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Would it be safe to say with DVD-Audio and SA-CD (the former even more than the latter) basically reaching a dead-end in the audio market that Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is high resolution audio's last hope?
With Blu-Ray and HD-DVD both supporting 8 discrete channels of 24 bit/96 kHz or 6 discrete channels of 24 bit/192 kHz Linear PCM (in either uncompressed or lossless compressed versions-- the latter supplied by Dolby TrueHD or DTS Master Audio, though there would be ample room to just do uncompressed LPCM if no video was involved) and their greater storage and higher bitrates do you believe that the powers that be might use either format as the catch all for both movies and music?
Certainly it would make things much easier for consumers if CD's and movie discs were wrapped up in one high resolution blue laser format. It would also mean the industry could put all its resources behind either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD (if either one beats out the other) and allow for actual high dollar advertising for a change and get the word out that there's a new kid in town that delivers the goods for video as well as audio content. The money spent on DVD and CD manufacturing would go to either of these new disc formats.
Imagine each and every album being master quality (and possibly in multi-channel too since there would be every opportunity to do up to 8 channels of high resolution on each and every release) and that being the standard and not the exception as it is with DVD-Audio and SA-CD now.
I think it would take tremendous will power on the part of the music industry to make such a paradigm shift as they did from LP's and tapes to CD's. However, once they made the switch it was done in a relatively short period of time. Currently, Universal Music Group has put their support behind Blu-Ray, but it remains to be seen what their ideas are for that format (i.e., if they would only release video performances much like DVD, or would they also support high resolution music releases like on SA-CD).
Your thoughts?
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Post by zeus September 21, 2006 (2 of 30)
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DVD-A went nowhere in part because it wasn't compatible with how most people listened to their music. DualDisc was a clunky and too late attempt to address precisely this omission. There's no real advantage in the next generation carrier's increased capacity for music, but I'm sure there are plans to use it for concerts etc., namely those including concurrent video content.
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Post by deckerm September 21, 2006 (3 of 30)
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If SACD didnt get embraced by the studios, nothing will. It offered superior sound, compatible with existing technology, but most of all it had superior copy protection, something the studios allege was critical. Given the lack of support, i no longer believe in the rhetoric of piracy as a concern of the labels. They had their shot at changing that with this technology and chose not to embrace it.
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The former posts all make it sound as if SACD is basically finished. Why? Because Universal and Naxos have abandoned us ? Do we really comprehend why they did so? Maybe we are currently a "niche market" but one that should grow if we are open to being SACD "evangelists". Maybe that is a poor term, if you don't like it and you can think of one better, post it!
We all need to do more to make the magazines more responsive to our existence, (write letters, write more letters, write still more letters)to the existence of a superior audio format that they only now are begining to respond to: This months Stereophile for the first time ever has several reviews of classical SACDs by David Patrick Stearns of Philadelphia Inquirer - I think. He seems to have listened in stereo only but that is a step forward!
We also need to bring others into the fold so to speak and get them to write letters and bring still others into the fold as well. That is really all there is to it do this and all will go well. Let someone else do it and whine about the potential of SACD that has been lost. You choose!
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Post by deckerm September 21, 2006 (5 of 30)
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Windsurfer said:
You choose!
I have chosen, and that is that I wont purchase a single CD that is not SACD. I have made this statement before and will make it again. I already own the definitive recordings of all time in classical music. The only reason I need to buy it again is for high resolution. There isnt a single new artist that makes me think his interpretations are more important then the ones I have on CD already.
I would LOVE to know what the classical record companies think their demographics are. Is it blue haired women listening to Andre Rieu? Is it college kids learning new music for their curriculum? Or is it us, who have listened to classical music all our lives, have sizable collections already, and are looking for reasons to buy the same pieces over and over again? If one judges attendance at classical concerts in the US as any indication of the classical buying public, then the record companies need to wake up and realize that there is only 1 niche, and that is the people who will buy 5 copies of Mahler 2, or Tchaik 4, or any of the great works over and over again, because we are addicted to the music. And if that niche works together to only purchase SACD, I think that is enough to either a) make the majors realize this is an important market, or b) lose artists to labels that is actively marketing to the only ones buying their music. I dont care if Zimerman or Mutter are on DG. They can be on Dorian for all I care, and I will buy their music if it is on SACD. But I dont buy their music as long as it is a product I dont endorse any longer.
sorry for long rant... a good 2000 merlot at hand.
