Malata DVD Questions - DVD-Audio and more (1 Viewer)

[Keith Mickunas]

I just received my Region 1 Malata today which was shipped out on Thursday. I've heard rumors of new firmware, but I don't know if that's available yet or if I got it. If anyone knows when the firmware updates were supposed to be available, or how to check for them, I'd like to know.
One thing I've found that seems interesting is that when I hit Display, item 7 is for DVD-Audio. I put in a Chesky DAD disk, which is detected as DVD-Video. So I'm wondering if this player has DVD-Audio support also. I saw somewhere that a firmware upgrade was supposed to add DVD-A support, is this the same as DVD-Audio? Is it possible that this player is really that good of a deal? Unfortunately I don't have a disc to check with, but since I intend to get a DVD-Audio player when the Grateful Dead's DVD-Audio disc is released in a couple of months, I guess it wouldn't hurt to buy something else to test on this player now.
Also, does anyone know what CDDA S/PDIF Bypass is? The manual says the following (I'm not making this up ):
"CDDA digital audio bit stream that flew from macherism can be output through digital jack directly without reprocessing."
Anybody know what this is and what it should be set to? I have a Yamaha RX-V1 so I'm guessing I want as little processing as possible going on in the Malata.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

Hmm, nobody has any insight on this yet? Anybody else receive a Malata this week?
Also, I've got some chinese characters on the display, is this normal? And is there anyway to tone down the display a bit? Its a bit on the obnoxious side.

 

[JohnnyG]

DAD does not equal DVD-Audio. DAD discs are basically DVD-Video discs using the highest quality of audio available in the DVD standard.
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John Golitsis
Next Big Thing Electronics

 

[Keith Mickunas]

That's exactly what the Malata showed me, which makes me wonder what it means by having a DVD-Audio selection show up on their display stuff. Its not referring to DAD or DD or anything like that. It appears to imply that it can recognize a DVD-Audio disc.
The Malata is a strange beast. In order to see info on the disc you are watching, or just on the player itself, you hit the Display button. It then brings up a screen with about 25 choices. These choices cover anything from seeing how many tracks are on a CD, to what the bitrate is. From this screen you can see things like whether multiple angles exist, time remaining, number of titles, and so on for DVDs, depending on what item in the menu you choose. There are items in the menu labeled "DVD", "DVD-A", "DVD-V", "CD", "Tray" and so on. Some of these give you status of the player (whether the tray is open and such). When you select "DVD-A" (number 7) it takes you to a screen that says DVD-Audio at the top and shows information that would tell you about the types of data available on a DVD-Audio disc such as if video is present, and one or two other things. If you select "DVD-V" that is where you see info on subtitles, multiples angles and so on. "DVD" shows info that would be common between all types of DVD discs. Unfortunately the manual says nothing about this menu.
When I played the DAD disc, I looked under DVD-V and DVD, as well as the others. DVD-A showed nothing different, implying that there is no DVD-A info on the disc, as one would expect. Under some of the others I saw the number of chapters, titles, and 24/96 info.
So everything I put in there never caused anything to show up under the DVD-A display. Since I have no DVD-Audio discs, this is implying that perhaps it does know DVD-Audio and they aren't mislabeling DAD as DVD-A or anything like that. Unfortunately I've yet to find any reference aside from one comment on avsforum that a firmware upgrade was including DVD-A support. I've also seen others mention that they had ordered Malata's early in the month and were delayed, partially because an upgrade was being made to the players and they had a backlog.
So can anyone tell me the following:
Does DVD-A = DVD-Audio?
Did Malata's that were shipped in late-July through early-August also have DVD-A under the display menu?
Also, do current DVD-Audio discs contain a DD track also? I know this has been mentioned as a possibility to make them backwards compatible with older DVD players. I figure I can go get a DVD-Audio disc and see what happens, but I got to figure out how to determine whether the Malata is reading the DVD-Audio or DD portion.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

I feel like I'm talking to myself here, hopefully someone will notice and chime in.
Has anyone played with MP3 much on this? I found it does do directories, contrary to what avdeals.com says on their website. But once I'm in a directory, I can't get back out of it. Anybody figure this out yet?

 

[James Nguyen]

Keith, well, I had to send back my unit to AVDeals since it arrived DOA but they actually called me out of nowhere today to let me know that they'd sent my unit to me express mail and it ought to be here by Thursday or Friday. This all before I had even sent in my return! wow, that's service.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

I was pretty satisfied with the service to. I order last Tuesday night. Wednesday they called to confirm the shipping address while I was at work, so I had to call them Thursday to confirm it. They shipped it that day and I had it on Monday.
Well I found that if I stop an MP3, then hit clear, then setup once or twice I can get back to the point to navigate directories. But so far once I've gotten into a directory I haven't found a quick way out. Also it handles long filenames, but not extended characters (vowels with umlauts, etc.). It converts the MP3 to PCM and it sounds awesome. But then again I record my at high variable bit rates, so YMMV.

 

[Kevin Coleman]

Okay,
I just bought a Metallica DVD-A disc. The Malata only recognizes it as a DVD-Video disc and plays the DD track accordingly. So there is no DVD-Audio support yet.
I called AVdeals where I bought it and asked them about a firmware update to add DVD-Audio. He said they are working on a firmware update right now but that it would not add DVD-Audio at this point. But it is possible at a later date. The German cine-ultra DVD is basically the same player as the Malata and it does have DVD-Audio support. So it is possible it is just a software issue. I wonder if anybody on AVS would want to try to hack the firmware?
Kevin C.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

Well that sucks. Did the display information show anything on the DVD-Audio disc? I guess they have some of the support, but just haven't added MLP to it yet.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

Well I tried Natalie Merchant's album on DVD-Audio and it saw it as DVD-Video and only played the DD track. Bummer.
Anyone know about the CDDA S/PDIF Bypass? I also saw options for Original, PCM, and Original with S/PDIF for DD, DTS, MPEG and PCM. Anyone know what these mean?