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DVD-A question

I'm relatively new to DVD-A. I love the sound, but don't like the format itself, for various reasons:

1) You need a TV to play the disc. There is no TV in my music room (and never will be!), so SACD/CD/Vinyl rules there. Is there a DVD-A player out there that can be EASILY used without having to use the onscreen menus to select between 2CH/MCH, etc.?

2) Some DVD-A discs play a little snippet of music over and over again until you've done your setup and hit PLAY. For instance, I have "Monster" by R.E.M., and it plays about 30 seconds of "What's The Frequency, Kenneth" over and over until you stop it. It does this before you do your setup, AND after the disc ends. This is one of the most annoying things I've ever encountered. Is there a player out there that can essentially disable this "feature".

3) Where SACD has a discrete Stereo layer and a Multichannel layer, does DVD-A also have this? I've been reading a little bit, and it sounds to me like DVD-A in stereo is actually a mix-down of the multichannel information. Is this true? Is this something to be concerned with? Especially when choosing a DVD-A player?

I currently have a junky Toshiba player, and am thinking about getting a better DVD-A player. Or should I just keep my Toshiba because DVD-A is dead?

Thanks in advance.

Tom
tfkaudio
mark02131's avatar
mark02131
99 posts
 
I have a McIntosh MPV851, Because of the display I could use this without a TV but I got a 15" flat panel monitor that I hung on the wall. I also use it for my XM tuner because it displays the title and artist of the song being played. I did turn the brightness all the way down so that when the lights are dimmed its not obtrusive. The McIntosh player will play in many different ways.

The formats depend on what's on the disk like
Normally these are on the disk

1) It will play 5.1 multi channel
2) 2 channel high resolution ether 96/24 or 192/24

Now this is where there things differ:
some DVD-A disks have a "mix down" track this is a special track that is used to down mix the multi channel to 2 channel If you select multichannel and you have your player configured for 2 channel it will use the mix down track.
With the McIntosh player if there is no mix down track and you are only using 2 channel it will do the mix down itself, it has it's own logic in it to do that

It can also play moves or a concert video on it. using the DVD-Video soundtrack.

You ask "is it dead" Well if its computer related media and it came out yesterday then of course it's dead. Tomorrow there is HD DVD and Blueray technology that will be at war with the DVD and SACD format. I guess if you get something with a good trade in value you can just keep trading in every few years and maybe someday it will settle down like LP's and CD's have.
robm321
932 posts
 
As bad as the software selection for SACD considering how long it's been out, DVD-A software selection is dismal.

Add to that all the setup irritations and limitation, and the only thing I give it credit for is surviving.

Did they give up on the format or what? I haven’t really followed DVD-A much.

Rob
kana813
956 posts
 
Anyone who doubts the value/performance of DVD-A/HiRez PCM should listen to a Classic Records DAD. IMO- the recording industry screwed up the format by trying to capture the surround sound HT
market.
robm321
932 posts
 
I certainly don't doubt the performance of DVD-A - in fact, I think it sounds marginally better than SACD, but I had to go with SACD simply becuase DVD-A was too scarse. I'm sure someday if it is still around I'll get a Universal player.

Rob
tfkaudio OP
591 posts
 
Thanks for the responses! I think I'm gonna sit awhile on the fence with this one. DualDisc and BlueRay would seem to jeopardize the future of DVD-A far more than SACD, and since I have over +100 SACDs now and only 4 DVD-A's, I think I'll continue buying SACD's for now.
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