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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
zd542
5,339 posts
 
"03-07-15: Tomcy6
ZD542, the $18 to $30 is on the hi-res download sites HDTracks and Acoustic Sounds Super HiRez. There were some titles at HDTracks on sale for $15.

Colekat, SACDs outside of classical are being released at the rate of one or two a month except for Japanese SHM SACDs which cost $40 to $90 apiece. The most desirable out of print SACDS go for very high prices. Only the ones no one wants are cheap. So I would say that SACD is not a vibrant, growing format. I enjoy SACDs and wish there were a lot of them that I wanted at good prices, but there just are not very many."

That's foolish. People like this never learn. All they're going to do is drive people to download without paying.
musichead's avatar
musichead OP
94 posts
 
To try SACD in my system can I just buy a cheaper SACD player and and use it as a transport to feed my DAC? Or is a full player required?
dsper
663 posts
 
The trick about CD and SACD, or any comparison, is that you need to get the volume equal from either source in blind testing.

Wonder what we would say if we could do that?
musichead's avatar
musichead OP
94 posts
 
Is the SACD signal louder? When I compare components I also do background listening. If it's musical it will draw you in if it's not it can be annoying or you don't even notice it. This is the subconscious response to it vs direct analysis of sound. This is where vinyl kills most digital systems.
zd542
5,339 posts
 
"03-09-15: Musichead
To try SACD in my system can I just buy a cheaper SACD player and and use it as a transport to feed my DAC? Or is a full player required?"

You need to get a full SACD player. There's very few SACD transport/dac combos in production. And the ones I do know of are very expensive. But getting a cheap SACD player to try SACD's is not the right way to do it. A well designed, good sounding Redbook player will almost always sound better than a cheap SACD player. The format alone can't overcome every obstacle and always sound better than CD. You need to buy an SACD player the way you buy any other piece of audio gear. And that's to employ careful consideration of any player you are looking to buy. Like any other component, you need to make sure the player is the right fit for your expectations.
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