Is Sony Abandoning SACD? (1 Viewer)

[dany]

Why is anyone buying a brand new format where its top price and full of bugs right from the get go?

 

[Manus]

" Why is anyone buying a brand new format where its top price and full of bugs right from the get go? "

Precisely.And it doesn't even offer full support to Lossless 5.1 .Wouldn't it be great if one format was so ineptly handled that it crashed and burned and it would make it easier and safer to upgrade ? It couldn't happen , could it ?

: http://www.projectorcentral.com/blu-ray_2.htm

~M~

 

[Paul.S]

I understand the broader point of course but frankly the absence of SACD from Sony stores is old news. It hasn't stopped me from continuing to buy SACDs. Two recent (Sony) titles include the now semi-rare The Stranger from CD Universe and the terrific Terrence Blanchard Let's Get Lost from Newbury Comics. I would tend to question the musical tastes of anyone who can't find any SACDs on the market to their liking.

I share this exact concern, Marc, especially given that the first generation high definition DVD players do not support either SACD or DVD-A.

 

[LanceJ]

Shameless plug: AFAIK the players should be able to play a dvd-audio's Dolby/DTS tracks and if provided, its linear PCM hi-res 48kHz/24bit or 96kHz/24bit stereo track.

BTW: from reports, for some weird reason Sony's Blu-Ray player can't play CDs.

 

[Paul.S]

Why would the players read stereo but not m.c., which is what infer from this part of your post? My understanding is that it is not an issue of stereo v. m.c. playback ability, but that the players don't read MLP.

Btw, with the significant caveat that their search engine is dodgy, I'd also disagree with the notion that Amazon is no good for SACD.

 

[Danny Tse]

Several days ago, I picked up the July 2006 issue of Hong Kong audiophile magazine "Hi Fi Review", featuring David Gilmour on the cover (apparently his new album comes in leather-bound packaging over there) of its music section, which is a 100 page magazine-within-a-magazine.



Inside, I noticed 5 full-page ads featuring new SACD releases. Here's one from Naxos....



and here's one from Hong Kong's Top Music....



Also one for a couple of Groove Note's latest SACD releases....



Ad for Opus 3's latest SACD offerings....



Last of all, an ad for Hong Kong's Bailey Records' latest SACD release....



I remember Universal Music here in the US doing the same in magazines such as Sound and Vision. But I think within a couple of months, Universal's ads (I remember one featuring the SACD of Steely Dan's Gaucho) were gone. The music companies need to keep the public aware of these new releases. Back in December 2005, when Sony released the M/C hybrid SACD of John Legend's "Get Lifted", Sony could've make waves when the album was subsequently nominated (and eventually winning) a bunch of Grammies. Instead, I saw no ads from Sony for the 6 SACD titles it released in December 2005/January 2006.

 

[LanceJ]

I'll admit I'm no musical expert and listen mostly to rock, certain types of pop, lighter punk and some ska music, but honestly Danny, I have never heard of John Legend.

These kinds of titles that dominate sacd are by far the biggest reason I don't own an sacd player.

 

[Paul.S]

Lance, I think/hope you've heard "Ordinary People" yet just don't know that it's (a Grammy-winning song) by John Legend.

 

[JediFonger]

so people who don't like to listen to mostly jazz/classical has tastes that are "questionable"?

c'mon, the way to make a format popular is POPULAR music. throw some beatles, coldplay, even kelly clarkson (yesh i know, collective groan) in 5.1 SACD and people will WANT SACD players for the home. sure, it won't be 99% of the market, but even 50% is better than less than 1% right now.

 

[Chris Gerhard]

There must be over 3,500 SACD titles including hundreds by popular artists in addition to all of the classical, jazz, and country titles. I have 15 by Bob Dylan, 5 by Elton John, 3 by Eric Clapton, 2 by Marvin Gaye, 1 by 3 Doors Down, 1 by Ryan Adams, 4 by Peter Gabriel, 4 by The Rolling Stones, and 4 by The Police among my SACD collection. I have found about twice as many SACD releases as DVD-A releases I wanted.

Chris

 

[Paul.S]

Thanks, Christopher.

Part of the joy of new formats is that they hopefully motivate music fans to check out artists whose work they might not have otherwise gotten exposed to. Rather than continuing to kvetch here about what's supposedly not available on SACD, I'd hope that music fans would check out more of what is, often in terrific multichannel presentations. Otherwise, it certainly seems like one is going to have to write to the artists' management or stick with CDs for those MIA-on-SACD artists, since they are apparently not interested in high rez presentation of their work.

All that Peter Gabriel and John Hiatt's Master Of Disaster on SACD didn't happen because of Sony or even PG's or JH's label: it happened because the artist championed the format/high rez.

I also question the notion that 'if you build it, the market will come.' Some people just don't care about high rez audio, and--messy though it may be--I would tend to surmise that a greater number of people with such feelings listen to Kelly Clarkson than jazz/classical, which has a history of audiophile pretensions.

In any event, the presence of J Lo on DualDisc and SACD did not make those formats explode, nor has the greater amount of rock/pop on DVD-A had such an affect on that format.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

"Part of the joy of new formats is that they hopefully motivate music fans to check out artists whose work they might not have otherwise gotten exposed to."

This happened to me recently as I really enjoyed the Nick Drake: A Treasury SACD.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

"There must be over 3,500 SACD titles including hundreds by popular artists in addition to all of the classical, jazz, and country titles."

3,893 titles accroding to http://www.sa-cd.net/

 

[JediFonger]

you're just making my point more clear. kids today may d/l a few big hit singles here and there from the artists you listed... but they're still going to be big britney spear/boy band album buyers. yeah i know, spears has 1 out for DVD-Audio and Celine Dion has her greatest hits on it as well... but 1 title (like J. Lo) here and there is not going to be a catalyst for the format. CD titles still dwarf SACD&DVDA's. doesn't mean i won't venture into new music (like Dire Straits recently), but the reality of the market is such that you'll need entire catalogs to be in SACD before the format takes off. heck, just throwing most of beatles stuff on SACD should be enough to kickstart it into the '2nd gear'.

PS the big thing is also to entice artists. if artists get in on it, with a format like SACD, consumers wouldn't even know if they bought a SACD because it still plays in their CD players =). you'll need one of these releases where it's SACD hybrid ONLY to sucker the mass in.

 

[Paul.S]

Yi: I'm not making any point other than my own. And why are you still talking about SACD 'taking off'? Not gonna happen. Beatles on SACD? Not gonna happen.

 

[dany]

Except for Sony of course, most any major brand DVD player ,if it only has one format,its DVD-A,not SACD. Must be a reason.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

"Must be a reason."

Because DVDA was designed for most DVD players. But there are far fewer titles in DVDA (even with DualDisc thrown in for an unfair fight). I don't see much about DualDisc anymore.

 

[dany]

1388 hybrid multichannel sacd
494 hybrid stereo
13 hybrid mono
95 single layer multichannel
191 single layer stereo
6 Hybrid

So ya think joe blow is going to just walk in and know ANY of this or say f$^k this,i'm just getting a reg cd. Its no wonder SACD is dead in the water.

 

[JediFonger]

anyone know how many CD's there are in the circulation currently? 1 million? more?

 

[dany]

Many,many Millions.