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SurroundGod said:
Would it be safe to say with DVD-Audio and SA-CD (the former even more than the latter) basically reaching a dead-end in the audio market that Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is high resolution audio's last hope? h resolution on each and every release) and that being the standard and not the exception as it is with DVD-Audio and SA-CD now....
I said this way back before I knew anything solid about blu ray back in 2004 concerning Dolby, and DTS with some new hi-res codecs for blu ray.
/showthread/1275/4144
and it all came true. DVD-A, it's sad, SACD, pretty much the same story I hate to say. Now I took a look at the DTS codecs for Blu-ray, and the potential just blows me away. With the bit rate for their best codec running at something like 23 Mbits per second... well it's just amazing.
How long before DTS audio only blu ray discs hit?
Well things aren't looking good for HD DVD or blu ray right now. Although they have a better shot than the other hi-res audio formats.
Why consumers would buy hi-def TVs like hotcakes and then give a chilly reception to true hi-def content is beyond me. I have no problem embracing blu ray as a video format or an audio one at this point. Whether it's PCM at higher bit rates or??? DSD on blu ray? Am I dreaming?
I'm just tired of CDs, and the trickle of titles on SACD that I could care less about.
To be continued I guess.
- Tony
www.StrangerSoundLabs.com
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1) Almost all recently recorded SA-CD's that I have heard generally do sound fantastic - not quite sure where you get the idea that they don't from.
2) Universal has announced this week that they think that HD-DVD is the one for them not Blu-Ray.
3) I don't think that any current medium apart from hybrid (the now defacto norm) SA-CD is able to play on all RBCD players; it certainly isn't the case with DVD (in any of the standard or hi-rez versions except for DualDisc).
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Post by Daland September 22, 2006 (8 of 30)
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SurroundGod said:
Would it be safe to say with DVD-Audio and SA-CD (the former even more than the latter) basically reaching a dead-end in the audio market that Blu-Ray or HD-DVD is high resolution audio's last hope?
I think that both Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are irrelevant for the audio market. Most people are not even prepared to buy CDs. So why should they pay a much higher price for the new formats?
The music industry simply can't get its act together. They don't realize that there are two completely different market segments: people who care about quality and people who don't, people who really listen to music and people who don't. In any other industry the people in charge would pursue a two-track strategy, targeting cheap products at one segment and more expensive products at the other. But the music industry is obsessed with quantity rather than quality, with video rather than audio. In this way they are undermining their own customer base.
Maybe Blu-Ray and HD-DVD will not even catch on in the video market. Most people are content with the current state of DVD technology. And they know from past experience that there will be an acute lack of software for many years to come. Technology without content is a big problem nowadays.
All we can do is to await the outcome of the latest format war. In the meantime it would give me great comfort if the labels producing SACDs were to shift their focus from third-rate works and composers to more important ones.
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Daland said:
In the meantime it would give me great comfort if the labels producing SACDs were to shift their focus from third-rate works and composers to more important ones.
Me thinks you're a bit harsh. We have several cycles of the Beethoven symphonies, Mahler symphonies, Shostakovich symphonies & Schubert symphonies in progress or completed - I hope you're not suggesting these are third-rate works!
There are many other cycles that in progress like Brautigam's Beethoven piano music, Ruud's Grieg, Praga's Brahms chamber music, Julia Fischer is steadily working her way through masterpieces that involve the violin, Kujiken's Bach cantata cycle, Monteverdi from Robert King and the list could go on. None of this is anywhere near third-rate.
Then we have other "potted" sampling of great repertoire with Hamelin's discs of Shostakovich & Brahms, Sudbin in Rachmaninov, Davis in Elgar...
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When the motorized vehicle was invented, horses and cars coexisted a while.
LAWRENCE SCHULMAN
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