Super Audio CD

[FireInTheHole]

Does anyone here have a CD or DVD player with SACD playback capability? Are these "Super Audio CDs" much better than regular CD's? I'm thinking of getting a new DVD player (my current one doesn't have HDMI output - and I'm waiting for Bluray to come down in price) and there are a few that support SACD, but an an increased cost.

Any opinions?

[Traditional_Ale]

Super CDs are nuts good.

Standard CD is 16-bit, super CD is 24-bit. HUGE difference.

16bit attenuates its audio to a grid that has about 16.5 million slices. 24-bit is 2.5 billion.

Without making your eyes glaze over, SuperCds are great, but havent seemed to have caught on.

[Azure]

So without all the techno mumbo jumbo....whats the difference in noobish terms?

[underGRADFlame]

If it were a dial on a amp, a normal CD would be 2 and a Super Audio CD would be 11!!!

[photon]

They sound a lot better, more accurate reproduction of the original sound wave, in theory anyway.

EDIT: I'd say the higher production values of the DVD-A and SACD stuff gives far more improvement to the quality of the material than the actual underlying technology though, I don't think I've ever seen a real study that shows anyone can tell the difference, and I know of one study that shows people can't tell the difference between a high quality source and that same source downsampled to 16bit/44kHz.

[flip]

biggest problem I've found is the lack of good SACDs. Best on I can think of is the Pink Floyd Dark Side one. Sounds great in 5.1.

But you won't find a lot of new releases with SACD. In fact you might even see some sort of Blu Ray audio format with 5.1 capability catch on (eg. NINs new album will be released on Blu ray with 24 bit 96Khz stereo mixes). sort of where DVD audio failed.

[Traditional_Ale]

Originally Posted by photon

They sound a lot better, more accurate reproduction of the original sound wave, in theory anyway.

EDIT: I'd say the higher production values of the DVD-A and SACD stuff gives far more improvement to the quality of the material than the actual underlying technology though, I don't think I've ever seen a real study that shows anyone can tell the difference, and I know of one study that shows people can't tell the difference between a high quality source and that same source downsampled to 16bit/44kHz.

That study would be true unless the sound was reproduced on a very high-end system. Then it would become much more apparent.

In noob terms without mumbo jumbo, it sounds way way way better. The real question is "can your ear tell the difference?"

[flip]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

That study would be true unless the sound was reproduced on a very high-end system. Then it would become much more apparent.

In noob terms without mumbo jumbo, it sounds way way way better. The real question is "can your ear tell the difference?"

biggest difference IMO is the mixing abilities that 5.1 provides, which SACDs offer. Listening to The Downward Spiral (NIN) in DVD audio (which is far inferior to SACD) sounds insane. ProLogic just can't provide that kind of surround.

as far as quality not sure if the difference is that much better to be able to tell. Like i said biggest benefit for me is the 5.1.

[FireInTheHole]

Originally Posted by flip

biggest difference IMO is the mixing abilities that 5.1 provides, which SACDs offer.

Thanks - that pretty much sums up what I expected. 5.1 vs. 2 channel would be pretty awesome. The biggest downside would then be that I could only experience that type of sound at home on the SACD player - not in the car - which is where I end up listening to most of my music these days.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

That study would be true unless the sound was reproduced on a very high-end system. Then it would become much more apparent.

In noob terms without mumbo jumbo, it sounds way way way better. The real question is "can your ear tell the difference?"

That study was done by audiophiles with high end equipment (actually on all different kinds of equipment, it was a year long study).

Agreed "can your ear tell" is the question, and I think the answer is pretty much all things being equal, no. Time and again studies show the inability for people to tell the difference between things (monster cables and COAT HANGERS as speaker wire for instance), and the companies that push the expensive stuff never participate in any studies because they know they're selling snake oil.

The only real factor between reasonably good stuff and the super high end stuff is the expectation of hearing a difference, which of course makes a difference audible. Remove the expectation by making a properly blinded test, and that goes away.

EDIT: And yeah I've got a few DVD-Audio 5.1 DVDs and they are pretty sweet to listen to.

[Traditional_Ale]

Originally Posted by photon

That study was done by audiophiles with high end equipment (actually on all different kinds of equipment, it was a year long study).

Agreed "can your ear tell" is the question, and I think the answer is pretty much all things being equal, no. Time and again studies show the inability for people to tell the difference between things (monster cables and COAT HANGERS as speaker wire for instance), and the companies that push the expensive stuff never participate in any studies because they know they're selling snake oil.

The only real factor between reasonably good stuff and the super high end stuff is the expectation of hearing a difference, which of course makes a difference audible. Remove the expectation by making a properly blinded test, and that goes away.

EDIT: And yeah I've got a few DVD-Audio 5.1 DVDs and they are pretty sweet to listen to.

Could not agree more.

But there is more to high-end cabling than just the sound. Monster cables, for example in a live music situation regect interference far better than cheap cables.

[Flaming Choy]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

Could not agree more.

But there is more to high-end cabling than just the sound. Monster cables, for example in a live music situation regect interference far better than cheap cables.

Found this interesting read, seems like monster cables also create a placebo effect that make things sound better.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/03/03/a...ter-cable-and/

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by Flaming Choy

Found this interesting read, seems like monster cables also create a placebo effect that make things sound better.

http://www.engadget.com/2008/03/03/a...ter-cable-and/

The interesting thing is this story made Fark/Digg/etc this weekend, yet if you trace the story backwards, it comes from a forum post that was posted in 2004.

http://forums.audioholics.com/forums...2&postcount=28

So this is one of those stories that, while I tend to believe it, I'm not sure how much I can trust a random post on a forum from 4 years ago.