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More on DVD-Audio and SACD
Spock the Baptist writes "This article at CNN covers the drive of manufacturers to get the public to convert from the CD format to two relatively new formats, DVD-Audio, and Super Audio Compact Disk. The manufacturers cite the superior audio quality, and 3-dimensionality of the new formats' reproduction as the reasons for customers to embrace these formats. The article also goes on to say: "An added bonus for record companies and retailers, who are engaged in a battle against piracy, is that the relative complexity of DVD-Audios and SACDs makes them much harder to copy. At the same time, that might turn some consumers off the format.""
One: I will not buy your "improved" format. You will not sneak this by my nose. You will probably on the other hand sneak this under the nose of everyone that does not read slashdot because I have found that everyone else is dumb.
Two: Someone will break your "copy protection" two weeks before you release it and this will not effect me any more than playing DVDs on my linux box does now.
Cheers!!
what about hardware players? do they already have them? unlike compressed and lossy formats like mp3 and ogg, these are formats people are more likely to carry around and play on hardware players, as opposed to digital copying. so...why switch when the players are expensive and the gain is minimal?
BSD is for people who love UNIX. Linux is for those who hate Microsoft.
Now I'll have to buy the White Album again.
--
For the book says, "We may be through with the past, but the past ain't through with us."
I do not need new hardware, or need to buy new copies of all my music.
I would like to be able to buy compilation disks with ALL of a groups albums on it, at CD quality, though..
The law is a weapon of the government, not a protection for the likes of you. Surely you understand that.
Music companies will still be releasing crap on those new formats, except this time around, the crap is more crisp and sharp.
:)
Kinda like a bad constipation
At last, I have always needed those copy-proof CDs!
Oh, wait!
It just seems like another attempt to jack up prices by introducing a new medium. I know that it provides superior quality, blah blah blah, but really: is it worth $30 a pop? I'd rather download the movie (I'm not saying I'd pirate it, although I do sometimes) legitimatly, amd I'd pay $5, or maybe even $10 if they would just let me do it.
Depends on what you want. All of the SACDs I've seen have an extra track that's CD quality, and plays in your standard CD player. That'll be the biggest help for adoption - you can buy a bunch of these now, and when you upgrade your player, your collection is upgraded automatically at the same time.
Copying isn't a problem though - although you just get the CD quality track. I've already backed up a few, and it's fine for, say, your car if you don't want your discs ripped off. I don't really need 5.1 sound in my car anyway.
"If he thinks he can hide and run from the United States and our allies, he's sorely mistaken." Bush on bin Laden
People aren't going to buy into another format change just yet. Especially since it'll involve buying a whole new system to get the "benefits". 16bit/44.1 audio CDs are here to stay, for at least another 10 years. I mean jeez, most people actually think mp3's and CDs burned from them sound good enough!!!
...
The only hope the labels have is to release exclusive content on SACD and artists arent gonna stand for that
the 'slide
"Corporate rock still sucks. What are you gonna do about it?"
This technology is complete, utter bullshit. Regular DVD audio tracks are just as capable of reproducing high fidelity music as this SACD and DVDA crap. DVD originally stood for Digital Versatile Disc. It has the needed capabilities and sound quality to function as the next generation high fidelity sound source.
These greedy bastards just want to suck an extra, uneeded device from us as well as reintroduce copy protection that ignores fair use.
I will ignore those SACDs and DVDAs until they are digitally copyable so that a scratch in my favorite record/song no longer will set me back 15 to 20 bucks.
Stop the brainwash
I listen to most of my music through headphones. They don't disturb other people (normally) like speakers do and they generally have a better response curve than the most expensive speakers. How is 5 channel sound going to improve my experience when headphones are limited to two channels?
Casettes broke and were non-random access. CD were vastly more reliable, and you could skip the filler tracks on most contract-bands. Oh, and they sounded better.
.... Maby when I get a third ear, I'll need the third speaker.
My point being - what non-quality reasons are there for me to move to these new formats?
I've already moved my mucic to a network: I can access all of my music anywhere there's a net connection and there are no jewel cases to lose.
Be damed if I'm going back to physical media just to gain 'headroom' or for a third channel...
