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SACD & other Formats

I'm a vinyl guy and have invested lots of money in my TT rig and listen primarily to vinyl because it can sound so much better than digital.

I want to buy a CDP that will satisfy and understand a well mastered CD can sound good as well. I abandoned red book play back 10 yrs back because it was very frustrating finding satisfaction. Too many poorly mastered CDs that could not communicate the music. Have things improved? I know you can get better digital sound for less $$, but has the quality of mastering improved?

Looking through stores online I see SACDs are getting a lot of new mastering attention, gold CDs are available, XRCDs, etc. Is SACD the direction to look? are the current SACD issues of titles living up to the marketing hype/price? sonically? the key is in the software, availability and mastering.
128x128musichead
geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Anything can be proven with mathematics.

;-)
ptss
1,964 posts
 
Musichead, heed ZD. SACD was/(is) just a blip on the radar.
It will imminently be out of date as hi-des downloads are going to provide stunning audio quality -- it's happening now. That's where you should be investigating. Don't waste money. People are buying and praising the OPPO 105D for many reasons, and it may help you with SACD's as well. I haven't used one but people I've come to know on this site are using it; and some pf them are used to listening to $25,000 CD players through excellent systems. P.S. They are already streaming SACD's at double speed- I think that says it all.
lowrider57's avatar
lowrider57
5,417 posts
 
More of the classical labels have become committed to Hybrid SACD, so they will be here for a while. As for rock/pop, we all know the cd is dying a slow death.
jafant's avatar
jafant
19,861 posts
 
MusicHead-

big fan of all things CD/SACD here. Let me start by asking which CD/SACD did you own previously?

What direction would you like to travel this time around?
What is your budget for a spinner? Are you open to (2) spinners- 1 for CD playback and the 2nd for an SACD player?

Interesting times for this movement, keep me posted.
Happy Listening! -JA
musichead's avatar
musichead OP
94 posts
 
Never owned a SACD player, I currently use a Cambridge Audio Stream Magic 6 V2 which gives me 100% flexibility to try computer audio, downloads, streaming, movies, etc. Sounds great, never offensive. My past experience with digital was the higher you climbed the more trade offs you faced. Some CDPs produced pleasing sound but musically sucked, none could deliver the drive and impact of Led Zep and the sultry voice of Diana Krall. I gave up digital then because I realized it limited what was musically engaging. A good vinyl system doesn't do that, that is why I primarily listen to vinyl.

My last big CDP was a Naim CDS2 and my current amp is a Rega Osiris, so the Isis CDP seems to stick out as a logical choice if I wanted a good red book player. I am familiar with the Modwright product and suspect a modded Oppo would probably sound nice.

At this point I am more interested in the quality of the mastering, how broad the selection is to determine is it worth going back? Guess I should try a few Hybrid discs because the mastering should still come through on what I currently use.
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