Paul.S
Senior HTF Member
Guys:
Be forewarned: [rant ON].
So I've now finally finished reading the over half-dozen SACD/DVD-A universal player/DV-47A-related threads. I've also now read Joel Brinkley's Stereophile Guide To Home Theater review of the DV-47A. The June 2002 issue arrived shortly after my earlier post in this thread.
Boy, did my Tosh SD-2108 pick the wrong time to die (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=44033). I've been without a DVD player since February. (You'll be able to tell how deeply advanced stage delirium tremens have set in from the bitchiness of this post.) It's starting to look like I'm going to have to knuckle under, go back and read Patrick Megenity's "PCinema" columns in SGHT, upgrade the 'puter to DVD-ROM, shimmy up a tall learning curve on software versus hardware DVD decoding and watch movies on my 'puter on the ViewSonic P225F 22" flat screen monitor I'm going to buy soon (since my crappy, AST monitor died right about the same time as my SD-2108) until after CES next year. Only then will we know if there's a larger array of universal machines on the horizon. I guess I could just shut up already and buy a cheap DVD-V player to tide me over. But I wanna play all these DVD-As and SACDs I've been buying for months already, dammit!
In terms of hardware availability, it seems to me that we're suffering through an interstitial passage between, on the one hand, the lackluster introduction and marketing of the SACD and DVD-A formats and, on the other, the hopeful, eventual 'popularization' of these formats. (I'm sure some of you guys saw the news earlier this week--I read it at AudioRevolution.com--that Warner and 5.1 Entertainment are going to do DVD-A demos before some screenings of Episode II. A former projectionist friend of mine tells me that this could be a technical/engineering sticky wicket akin to what has many buying those Radio Shack switch boxes for the home.) All the while of course, the 'copyright protection in the digital media age' debate rages on.
Anyway . . . finally, my more specific point is this: in my fussy opinion, and with all due respect to Stan T and others who are enamored with the DV-47A, we should have more and better universal player options than just that unit at this stage of the game. Some have chroma bug, bass management, SACD playback quality and build quality issues with the piece. Personally, I think the DV-47A is overpriced. I disagree with Brinkley's comment that the unit's price is "attractive." I also mildly resent his latent intimation in the closing paragraph of his review that we should be geeked up about buying the DV-47A simply because it's available "now." Um, no. How 'bout not buying it and demanding that more/better/less expensive product be made available "now."
Think for a moment about how common CDs are, how mature that market is and how deep that format's market penetration is. I just bought a Sony D-F20 portable CD player (with tuner) for $69 at Best Buy (I had to be able to play Vapor Trails on May 14!). Its impact immunity is, pardon the pun, jarring--I can run on the treadmill with the damn thing and it doesn't skip. Now think for another moment about your non-HTFer, CD-buying friends. Do you really think you could convince them to buy a "high resolution" disc player when they represent a large market segment that is--bless their hearts--largely satisfied with CD sound quality . . . and the new player costs five times what they are seeing DVD-V players priced at at the local supermarket?! This is not the way to grow these formats.
Barely a year-and-a-half after the March 1997 introduction of DVD-V, I bought the SD-2108, which was remarkable in its day: component video and DTS (rare back then) . . . for $300! Now, we're over two years past the SCD-1 and DVX-A10 and the "best" universal machine that's available has all of the above-mentioned issues . . . and MSRPs for $1200? Something's rotten in Denmark.
On April 15, Jeff Adams said in a thread (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=62674): "I think what I might do is wait another 6 months to a year to see what other manufacturers come out with both sacd and dvd-audio on the same player. Hopefully this dreaded format war is finally over with affordable combo players."
Begrudgingly, I think I'm resigned to agreeing to be in that same boat. Hopefully its not an under-filled life raft from which we're watching the sinking of both a great ship (these formats) and people in the water around us (those who've bought now and may get spanked in maybe two years by the introduction of high rez players that pass signal via digital outs).