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
Ignoring the copyright issues for a second...
It seems to me, the cost of CDs is a sore point with some (many?) consumers already. Why would anyone think think those same consumers would rush out to adopt a new technology that's likey going to be more expensive?
It is quite simple
Haiku should not be funny
Try a Senryu
I hate to break it to the makers of DVD audio and so forth but an old saying is still true:
"In the design of an audio system the quality of the sound is determined by the weakest component." (An old McIntosh training manual page).
If my CD's only encode say 20Hz to 20Khz having speakers that can produce say 10Hz to 30Khz does me no good. The inverse is also true, if my DVD-AUDIO cd has 10Hz to 30KHz and I have speakers that only do 30Hz to 10KHz WHO CARES.
Take any speaker set you buy for under $200 a speaker and I have news, you frequency response, dB response, and all that crap the audiophiles go nutz over is not going to match the sounds on the DVD-AUDIO CD.
Any component in the audio system (walkman, integrated amps, component pieces, etc..) can be the target of a bitchy old red head! "You are the weakest link, Good Bye!"
I have a client that is gaga for audio. He's gotta have more than $40k in his system. Tube amps, at $2k turn table, the works! He invited me over to listen to a fidelity test of Pink Floyd the Wall a year or to ago. We first listened to it on an all digital system with the recent release of the Wall. Sounded great, it was an all Carver system with Infinity speakers (Basically the best system that say Best Buy could put together.) We have fun shot pool and 2 hours later ate with the rest of the guests (there were like 40 of us there.) then we went upstairs to the "Fidelity Room" He had speakers that were like $2000 bucks a piece and had a self tuning equalizer setup (It was cool to see) and then we played a few select tracks off the CD. Sounded the same. Again we went and shot-the-shit so to speak for another hour as he prep his vinyl and the difference was night and day. The we listened to some tape recording of it (I think they were called DAT recordings) and that was damn good too! Both were far better than CDs. Anyways, a few days later after I had bought my home theater setup (Onkyo setup I bought while I was working at a Circuit City back in highschool, a 646 integrated amp with infinity speakers) and he brought over the Vinyl and Dat components. We listened to the CD, Record, and DAT tapes and guess what? They all sounded the same.
Plain and simple it's like a car, the ability to top out at 300 mph is usless when the speed limit is 55. DVD-AUDIO and Super CDs are worthless unless the system they are played on can keep up.
Great idea for audiophiles I am sure but to the common consumer... useless.
I have to admit the extra features would be cool, perhaps embedded album art and lyrics would be a nice touch but again I see no reson to change unless I have the equipment that can match the fidelity.
My two cents (along with at least 40 spelling errors)
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
Not only does this format require a new drive to play, but the average joe consumer won't be able to hear the difference anyway. Right now I have a stereo and speakers that can't even take full advantage of a regular CD, let alone new "improved" formats. I'm willing to bet that most people don't have that kind of system. Unless you have an audiophile quality setup already there is absolutly no reason to upgrade other than to throw your money away.
"I've figured out what's wrong with life: It's other people." -Dilbert
Here's an "audiophile to English" dictionary:
"warm" = crackly
"proven" = bigger, less convenient, less versatile
"superior" = elitist
"music" = jazz and classical
[ home ]
These new formats are ploys to sell new hardware and foist copy-protection on us, at higher prices. Do us all a favor and don't buy into this crap.
Karma: Bored. (Thinking about resurrecting the "Anyone else is an imposter" joke.)
DVD-audio is a reasonably mature format, and many existing DVD players can read it. It contains some huge advantages over audio CD -- 24bit samples at 48kHz vs. audio CD's 16bit x 44.1kHz; support for 5.1 as well as stereo, 6.1, 7.1, 10.2, etc; better integration of multimedia extras; etc. I expect handheld players (the DVDiscman?) to become available in the next three years as soon as DVD reader assemblies become cheaper, and I expect these DVDiscmen to become cheap within five or six years.
Also I wouldn't count out a hack of both audio-CD and DVD-audio data on the same disc, using different wavelength lasers. This would totally solve the backward compatibility problem, as well as make it easier than regular DVD-audio to rip.
Can't say much for the other up-and-coming format mentioned, as I know nothing about it.
