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What Hirez Discs Have You Purchased Recently? (1 Viewer)

Paul.S

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Steve Tannehill said:
Acoustic Sounds has free shipping for orders over $89. That's just 3 titles at $29.98 each.
The red banner at the site says shipping is free"on orders over $99*." Ninety-nine. So that would be four discs. And the italicized "fine print" below says "Pre-orders do not qualify for this offer." :(
 

Steve Tannehill

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I can wait until they are in stock...I don't see there being a run on these titles.
 

Mikael Soderholm

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Paul.S said:
Interesting and thrilling titles, to be sure, but why offer DTS HD MA as well as Dolby True Hd together with PCM, since it's all the same in stereo? Dts and Dolby are just containers for the uncompressed PCM, after all, or am I missing something here?

btw, I got the Stones Grrr blu audio only, sounds incredible, amazing what fidelity was left in those old tracks.
 

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Mikael Soderholm said:
btw, I got the Stones Grrr blu audio only, sounds incredible, amazing what fidelity was left in those old tracks.
Couldn't agree more...which is why I am not-so-patiently waiting for these new Blu audio releases to become widely available.
 

Paul.S

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Steve T. et al.:

Another interesting pricing-related bit is that currently domestic Amazon has (only) one of these UMG BD-As listed--the Anne-Sophie Mutter Beethoven--and it has a November 19 street date (whereas Music Direct currently lists the release date as TBA). More to the pricing point, Amazon has it listed for $17.98. Here's hoping that Amaz keeps that pricing and has all the others for the same, too--over $10 cheaper than Music Direct's current pricing.
 

Blair G

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Latest purchases over the last couple of months:

SACD:

Tower of Power - Soul Vaccination Live
Rush - Hemispheres
Poco - Pickin' Up the Pieces
John Coltrane - My Favorite Things
Miles Davis - Bitches Brew
Herbie Hancock - Flood
Mostly Autumn - Passengers

DVD:

Jane Monheit - Into the Sun (Dual Disc)
Nanci Griffith - The Last of the True Believers (DAD)
Jimmy Rushing - Gee, Baby Ain't I Been Good To You (DAD)
Terry Evans - Blues For Thought
 

Paul.S

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Re ^^

Blair: Post a few words about Hemispheres when you have given it a few spins? Although I need to give it some more dedicated listening time, I recently got Audio Fidelity's Counterparts SACD and I'm not bowled over by sonic differences compared to the 1997 remastered CD as of yet. (More readily interesting are the minor differences in the songs. There are some different edits on the AF release; little things like a different four bar vamp at the end of "Stick It Out.") I'm wondering how much this might have to do with Counterparts almost surely having been a digital recording. As much as I love Rush and am tempted by AF's gold CD remaster of Roll the Bones, that issue mutes some of my desire to get that disc since I know RTB was a digital recording (along with the fact that AF charges essentially the same price for their gold CDs as their SACDs and high rez is definitely more of a priority in my budget).
 

Paul.S

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Mikael Soderholm said:
Interesting and thrilling titles, to be sure, but why offer DTS HD MA as well as Dolby True Hd together with PCM, since it's all the same in stereo? Dts and Dolby are just containers for the uncompressed PCM, after all, or am I missing something here?
I'm reading mildly conflicting info about whether we're going to get 5.1 on (m)any of these releases. I haven't watched it yet, but this video interview of a UMG exec supposedly includes a comment (that sounds very "MoFi" to me) essentially saying that if it wasn't originally recorded in 5.1 there would be no surround on the BD-A (which raises the still unanswered question about whether that means they will not be putting 5.1 on these BD-As even if UMG themselves have previously released the title on SA-CD/DVD-A in 5.1). I think we have to wait until we get more tech specs on these releases.

As far as the blurb I think you're referring to from the "Super Deluxe Edition" link I posted, I just think the following is poorly written on writer Paul SInclair's part: ". . . these forthcoming blu-ray audio reissues will offer no video content, just three hi-res stereo audio options: Full DTS Master Audio, PCM (Pulse Control Modulation uncompressed Sound) or Dolby True HD." He says they will offer three stereo options (which is not my tentative understanding) but then when he lists them he uses the word "or." My current, tentative understanding is that the discs will always include high rez PCM stereo. IF there is surround, it will be DTS HD-MA and/or Dolby TrueHD.
 

Paul.S

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Paul.S said:
I'm reading mildly conflicting info about whether we're going to get 5.1 on (m)any of these releases. I haven't watched it yet, but this video interview of a UMG exec supposedly includes a comment (that sounds very "MoFi" to me) essentially saying that if it wasn't originally recorded in 5.1 there would be no surround on the BD-A (which raises the still unanswered question about whether that means they will not be putting 5.1 on these BD-As even if UMG themselves have previously released the title on SA-CD/DVD-A in 5.1). I think we have to wait until we get more tech specs on these releases.
I've now watched this interview video and I find Robert-Murphy (the UMG exec) mildly annoying--from his injecting personal editorial perspective into what should arguably be more objective executive decisions to his IMO delusional perspective (expressed towards the end of the interview) about how UMG's BD-Audio releases are paving the way for broad acceptance of HD audio 'five to ten years' into the future.

