DVD-Audio council announces 70 titles before year's end. (1 Viewer)

[Lee Scoggins]

If there's one thing in common between the DVD-A/SACD guys on this board, we're all self serving - anything that gets us more high-res audio

I agree. The more titles, the happier I am ...and likely the more that hirez succeeds....

Al, for the record I love Sinatra and I did not pick up initially on the Rat Pack album.

I do think its a shame that Universal is offering the same titles in DVDA as SACD. If they offered a different set those of us with both SACD and DVDA would have more titles to buy.

I do look forward to the REM and the new Greendale is very good also.

 

[John Kotches]

I do think its a shame that Universal is offering the same titles in DVDA as SACD. If they offered a different set those of us with both SACD and DVDA would have more titles to buy.

The bulk of the work was done for the DVD-Audio releases when they were prepped for SACD release. Multi-channel masters for analog sourced releases were done at 24/96K, so they are perfectly setup for DVD-Audio release.

Therefore, the effort to deliver as DVD-Audio titles is minimal... DVD-Audio authoring, menuing and bonus materials if they are so inclined.

While as music lovers we would undoubtedly have preferred a broader title selection, from a business perspective it's a smart move in leveraging their early efforts. I think I can understand the reasoning behind their decisions, even if they aren't the same choices I might have made myself.

Regards,

 

[Rachael B]

John, it's predatory marketing, but hey, they may want to run the formats head to head and see what happens? Wouldn't you?

 

[John Kotches]

Rachael,

Universal might be wanting to capture sales across the entire Hi-Res market for a title, not just one formats worth.

Then again, I don't claim to be an expert in business strategy... I've got some decent computer geek skills though and a lot of experience in leveraging previous work efforts into newer solutions.

Regards,

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Universal might be wanting to capture sales across the entire Hi-Res market for a title, not just one formats worth

They could be thinking that the marginal cost of producing DVDAs is outweighed by the additional sales revenue of the same titles.

One could argue that the smartest move is keeping your best customers happy. Repetitive titles don't seem to be keeping us happy here.

Its a shame we aren't getting more 192K sampling rate stuff though. That's where DVDA really sounds good.

 

[Gordon McMurphy]

I'll be buying the Neil Young titles for sure. They are 176.2khz stereo - no 5.1, which doesn't bother me in the slightest. I hope that everything from Neil Young to Rust Never Sleeps is released next year.


Gordy

 

[Michael St. Clair]

Post deleted.

 

[Felix Martinez]

I'm surprised no one noticed the Fleetwood Mac titles are MIA. I contacted Rhino and got this response...

Hello Felix. Unfortunately we are still waiting for the Fleetwood Mac titles. With them on tour they have not had the chance to finish them.

...so it's good to see those titles are still on track - maybe not for 2003, but soon!

Cheers,

 

[Justin Lane]

Its a shame we aren't getting more 192K sampling rate stuff though. That's where DVDA really sounds good.

I agree as the 192K sampling rate IMHO provides the best audio presentation available to consumers today.

The bright side is that in the case of the Universal releases, getting discs at 24/96 we are getting the actual master. The Universal SACD convert these PCM masters to DSD altering the original sound quality of masters for their SACD releases. So buying the DVD-A, even if you already own the SACD, will result in an upgrade in sound quality truer to the original master. Most sensible audiophiles perfer this scenario instead of having to compromise sound quality in anyway with additional unneccessary conversions.

J

 

[Dan Hitchman]

Justin:

Are all of Universal's SACD's from PCM masters? Could some of the older titles (like the E.T. soundtrack) be coming from analog restorations so that Universal is doing analog to PCM and analog to DSD transfering on those titles?

Where can we find the definitive answers to the source material used for these releases?

I certainly don't want to buy SACD's that are PCM to DSD transfers or even DVD-Audio discs that may in some rare instances be DSD to PCM, let alone analog to PCM to DSD. You're right in the fact that there shouldn't be unnecessary conversion steps. At least with Telarc and a few other audiophile labels you know to which high rez. camp they belong to (Telarc releases are pure DSD recordings and released on SACD, Fantasy Record's classic albums are strictly analog to DSD, etc. etc.)

When will the big labels like Universal learn??

Dan

 

[John Kotches]

Dan,

All multi-track analog tapes on the Universal releases were transferred to 24/96K for mixing. The 6-channel masters (5.1 is 6 channels ) were then transcoded (for lack of a better term) to DSD.

It is possible that analog stereo masters went straight to DSD, but since my personal interest is in surround I haven't paid much attention to the stereo tracks.

FWIW, I don't like using the term "upsample" or "downsample" when going PCM --> DSD or DSD --> PCM as they are not the same formats.

Regards,

 

[KeithH]

Not a very impressive list. The titles that interest me most are already out on SACD -- Steely Dan Gaucho and Peter Frampton Frampton Comes Alive. I will consider the R.E.M. compilation, though.

I get tired of saying it, but would WEA get off its ass already and give us Prince, Madonna, Van Halen, Dire Straits, etc., etc., etc.?

 

[Justin Lane]

I get tired of saying it, but would WEA get off its ass already and give us Prince, Madonna, Van Halen, Dire Straits, etc., etc., etc.?

I agree totally Keith. And when they are at it, give us some Talking Heads, Zeppelin Studio albums, early Metallica, and some early James Taylor (they love putting out greatest hits discs for Taylor, why not a DVD-A).

It is nice to see they are actually getting out some Sinatra, Neil Young, and supposedly the rest of the REM catalog, but they could be doing so much more.

J

 

[Rachael B]

Dan, John Kotches said in a thread recently that all the Universal discs were sourced from PCM. IMO, that hasn't stoped many of them from sounding really good. When I heard the new Aaron Neville disc, I could hardly believe it wasn't DSD recorded. I'm not unconcerned how audio discs are sourced, but DSD to PCM or vice versa, doesn't scare me off.

 

[John Kotches]

Rachael,

To be clear, the MC tracks are PCM at some point in time.

Some of the stereo tracks, and before you ask I don't know which ones, were straight Analog --> DSD.

Regards,

 

[Rachael B]

John, to me, that means having some PCM somewhere/anywhere in the the process doesn't mean the sky is falling. Although I've been hit with pieces of it many times. There are oodles of great sounding SACD's that have been PCM at some point, I'm sure. In fact, I'd be shocked if original DSD recordings couldn't be used to make dynamite DVD-A's. I just don't think which of the two formats that we the consumer ends up with really makes all that much difference, sound-wise. You and Lee can argue about what's theoretically best till ya'all are blue in the face, but "mallato" recordings abound and they sound OK to me. Hail uni-player U.! Best wishes!

 

[John Kotches]

Rachael,

There have been a few titles that were initially captured as DSD than transcoded to PCM. There are many, many more SACD releases that have transcoded PCM to DSD for release.

Something I said a while back still holds true though...
If the initial capture is crap, it doesn't matter what format it is released in. It will be what it is

Cheers,

 

[Rachael B]

John, I aggree! I know of plenty of albums that sound poorly in any (every) format they've ever been issued in. Best wishes!

 

[Lee Scoggins]

If the initial capture is crap, it doesn't matter what format it is released in.

That's a generally valid rule of thumb, but sometimes upsampling can improve the sound if done right.

 

[John Kotches]

ROFLMAO Lee.

Nothing can remove the fact that a crap capture is just that.

OTOH, if you're talking about terrible mastering that's a different story.

Regards,