Not wasting my time on new Digital

D Edwards,thanks for the details thats the type of info I was looking for. Like quite a few people on this forum, I have a combo 2 ch. / HT setup. If I could pare down the equipment to one set AND improve the music experience that would be great. I'm in Atlanta, I believe you said you were in the north east someplace. If I know ahead of time I'm coming up that way I'll get a hold of you. What genre of music do you primarily listen to? Also, I'm very surprised more people haven't jumped in on the thread, I get a feeling quite a few are lurking around. Normally this would have turned into a pissing contest by now. Thanks for the inspiration. The ATC's look interesting as well, I bet the really do Rock and HT well.

Hey Snipes,

Sorry for the lag time, let me answer your questions first;

"What genre of music do you primarily listen to?" It easier to describe what I don't listen too, I don't listen to Brubeck, Davis, DeMeola (GRP) type jazz, Very little country, No gangsta rap, and bagpipes.

But everything else is fair game,

"I believe you said you were in the north east someplace"
Baltimore/ Reading PA

"I'm very surprised more people haven't jumped in on the thread."

Everything I've written in this thread I have been writing on various boards for the last 7-8 years, I am not surprised.

Normally this would have turned into a pissing contest by now.

Most people have so little quality experience with surround it is dismissed not something to fight about.

"The ATC's look interesting as well, I bet the really do Rock and HT well."

The ATC's do everything well, large classical being where they can really seperate themselves with that midrange from most audiophile speakers. But there are few speakers that I can think of that can play Megadeth to Norah Jones with the same veracity and quality of two very different types of "rock/pop" music.

DAVE,

no special discs required, just setup your surround as it is now. I'm looking for someone with a system that I can help over the phone get their system correct. (snipes same for you) No takers yet. What center channel do you have?

And to top all of this off, now we have Blue Ray technology coming to the forefront from the same wonderful people that gave us SACD and DVD A. I absolutely refuse to invest in this, till it is totally proven. We all know the current fiasco regarding SACD and DVD-A. Please Sony, enough is enough.

And to D-edwards, yep I am an aging baby boomer. Been in this hobby/business since 1957, owned and sold more gear that you can possibly fathom. I do take offense as being dismissed as nothing more than a relic.

Got into digital the day it hit the streets. In fact when I purchased the first CD Player, there was only 25 CD titles in the Schwanns Catalog. Digital has its place as does analog. Also have had a very expensive Lexicon HT system. Great for movies, total dreck for music.

For all the prowess that Digital provides, when it comes to accurate musical reproduction, it is only of late, that the promise of digital is coming to light, but the jury is still out for me. It takes a damn expensive digital player to get music,not movies, to sound correct.

While it's not clear whether HD DVD or Blu-ray will win out, one of them surely will. Because unlike SACD and DVD-A, these new formats have compelling benefits for the mass market.

For what it is worth. Once again Sony wants to re-package and re-sell their existing library. This marketing strategy always fails. No one with any common sense, no matter how good Blue Ray or HD DVD may or may not be, is going to spend hundreds to thousands of dollars to re-populate what they already own in an existing format.

If Blue Ray or HD DVD is a superior process, it will have to very right straight out of the box and have such a dramatic impact to make all other digital forms obsolete immediately. Thats an almost impossible task, due to the fact that costs at the retail level cannot exceed the magic $399.00 for a launch of a new format player. Software has to be priced very near current levels. At present all I see is a lot of red ink to be overcome. And for the consumer another format to deal with, that has all the potential of another SACD or DVD-A demise, that leaves consumers with outdated formats, that consumers paid far to much for. Till proven different, I believe this to be another fad, with zero substance.

There is a need for a new digital system to raise the bar, that we have had since 1982, but major breakthroughs do not occur often and are not priced at entry level consumer gear in the initial launch. In 1982 I paid a very hefty price for a first generation CD Player and the first CD discs were very expensive, when compared to the analog LP of the same period.

With Blue Ray and HD DVD I do not see that happening. These new operating systems will have to hit the decks running and the return on investment to Sony will have to be swift. Entry level consumer electronic products, due to their mass market nature, will not have the build, parts, or reliability quality to ensure consumer confidence after the launch.

But, I am always ready to be impressed beyond my wildest expectations, which happens all to infrequently and after 48 years in this hobby business, major breakthroughs I can count on the fingers of one hand. I spent a lot of years at CBS/Columbia and well remember the Quad disaster of 1975. There is not a better mouse trap, only major break throughs that deliver the promise, and that technology is expensive to R&D and deliver to the market place.