Why DVD-A and SA-CD cannot succeed. (1 Viewer)

[Ted Todorov]

I totally agree with Rachel B. Jeff Ulmer on this one. The music company executives are living on Mars: they need to get rid of the analog out only restriction on SACD pronto if they have any desire to see their product succeed. It is not that the overage user is too dumb to figure out how to plug in six cables. It's that the average user is smart enough to know that they don't need to!

They also need to do something about CD prices. They continue to put out soundtracks for films that cost more than a DVD!!! What are they thinking??? I saw and loved The Company recently, and wanted to buy the soundtrack. Tower Records: $18.99 + tax. Amazon.com $18.99 + shipping. Over $20!!! (and I already have 2 of the cuts on other CDs) I suddenly discovered I wasn't that eager to buy it anymore. I'll just wait for the DVD...

It's not J6P that is stupid -- it is the music company execs who are morons.

Ted

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Joe Sixpack is not stupid but he is lazy. He needs to be convinced that the extra value of hearing his band in the best possible format is worth the cost of the disc. They did this with $3.00 lattes at Starbucks, why not music?

As for execs, they are probably behaving more out of paranoia than stupidity, but suing one's customers appears to me to be the worst business strategy of all. David Kawakami has also stated that the RIAA suing is a huge mistake.

 

[Brian L]

Well, because its probably easier to demonstrate that a Starbucks coffee tastes better than say a cup of McDonalds coffee, than it is to demonstrate the sonic superiority of SACD or DVD-A over redbook.

I would wager that comparing a 2CH Redbook layer to a 2CH SACD layer, assuming they are from the exact same masters, is going to be a pretty hard sell to the average person played back on average equipment.

Cripes, I have above average gear, thought not what anyone would call high end (NAD and B&W) and switching between the 2CH mixes of most of my hybrid SACDs doesn't jump up and grab me as being that much better.

But, cue up a good hi-rez MC mix, and thats something that even the average Joe or Jane can appreciate, although again, they might wonder why this is better than what they can get now with 5.1 DD or DTS on their DVDs.

BGL

 

[Rachael B]

I've been geling on Jeff Ulmer's car stereo comment and 5 years+ into the SA-CD format, it's hard to understand that Sony has not introduced car units. Many people listen so much there. The fidelity wouldn't have to even approach home standards. The important thing would simply be to play the M/C track if desired, IMO. Nice call Jeff!

 

[Rachael B]

Copy protection is rather irrelevant if you can't sell the discs in the first place. That seems to be the coming panorama...?

Ted, I aggree the executives are living on Mars but even they are not as stupid as you give them credit for. Substitute cold and calculating for moronic, not to imply they calculated exactly correctly!

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

Thanks Rachael. It baffles me why MC isn't being pushed in car rigs. They present an almost ideal listening environment in that the positions are pretty much fixed. The younger demographic (the ones who do the most downloading IMO) spend thousands on their car stereos, and if they were surround capable and had bass management, who wouldn't be lining up for material to play on them? Since you can't download or easily replicate a multichannel disc, you have no choice but to purchase.

Seems like a no brainer to me. That the discs are also hi rez is just a side benefit.

 

[Rachael B]

Jeff, I'm visualizing the image driven TV campaign right now, "...while you're sitting on the SUX 6000's plush, leather seating you'll be surrounded by a powerful seven channel, twin subwoofer, 2000 watt, super audio CD/DVD surround system in the ultra low noise, pressurized cabin..." It'll need plenty of sex and youth appeal. I picture the usual car speeding down a mountain highway or the Pacific Coast Highway, music by Springsteen blaring, "Drivin' in the U.S.A. ..." Welcum tu mi nite-mere.

SA-CD & SACD have been cooking for 5+ years. Out of a million monkeys, atleast one of them would of thought of this by now, surely? Why hasn't So-ny? ..or So+ny? Best wishes Jeff!

 

[Phil A]

With the level of noise in the interior of even a luxury car, to a certain extent hi-rez would be a waste. I have a DVD-V in one vehicle and have played my DADs and DVD-As in it and have also listened to the system in the Acura and while it is nice, for my car I would much rather have a unit like: http://www.crutchfield.com/cgi-bin/S...=0&cc=01&avf=N

where I can record what I like on a hard drive. I don't like keeping hi-rez stuff in a vehicle and I even make CD-Rs on my Pioneer Elite Recordor for the cars as I don't even like my regular CDs in there.

