CBS, Capitol(?), etc. They certainly have a huge back catalog available to them, and I'm sure they can have some influence over certain artists recording on their digital technology. Unfortunately, I don't think that many artists will want to record digitally for awhile. Digital recording is still "taboo" to many musicians and engineers.

The deciding factor, in my humble opinion, is whether who can flood the market with high quality MULTI-CHANNEL software. I've tried both Marantz SA-1 (2-channel) vs a relatively "inexpensive" Toshiba 9200 DVD-A using a multi-channel DVD-A and the multi-channel is clearly the winner.
I haven't seen any multi-channel SACD software despite that Philips has a multi-channel player. Maybe this is a major strategic screwup by the SONY/Philips camp; i.e., they fail the take advantage of the time they stole from the DVD-A delay.

Who can tell, but DVD-A could still win out in the end. There millions of DVD players being sold and millions more will be sold in the next year or two. Most of these are 24bit/96mhz. As with all things electronic, DVD-A technology will be standard someday soon, replacing 24/96. These future players will most likely sell for the same $200 to $300. Joe Consumer who only wants to watch movies and listen to music on your typical mass market system will be (and currently is) very happy with his DVD machine that also plays CDs. This natural progression in the DVD player gives DVD-A hundreds of millions of potential customers assuming the typical mass market DVD player will have this technology someday soon.

Also do not forget that four years ago, HDCD superiority was suppose to make regular CDs obsolete. Now ordinary 24/96 machines sound about as good as HDCD, so HDCD is probably obsolete already. DVD-A is basically 24bit/192mhz. How soon will these DAC chips be standard, and inside the typical DVD player I mention above??? We will see ??

Rdr4b, there are multichannel SACDs out there now, as I think Sony saw the light and realized that might be the way to get consumers to go for a format other than CD. The dmp and recent Delos releases are 6-channel discs, for example. In answer to the original question, having both an SACD player and a 24/96 transport/DAC combo (no DVD-A player), the winner in my view is the audiophile if either of these formats catches on, as both are significant improvements over standard CDs. My preference is SACD principally because I don't like the fact that due to the software manufacturers I can't use my outboard DAC for DVD-A, so I'd be stuck with a mid-fi machine's internal DAC, and because I'm opposed to the copycode/watermarking practices.

Thanks, Reprince, for enlighten me about the availabiltity of multi-channel SACD. It is a shame that I only own a 2 channel Marantz SA1. Comparing SA1 and Toshiba 9200 side by side playing SACD and DVD-A, I must admit that they both sound equally spectacular versus CDs although SACD does have more "air". However, I would be hard pressed to believe any average consumer can appreciate the difference. In the end, whoever floods the market with reasonably priced software wins.