HI-REZ DVD-Audio and SACD Reference-Quality Recommendations

polkatese

Polkies,

I like to start a thread that hopefully can become a sticky, for us to exchange Information on Audition/Demo Reference quality for Hi-Rez DVD-Audio and SACD. Whether they are Stereo or Multi-Channels is not a factor, as long as you feel that they produce the best sound it can be. Ideally, your recommendation(s) would be something that you have first-hand experience.

Criteria of evaluation: With no added processing (i.e. Source Direct, Pure-Direct modes)
- Recording Quality
- Low: tight, deep, controlled
- Mid: Vocal, instrument separation, decay
- High: clean top end

Please feel free to add any other qualities that you deem appropriate to be considered as Reference Quality.

Let me start off with:

Steely Dan - Gaucho

http://www.amazon.com/Gaucho-DVD-Audio-Steely-Dan/dp/B0001JXQDI

Fongolio

Morph The Cat DVD-Audio
Brothers In Arms SACD
Dark Side Of The Moon SACD
Blue Man Group The Complex DVD-Audio
Any Porcupine Tree DVD-A

punk-roc

+1 to any Porcupine Tree, except maybe Deadwing

Jason

cfrizz

The Eagles, Hotel California, DVD-A
The Eagles, Hell Freezes Over, DVD-A
Elton John, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, SACD
The Carpenters, Greatest Hits, SACD
Queen, Night At The Opera, DVD-A
Fleetwood Mac, Rumours, DVD-A
Olivia Newton-John, One Womans Live Journey, DVD-A
Deep Purple, Machine Head, DVD-A
The Police, Every Breath You Take, SACD
Eric Clapton, 461 Ocean Blvd, SACD
Tchaikovsky: 1812 Overture, DVD-A
Blue Man Group, Audio, DVD-A
Billy Joel, The Stranger, SACD

headrott

Beck - Sea Change

Very good audio from the SACD. Don't recommend the DVD-A version as much.

Greg

gfong

Elton John's "Honky Chateau" and "Madman across the Water" SACD's

reeltrouble1

Jonatha Brooke--Steady Pull, DVD-A is one of my favorites, great sound and enjoyable extras on this one.

David Elias--The Window, SACD, great music just for the sake of music, some of the tracks are haunting in their sound and lyric.

RT1

zingo

Anything I've heard from Chesky Records on SACD.

polkatese

Big Phat Band - XXL - DVD-Audio

This is definitely a Top-Notch surround 5.1 demo disc. Bass, vocal, brass horns going around, and mastering quality are incredible.

polkatese

http://www.buenavistasocialclub.com/

Buena Vista Social Club - DVD-Audio

A little story: Back in the heydey of DVD-A (2000-2003) I read about the rave reviews of this album. But it never intrigue me to purchase it. So a few years past by and sometimes in 2006 I ran into a sale (DVD-As and SACD) over at Borders, and I saw this album again. I thought maybe I should just buy it and decided later whether I like it or not. More so for the fact that DVD-A format is dying. Fast forward to this week, as I am doing burn-in of Modwright and plop it in. Well, I am very impressed with the recording quality, and it's a very prominence influence of latin rhytm musicality. I don't speak the language, but that didn't stop me from enjoying the music.

Since this DVD-A is OOP, price is upward $40s for used, and $60s for new.