But what do I know. I'm just looking for anonymous gay sex.
No, dumbasses at the RIAA et al, people want portability and freedom. Why don't they get this yet? How many songs are downloaded/ripped to a LOWER quality format (128kbit) for the sake of convenience?
This just proves that they either just don't get it, or they are fearing that they are losing that sweet sweet control that they have had for so long. Or both.
OK, here it is. You want to get the music fans back? Take the incredibly massive archives of music that you "own", digitize them, and offer the files at a reasonable price. How many Ratt CDs have you sold over the past 10 years? But you know what - if I could get all those songs at $0.15 per song I would do it. That was my high-school years. Offer ridiculous compilation albums in MP3 format. "Top 100 songs of the 80s" for $20. Customize, you pick 100 songs for $20. I am not talking the latest releases, how about anything older than 5 years old. Those songs are just sitting there. Generate some interest in music instead of bitching and moaning that nobody is interested in the drivel that you put out. Hell, offer a CD full of old MP3s with every new CD that you buy. Something! Anything! Just stop trying to control your customers with force.
How come I can think up several plausible solutions off the top of my head, but they are blind to the fact that digital file formats for music are here to stay?
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
SACD and DVD-A players are both readily available. DVD-A can be found on middle-range DVD players from JVC and Panasonic, and on low-end players from Apex. SACD, AFAIK, is Sony-only, but many SACD players are also DVD-capable, so it's entirely possible that if you've bought a player in the last six months or so (I've had DVD-A for 18 months now), you got it without even noticing.
Audio quality from either source is a vast improvement over CD, particularly for those with 5.1 setups. Stereo quality is also noticeably better, particularly on SACDs.
SACD is a "ghost" format, in that it can be put on the same disc with crappy PCM audio. Cost can be about the same as normal CDs (I just saw a couple of Sony Classical CDs with SACD labels at Borders for $15), or substantially more. Usually there are "expensive" SACD discs next to the demo units in large stores. Almost every large electronics store seems to have an SACD demo unit and a few disks; it's a more attainable format.
SACD seems to have fewer multichannel discs, but more really great recordings (Miles Davis' "Kind of Blue" etc) than DVD-A. Sony's music library really strong argument for the format.
DVD-A is really, really impressive. When people who don't like my music mention how utterly phenomenal a recording is, I've got to think it's a difference that is noticeable.
The down side to DVD-A is that it is universally more expensive than CD, with prices in line with DVD movies; Best Buy sells most of its DVD-A titles (racked with DVDs, not music) for $18 - $22, which is simply insane. Amazon.com does better, with prices more in line with normal CDs. Best Buy is the only retail chain I've been in with any selection of DVD-A titles, and the selection seems in general to be smaller than that of SACDs.
A friend of mine with a recording-studio background has explained that it's very easy to make an SACD from a multitrack analog master tape, 20 or 30 year old recording, so those will likely be the mainstay of SACD releases for some time.
-- I wanna decide who lives and who dies - Crow T. Robot, MST3K
SACDs and DVD-Audios, when coupled with the right speakers, sound superior to regular CDs.
"if you're working around the house, then it (the enhanced sound) doesn't really matter."
In order to get the benefit, you have to be sitting right in the middle of the stereo (or surround) field of your new $600 Klipsch speakers, with a new $500 deck, $550 reciever, and maybe a nice preamp. Also, the difference in dynamic range between 16 bits (CD) and 24 (DVD-Audio), while nice, isn't even going to be noticed on any piece of music destined for the radio, because they compress it into oblivion before it gets anywhere near the station, let alone your reciever.
(Pop in any rock album from the last 10 years. Watch the levels -- they won't vary more than about 10dB. Do the same with a Beethoven Piano Sonata. The levels are all over the place.)
You've also got to care. The only people who are interested in this are classical music fans (so we can hear the difference between the 300-year-old Stradivarius and the 275-year-old Stradivarius), and the muscians, producers, and engineers who think that everyone's an audiophile too.
I'm not even sure that I'd want to hear Britney on SACD. It would probably rupture my eardrums.
DVD-A will not make most music sound better.
Which does *NOT* mean that it *cannot* make most music sound better.