[rant OFF]
Verklempt,
Paul
Be forewarned: [rant ON].
So I've now finally finished reading the over half-dozen SACD/DVD-A universal player/DV-47A-related threads. I've also now read Joel Brinkley's Stereophile Guide To Home Theater review of the DV-47A. The June 2002 issue arrived shortly after my earlier post in this thread.
Boy, did my Tosh SD-2108 pick the wrong time to die (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=44033). I've been without a DVD player since February. (You'll be able to tell how deeply advanced stage delirium tremens have set in from the bitchiness of this post.) It's starting to look like I'm going to have to knuckle under, go back and read Patrick Megenity's "PCinema" columns in SGHT, upgrade the 'puter to DVD-ROM, shimmy up a tall learning curve on software versus hardware DVD decoding and watch movies on my 'puter on the ViewSonic P225F 22" flat screen monitor I'm going to buy soon (since my crappy, AST monitor died right about the same time as my SD-2108) until after CES next year. Only then will we know if there's a larger array of universal machines on the horizon. I guess I could just shut up already and buy a cheap DVD-V player to tide me over. But I wanna play all these DVD-As and SACDs I've been buying for months already, dammit!
In terms of hardware availability, it seems to me that we're suffering through an interstitial passage between, on the one hand, the lackluster introduction and marketing of the SACD and DVD-A formats and, on the other, the hopeful, eventual 'popularization' of these formats. (I'm sure some of you guys saw the news earlier this week--I read it at AudioRevolution.com--that Warner and 5.1 Entertainment are going to do DVD-A demos before some screenings of Episode II. A former projectionist friend of mine tells me that this could be a technical/engineering sticky wicket akin to what has many buying those Radio Shack switch boxes for the home.) All the while of course, the 'copyright protection in the digital media age' debate rages on.
Anyway . . . finally, my more specific point is this: in my fussy opinion, and with all due respect to Stan T and others who are enamored with the DV-47A, we should have more and better universal player options than just that unit at this stage of the game. Some have chroma bug, bass management, SACD playback quality and build quality issues with the piece. Personally, I think the DV-47A is overpriced. I disagree with Brinkley's comment that the unit's price is "attractive." I also mildly resent his latent intimation in the closing paragraph of his review that we should be geeked up about buying the DV-47A simply because it's available "now." Um, no. How 'bout not buying it and demanding that more/better/less expensive product be made available "now."
Think for a moment about how common CDs are, how mature that market is and how deep that format's market penetration is. I just bought a Sony D-F20 portable CD player (with tuner) for $69 at Best Buy (I had to be able to play Vapor Trails on May 14!). Its impact immunity is, pardon the pun, jarring--I can run on the treadmill with the damn thing and it doesn't skip. Now think for another moment about your non-HTFer, CD-buying friends. Do you really think you could convince them to buy a "high resolution" disc player when they represent a large market segment that is--bless their hearts--largely satisfied with CD sound quality . . . and the new player costs five times what they are seeing DVD-V players priced at at the local supermarket?! This is not the way to grow these formats.
Barely a year-and-a-half after the March 1997 introduction of DVD-V, I bought the SD-2108, which was remarkable in its day: component video and DTS (rare back then) . . . for $300! Now, we're over two years past the SCD-1 and DVX-A10 and the "best" universal machine that's available has all of the above-mentioned issues . . . and MSRPs for $1200? Something's rotten in Denmark.
On April 15, Jeff Adams said in a thread (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...threadid=62674): "I think what I might do is wait another 6 months to a year to see what other manufacturers come out with both sacd and dvd-audio on the same player. Hopefully this dreaded format war is finally over with affordable combo players."
Begrudgingly, I think I'm resigned to agreeing to be in that same boat. Hopefully its not an under-filled life raft from which we're watching the sinking of both a great ship (these formats) and people in the water around us (those who've bought now and may get spanked in maybe two years by the introduction of high rez players that pass signal via digital outs).
[rant OFF]
Verklempt,
Paul
