Why SACD is not bigger than it is... (1 Viewer)

[Lewis Besze]

Laserdisc managed to survive in it's niche for quite a while before DVD showed up.

It "died" soon after DVD was introduced.

 

[Seth--L]

It's not that simple. To enjoy multi-channel sound, the vast majority of music listeners will need to upgrade their receivers and buy additional speakers.

Let's not forget all the people who listen to music on a $50 boom box (or computer speakers) and use their TV speakers for movies on DVD. A $200 universal player will mean nothing to them.

 

[Frank_S]

Lee said,

Also, the labels will likely push harder for the conversion once more progress is made since there is better copy protection in hirez.

Good point Lee! I never thought of that, but now that you mention it, would'nt that be a bad thing, I mean kids have a hard time spending money on CD's, they believe downloading is essential, who'll be buying these copy protected discs?

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Let's not forget all the people who listen to music on a $50 boom box (or computer speakers) and use their TV speakers for movies on DVD. A $200 universal player will mean nothing to them.

But Seth these folks are late adopters and may only do hirez when it becomes the only option. That is not a required or essential ingredient for mainstream adoption. I know we won't get everybody.

I just want to get enough fans so we get lots of titles.

And more great, ever refined SACD players or DVDA players.

Both formats are still in their infancy. I have heard the Meitner player recently and it blows away (sad to say) my SCD777ES. Another evolution of the technology if you will with more refined high bands. Just wait as that technology trickles into $1K players in the next year or two, and as better chips improve the sonics.

As Dennis Miller once said, of course that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.

I will tell you what the wildcard is...BlueRay.

I can easily see the labels putting a real marketing push into high def DVDs. Perhaps they will look at the DVDA/SACD situation and decide that starting from a clean slate and ONE STANDARD is better than continuing to build out these formats. I am concerned about this, but the silver lining may be that BluRay would have enough capacity for even higher resolution DSD or PCM. Maybe one disc would have Redbook/DVDA at 192/DSD. Then everyone wins.

 

[Thomas Newton]

Also, the labels will likely push harder for the conversion once more progress is made since there is better copy protection in hirez.

That's exactly why I won't touch SACD or DVD-A. And I was one of the music industry's better customers, before they started their latest round of wars on the public.

Now, tell me again why someone who is (supposedly) shopping for a $70 player and who owns fewer than 10 CDs is going to throw out the CD player they already have, just so they can spend more money on less-functional discs that won't sound any better on their equipment? (The CD specification allows for way more fidelity than you're likely to get out of a discount department store stereo.)

If I'm wrong, and the players do catch on with that crowd, how long until audiophiles start seeing "high resolution" discs whose dynamic range has been artificially compressed down to nearly nothing, to make them sound "louder"? That flaw in CDs is, after all, a choice by certain people; not a matter of running out of the range available on CD.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

That flaw in CDs is, after all, a choice by certain people; not a matter of running out of the range available on CD.

There are real limitations with 16/44 CD playback that even hirez PCM engineers will strongly agree with. In fact, this was a driving force toward higher resolution audio development in the first place. Labels wanted a better, more detailed way to archive their valuable catalogs.

For instance, it is universally accepted in the pro community that high frequency signals sound very harsh in normal redbook playback.

Super Audio is beyond just the audiophile community and press. Over 2 million SACD players have been sold worldwide and the Rolling Stones series sold in excess of one million discs.

 

[Seth--L]

No. These people represent easily 90+% of the market. The only reason they switched from LPs to CDs was because the differences were tangible (small, larger storage capacity and no pops, clicks or hissing).

Anyone who listens to MP3s on the computer speakers that came for free with their computer (90% of all college students) do not care about hi-resolution (the other 9% have a boom-box/shelf/mini system and the lone 1% has a stereo system).

 

[Rachael B]

I just think SACD isn't bigger because they wanted them to fit on standard shelves...

 

[Scott Kriefall]

Hirez sounds much better than redbook on even modest systems.

But will that continue to be the case even after DVD-A or SACD sales overtake CD sales? Once that occurs, I suspect that the hirez formats will begin to suffer from the same overcompression and bad mastering that is common on so many new CDs. I do own a DVD-A/SACD player (Pioneer DV-563A), so I hope my fears do not come true.

 

[Lee Scoggins]

Once that occurs, I suspect that the hirez formats will begin to suffer from the same overcompression and bad mastering that is common on so many new CDs.

Scott,

That's a real possibility or maybe an inevitability. However, the labels that produce the music I like will mostly do flat transfers from the master. And because hirez will be more economically viable, I may have more titles to choose from.

 

[Dennis Nicholls]

This seems like a good thread to resurrect.

 

[Danny Tse]

From post #46, dated July 29th, 2003, by Lee

We have tons of titles out (1200+) and many more coming and at an increasing rate.

Wow!! Almost one year later, the number of titles available/announced on a worldwide basis almost doubled. Currently 2,244 titles listed at sa-cd.net.

 

[DonaldB]

This seems like a good thread to resurrect.

Doing so presupposes you have something new to add. Care to share?

 

[John Kotches]

Donald:

He did have something new to share. In just under one year, more titles have been released on SA-CD than the entire DVD-A catalog.

In addition, the title count has basically doubled. It equates to about 20 titles/week.

Good news for hi-res fans in general, although definitely much better for those that favor SA-CD.

Cheers,

 

[Lee Scoggins]

This may be the most generous statement ever about Super Audio from John.

I do question resurrecting such a format war discussion when there are several open, ongoing threads on the same topic.

I will add that there are about 3-4 new SACD titles being released every day. That's certainly not bad for a niche format.

Also, I might ask each of us to read the new BusinessWeek, normally a cut-rate publication as business goes, which has an interesting article on the death of the mass market. It largely supports my contention that Joe Sixpack is a mythical creature. The point of this is that better marketers will increasingly target niches and look for new ways to reach them. I think this holds a lot of promise for reaching current and future fans of hirez audio.

Whether the music industry has enough intelligence to understand and implement these new ideas is another story.

 

[Will_B]

I will add that there are about 3-4 new SACD titles being released every day. That's certainly not bad for a niche format.

A better measure would be "how many new titles per day are being picked up by retailers to stock?"

Those 3 or 4 new titles per day are being passed over for a reason.

 

[Rachael B]

Big 5 releases have slowed to a crawl. The lummbering, dull, slooth-like big 5 entities can't/won't adapt to hi-rez, SA-CD in this thread. If it wasn't for the baby labels, SA-CD would be going at about the same speed as DVD-A, S-L-O-W and S-L-O-W-E-R.

You have to wonder when Universal will follow suit and ease back on their not so fast SA-CD release schedule? The hi-rez transition is so exciting! :rolleyes

 

[Lee Scoggins]

You have to wonder when Universal will follow suit and ease back on their not so fast SA-CD release schedule?

Universal will keep releasing titles as long as it is profitable. They have had some big selling titles as well.

I think a few big releases, maybe following some kind of agreement on the multiple royalty issue, will reignite things.

We need Sony and Others to do something very high profile in terms of advertising and big albums.

The Beatles would be a nice kick in the pants!

And we shall see if the Pink Floyd and Springsteen rumors are true...

 

[DonaldB]

Donald:

He did have something new to share. In just under one year, more titles have been released on SA-CD than the entire DVD-A catalog.

No, that was Danny's contribution. Dennis merely bumped the thread up without actually adding anything. It's not that big of a deal, since there's nothing wrong with revisiting the topic, but one would think the person doing so would add something.