Even with standard audio CDs, they (meaning the braindead sound engineers who optimize for radio play rather than home audio) only use roughly 25% of the dynamic range of a CD. Threshold-minus-16db to jet engine, yet vocals and drums have roughly the same level. So what will we get with DVD audio? A wider range, with better granularity, and drums will *STILL* share the mix with vocals.
No real incentive exists to use this format, unless the RIAA manages to force the public, via legislation or simply eliminating all other choices. None. Or, if sound engineers start doing their "real" job rather than pandering to the PR pimps (which I can't blame them for, really - I too, and I suppose most people, have had to make choices between "do it wrong or look for a new job").
Note that I do not mean to say that DVD-A doesn't *crush* standard 16-bit 44.1khz PCM audio, as POTENTIAL quality goes. But it will get used just as poorly as its predecessor.
...there is an entirely new form factor.
8track->cassette->CD
Super8->VHS->DVD
LP's are in there somewhere, along with all the lost formats (DAT, ElCassette, Minidisc, etc)
With each new toy, there was a real form factor change along with a fidelity change.
A 5" round thing that looks like a CD, plays in what looks like a CD player, plays only music, plays music at no real discernable quality gain, yet costs significantly more, and carries the potential of no copying...
That's dead before it leaves the gate.
At least come up with some new player and format. Maybe a solid state chip or something. Not just another "CD".
I mean literraly there are only so many chords and note combinations possible. Unless something radical comes along I think that we will only have new instruments to rely upon.
Heck not even new instruments. If you use the same melody as a previously published song, you're likely to face legal action. Four notes are enough to infringe, and there are fewer than 50,000 possible combinations.
The theoretical limit on the number of distinct works is the subject of a short story called "Melancholy Elephants" by Spider Robinson. Read it and weep.
Will I retire or break 10K?
There is a bit of FUD in that article and some of the posts here. Here are some details that I know of for each format.
SACD:
1. Each SACD MUST include at least a Stereo SACD section. The multichannel and CD (Redbook) parts are optional.
2. An SACD with a CD layer is completely backwards compatible.
3. Not all current SACD's include the CD layer. The reasons for this are most likely due to manufacturing capacity. Sony currently has two pressing plants in Japan that just came online with Hybrid SACD pressing capability, so expect this to change.
4. Nothing prevents you from recording off of the analog outputs or ripping the CD layer (if it exists).
5. More manufacturers than Sony are producing SACD equipment. There are many new universal players (DVD, DVD-A, SACD, CD, VCD, etc) from the likes of Onkyo, Pioneer, Apex, and Yamaha either on the market now or in the works.
6. SACD uses whats called "Direct Stream Digital" (DSD) as it's recording process. DSD is a 1bit system with a sampling rate of over 2 million samples a second.
7. No TV is required to access the disk, track access is provided in a CD like fashion.
8. All SACD's include text titles on the disc for track, artist, and album information.
DVD-Audio:
1. DVD-Audio is backwards compatible with DVD players. However, the backwards compatibility is achieved by putting a lower resolution Dolby Digital and/or DTS version in the VIDEO_TS part of the DVD.
2. The actualy DVD-A material resides in a separate directory on a DVD called AUDIO_TS
3. DVD-Audio does not have to include a stereo track. IMHO this is a bad thing.
4. Linear PCM is the technology behind DVD-Audio. Max sample rates are 24bit/96khz for 5.1 and 24bit/192khz for stereo.
5. LPCM is compressed and encrypted with MLP (Meridian Lossless Packaging). The compression is obviously lossless.
6. Dolby Digital and DTS are lossy encoding methods akin to the beloved MP3.
7. Some labels are including a "Macrovision Like" copy protection scheme on the DVD-A tracks.
8. You can rip the DD or DTS side, but you cannot rip the MLP LPCM audio (yet). You may not even be able to record the analog audio if watermarking is included.
9. The interface for a DVD-Audio disk may require a TV to navigate. There is no set structure allowing you to have easy access in a "CD Track" like nature. This is entirely up to the producer of the disk.
Each format is a bit more expensive than current CD prices. Heck current CD prices are higher than they should be, but a new format should be expected to have higher prices initially.