Setting my viscera aside, if this interview is any indication it is going to be imperative for critical buyers to seek out reviews before buying these if 5.1 is critical for you. Frankly, he is disingenuous in his response when asked about 5.1. He says they will provide it when the artist does it and specifically cites Queen as an example. But after this more straightforward response, he then goes into personal editorial mode and shockingly says basically that although surround sound makes sense for a movie in which you might have a helicopter flying through a scene, he says that when he goes to a classical concert that the experience takes place in front of him and so he therefore doesn't support surround sound for classical recorded music. See around the 26 minute mark in the interview.

Amongst other things, this raises the question of what happens when engineers of a particular new recording disagree with the perspective of this senior label exec: Will the 5.1 mix get released? He then circles back to his more sanguine earlier perspective, concluding his remarks by saying basically that if the 5.1 mix exists they will "make it available." It certainly doesn't sound to me like UMG will be hiring engineers who may not have had anything to do with the original recording to do 5.1 mixes of catalog titles. Mark Wilder's 5.1 mix of EWF's Gratitude for SACD comes to mind as an example of something we won't likely be getting if this exec is the/a final decision-maker.
 

Steve Tannehill

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Latest acquisition from Amazon.co.uk is Five Miles Out by Mike Oldfield. This 2-CD 1-DVD set includes the original recording remastered with bonus tracks, a concert recording from 1982 (Tubular Bells live is impressive) and a regular DVD in DTS and DD of the album in stereo and 5.1.The 5.1 mix is great. The song Five Miles Out, which is one of my favorites, is noticeably different than the original mix--different instruments and voices included.The DVD also includes the Five Miles Out music video and two TV show appearances.I only wish the concert was in 5.1.
 

Steve Tannehill

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Latest acquisitions are Rush Hemispheres on SACD, and Paul McCartney New in 96/24 from HDTracks. New is growing on me, and sounds great.
 

Paul.S

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Steve: Please eventually post word on the AQ of the Hemispheres SA-CD. I'd especially love to hear comparative comments on that disc vis-a-vis the original Hemispheres CD or the 1997 remaster. Also, how are the liner notes? I was displeased with Mobile Fidelity's conversion in their gold CD of Rush's Counterparts of what was originally a booklet into a single, big foldout sheet with way too small typeface.
 

Mikael Soderholm

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Paul.S said:
As far as the blurb I think you're referring to from the "Super Deluxe Edition" link I posted, I just think the following is poorly written on writer Paul SInclair's part: ". . . these forthcoming blu-ray audio reissues will offer no video content, just three hi-res stereo audio options: Full DTS Master Audio, PCM (Pulse Control Modulation uncompressed Sound) or Dolby True HD." He says they will offer three stereo options (which is not my tentative understanding) but then when he lists them he uses the word "or." My current, tentative understanding is that the discs will always include high rez PCM stereo. IF there is surround, it will be DTS HD-MA and/or Dolby TrueHD.
Strange, like you say, he says 'three hi-res audio options', but also one 'or' the other..?
However, if space is not an issue (which it shouldn't be, since there is no video on these discs), why mess with DTS-MA or Dolby True HD, just put the uncompressed PCM on there, stereo or multi-channel, there will still be plenty of room left on he disc. Providing lossless compression alternatives is like offering the same exe file packaged with zip and rar, in addition to the actual exeutable, just so you can unpack it using your favorite program ;)
 

Paul.S

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Re ^^ I'm largely in agreement.

I got into a back-and-forth with someone on another site who made the argument that since a particular PCM-only music BD release by one of his fave artists caused issues that the artist was not aware of until brought to the artist's attention via his fan boards, including the lossless codecs in addition to PCM when there is no space issue is a good idea. Specifically, there were folks with no HDMI AVR who wanted to use S/PDIF to get lossy surround and were therefore SOL with a PCM-only release (since, unlike DTS HD-MA and Dolby True, lossy extraction for those with no lossless ability is not an option).

I thought/think it problematic to make that argument when the only folks it affects are a diminishing subset within an already small audience (and I say that as someone with no HDMI AVR--I've been chugging along just fine with m.c. analog outs for over 10 years). Plus, the release in question was three years ago and I'd like to think in the intervening time that the number of folks with no HDMI AVR has shrunk even further.
 

Mikael Soderholm

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Like you, I still use analog multi channel outputs, works great, and I love my non-HDMI amp so much, I'm not likely to change it in the foreseeable future. But the people affected by this possible problem, ie. those who have no HDMI and no analog outputs, can not be more than a handful, right? Either you have a good amp you like, and use your analog inputs, or you have already replaced it for one with HDMI for the simplicity. Why stay with a non-HDMI otherwise?
 

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