As I noted earlier hooking up analog cables is the easiest of the system set-up and some of them (Rotel DVD-A Receiver to other DVD-A Receiver or Sony's SACD box set) don't even require cables. Digital connections are showing up on some ltd. (more pricey vs. avg. stuff at this point) and no doubt will make their way into less expensive stuff in the future.

What's killing hi-rez is the music industry. It is hurting. They have not faced the reality that most people think CDs are overpriced and if they want their formats to succeed they need software out there at good prices. I like back catalog releases but that will only do for a niche market. So they need to put current releases on hi-rez. They also need to price it at worst at CD-like prices. I have not seen anything from either format that indicates are gearing up to getting current releases out the door. If they don't do that all they can be is a niche market that will last for a while and probably slowly fade away.

The people making hardware are heading in the right direction. Toshiba will have a $180 list universal in June and a $200 list universal changer in May. Look at DTS. They are not in the greatest financial shape from stuff I have read. They have had public sales of add'l stock to raise funds. Every piece of newer hardware (receiver, pre/pro) now includes DTS. Look at the software, very small % of releases incl. DTS. DTS will hang around for a bit as a niche market as will SACD and DVD-A. SACD and DVD-A sooner or later need to do something more to go beyond a niche market.

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Minidisc must be Sony's favorite fringe format. Not only do they have an updated format with better codecs and five times the storage density (April 2004), but they've been selling Minidisc car decks forever (and still do).

 

[Marvin]

As an example, the 2 Kinks albums that they put out on hybrid SACD last year sell for $29.99! Either they don't want to sell a lot of these SACDs, or they don't expect to, or don't care if they do.

 

[Marc Colella]

Or The Who's Tommy going for $55 CAD at HMV.

 

[Rachael B]

Phil, the car sound quality isn't all that relevant. It's the image that they sell. The image of you slipping the disc into the ulra-attractive in-dash reciever. Stop thinking like an audiophile, audio-vidiot for a minute. I know it's hard. It's hard for me too sometimes.

BTW, that in-dash reciever you posted a link to looks pretty happenin'. However, it seems daft that So-ny didn't add SA-CD playback to it given that it does almost everything else possible short of global positioning! Or, did I not read quite far enough? I don't keep up with car audio equipment much but that must be one of Sony's top of the line units...? AND, at that price point it deserves SA-CD playback, me thinks.

It causes another thought to bubble up too. If they won't put SA-CD playback on a unit like that, how serious is So-ny about SA-CD? Best wishes old timing dude!

 

[Rich Malloy]

Music costs way too much, no doubt about that.

But MFSL (the guys who did "The Kinks" SACDs) are like Criterion... they license recordings and then go to extraordinary lengths to obtain the original elements and transfer them with state-of-the-art equipment, mastered by folks who know class from ass, and with high-quality inserts, etc. Like Criterion, you have to pay more. But when it comes to an artist/album I really like, it's worth it to me. Though I know it'll be costly, I'm never sorry to hear that MFSL will be releasing something near and dear!

 

[Rachael B]

Marvin, you should be able to find them for $25 someplace. I think that's "all" I paid for them. I bite the bullet and buy intresting SA-CD's before they possibly disappear into history's footnotes. Hey, I need somethin' to play to justify the players I have...

I completely aggree with you though. Record companies have operated on a price-gouging business model for so long that they can't seem to let go of it despite mountains of evidence that refute it. Mobile Fidelity has been around that price-point for a long time. Maybe that's why they went out-of-business once already?

 

[Rachael B]

Rich, I'm like you. I've bought all their releases since they came back except the Lennon stuff that isn't Super Audio, which must be Yoko Ono's fault!

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Funny how Audio Fidelity can use such care and release recordings for half the price....

 

[Marvin]

Be that as it may, (1) a $29.99 list price isn't conducive to SA-CD succeeding and (2) what does that say about other (unclassy) SACD producers who charge less? What do they make their copies from?

 

[Ted Todorov]

Sorry, but copy protection killed DAT as a consumer product, it will kill SACD as well unless it is remedied. I don't doubt your assessment of the music execs state of mind one bit, but the fact that they are still obsessing with useless copy protection rather than with their meager sales just goes to show how out of touch with reality they are.

Ted

 

[Rich Malloy]

Can't argue with that. Shockingly good deals (at least considering how much we had to pay for Steve Hoffman mastered titles from DCC).

 

[Rachael B]

That's a really good Comparrison Michael. The Audio Fidelity releases are the biggest value in SA-CD's on the planet IMO. The Zombies disc stille amazes me everytime I play it. I'd pit it against anything Mo-Fi has put out! All Hail Hoffman!