Personally I prefer the features of SACD, and I would love to see hybrid discs become the norm for all new releases as long as the price is equivalent.
-tj
----------------- Who is Jesus?
They may play in dolby digital but unless you have a DVD-Audio player you are NOT getting what you paid for. There are multiple audio tracks encoded on the disc, you are only playing the dolby digital 5.1 track. While this sounds better than CD, its still not DVD-Audio
A DVD-Video player will not recognize and play the ultra-high fidelity PCM and MLP encoded audio tracks on a DVD-Audio disc. To play these tracks, a DVD player is required that meets the DVD-Audio specification. These players can be identified by the DVD-Audio logo.
This seems to be an extremely common misconception, one that is even perpetuated by Best Buy employees. Ironically, they sell DVD-Audio discs but not the players!!
info found on www.digitalaudioguide.com
However, there ARE people who can hear the difference. Why make fun of them wanting something that sounds better?
All you people making fun of them...what kind of computer to you have? After all, most people would not notice the difference between a ~1 GHz Celeron with a GeForce2 MX, and the latest Athlon or P4 and a GeForce 4 Ti4600. Anyone who has spent more than $1000 on their computer setup needs to shut up about the audiophiles.
As one of the people unsatisfied with CD quality sound, I am heartened that the industry is (finally!) stepping up to the bar and trying to produce genuinely musical sound. Even if you think you have lead ears (i.e., noone can tell the difference between CD players, CD is good enough, etc.), I think many would be surprised to hear the difference when presented to them. The article mentions how even musicians think they're hearing complete sound, until they hear what's possible. Sound perception in humans is far from perfect and sound memory and recognition less so, but our hearing is still more acute than CD's allow.
Given all that, the two competing formats are interesting especially from an engineering perspective (as I understand it). I'm definitely not expert on the formats, but here's my (half-baked) take on the current situation.
DVD-A seems like an obvious winner for more multimedia capability and the appearance of backwards compatibility (its DVD after all, right?). Cool. However, DVD-A requires lots of electronics to process the signal including sophisticated D-to-A converters (a la the CD medium where they've been trying to perfect this D-to-A process for many years). This is the 16-bit... 18-bit... 20-bit progression you've probably heard of re: CD players. It's doable, but its kind of brute force from a pure engineering perspective, and from an audio perspective, it's less than ideal because the format guarantees a reasonably long signal path through all these converters and electronics.
Enter Sony's SACD. SACD takes a radically simpler approach which puts the quality of the sound as the primary driver in the format. As I understand it, SACD format is based on an ongoing stream of bits (no words to chunk and convert). There's still work to be done, but the signal path is much shorter since the electronics are much simpler (vanilla compared to DVD sound processing). Some (many?) studios use SACD in the studio record and process music before down-converting it to CD format. So, SACD is about the music.
Given those two issues, SACD could lead to phenomenally better sound even in cheaper units SACD players (than roughly equivalent DVD-A players) if (once?) volume sales and production arrive. Simpler, cheaper, and higher quality than CD (or DVD-A for the most part). So, I'm kind of taken with the SACD approach for the new audio standard. Perhaps DVD's themselves can upgrade (higher capacities for higher resolution movies) without worrying about DVD-A so much. Good sound for movies is nice, but at least get better than 640x480 resolution for the movies!
So, here's one vote for a next generation audio format. And there are my (random, not entirely informed) two cents on the competing formats.
1) would love to read about a test where an IDENTICAL signal source was recorded in CD and SACD and compared, BLIND, by ordinary consumers. Is the difference really audible?
2) More to the point, is there any way to STOP CD publishers from deliberately introducing degradation into the CD track in order to make the SACD sound better by comparison? Not that they would ever do such a thing, of course... but I'd like to see at least a truth-in-advertising disclosure if they did.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Not very, that is. This arrangement is the worst possible, since you will have 100% phase cancellation (in theory). In reality, your bass-to-low/midrange will fade out, and you will have no imaging or soundstage. This effect will vary greatly due to diffraction, leading to large changes in sound depending on where your head is.
The reason headphones work is that all of the sound is going into your ears: no possibility for cancellation. Personally, I much prefer loudspeakers for "thre dimentionality."