Blu-Ray Pure Audio

Tornado Red

F1nut wrote: »

That SHM-SACD is $41.00 from CD Japan.

Got to admit, I'd really like to hear a copy of that to compare. Nothing like sizing up 2 different formats with your own ears on your own equipment.

FTGV

F1nut wrote: »

You do realize that Blu-ray Audio is the same thing as that old average technology DVD-A, right?

Yes same hi rez linear PCM 24/192k capability.Average? Not in the least.

F1nut

Come on Fred, keep up. :razz: Go back and read BlueFox's comments and I believe it will all make sense.

FTGV

My bad. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jofNR_WkoCE

BlueFox

F1nut wrote: »

Well, you're the one that said there was no technical reason or data. A technical reason/data was presented and now you want to dismiss it?

Well, this thread is about Blueray audio, and Headrott had to say that SACD will sound better. Pulling a quote out of an article does not provide any proof that an SACD will sound better. It is just a quote, and it wasn't even related to sound quality. It is mentioning a difference between two technologies, not saying because of this feature SACD will sound better.

While SACD and high-res files are different technologies, the end result will be the same. The final 'sound' will be determined by the gear, cables, power, and room. Not the file format.

4xoddic

Tabula Rasa
$30 per SACD (All prices include shipping and any applicable sales tax.)

To order send either an International money order or a bank draft made payable to Water Lily Acoustics to the address below.

Water Lily Acoustics
p.o. box 91448
Santa Barbara, CA. 93190 USA

http://www.waterlilyacoustics.com/main.htm

Amazon (source of prices above) reviews say Tabula Rasa better than Ry Cooder, V.M. Bhatt — A Meeting by the River, SACD.

DSD download direct from Salina, KS:

http://store.acousticsounds.com/d/94737/Bela_Fleck__Vishwa_Mohan_Bhatt-Tabula_Rasa-DSD_Download

The Sony SACDP was purchased for blu-ray duty until I open the lid on my BDP-51D & put my prosthetic eye in search mode for dust & dog hair. The Pioneer (w/firmware update) was refusing to play too many Netflix blu-rays. Not ONE refusal w/Sony!

For reference sake, ~ 1969 I owned a mono Sony cassette recorder (size of a suitcase), which used a cassette ~ 1/2 the thickness (other dimensions similar) of an 8-track. I replaced it with a Sony stereo 8-track recorder, until going to a TOTL Pioneer CT-F9191 in 1975. I never had the bad habit of purchasing new pre-recorded 8-tracks nor cassettes. Cuts were never broken by changing tracks/flipping a cassette.

http://www.hifiengine.com/library/pioneer/ct-f9191.shtml

4xoddic

Yes, the 51 doesn't seem to have any qualms about Redbook. I think my plan is to pop the lid, Dustoff & connect analog to the new TEAC ud-501 & rerip all my CDs to ALAC. As I read up on PureVinyl, it appears that my Apples all lack sufficient RAM to be top-notch. I'm working with Santa on that.

The wife's ban on new CDs means she frowns of blu-ray purchases as well. I do enjoy Jeff Beck Live @ Ronnie Scott's quite a bit. Last night, I caught the wife playing a memory game on the iPad while sitting in front of the R channel RTiA9 as Emmylou's Stumble Into Grace was wified to the ATV. Turned the dBs down several notches w/out a response. Proves even she can't multitask beyond 2 diversions.

mantis

F1nut wrote: »

I found this.




Are there any high end Blu-ray audio only players on the market?

I have not seen one if there is. Everyone is a Blu ray Video player. I honestly think it's a bit late to the party for things such as this. With all the Online High Rez Music you can purchase now, I just don't see the need for Physical Media anymore. I think the benefits outweigh the negatives in most cases. I do however like to hold a Jewel case and read but I'll gladly give that up for not having hundreds of discs everywhere that I have to store and clean all the time.

When Blu ray Audio was coming out ,I'll admit I was very excited. But that really faded quickly. How many Discs are available now?

mantis

tonyb wrote: »

LOL.....You guys crack me up. Like a bunch of dudes in the bathroom measuring d$cks.

Basically what this all comes down to is splitting hairs. PCM...DSD...SACD...BR audio....as long as it sounds good to you, who gives a flying......you know what.

Some of you guys act like audio is a race to squeeze out every last drop of resolution in a source component or file.....then throw it all 2 sheets to the wind by playing it all back on tube gear which isn't the most resolute. But tubes sure do add some soul, musicality to what hits it, that's the magic. I think there's a fine line between resolution and musicality, too much resolution sucks the musicality right out imho. If they can retain the musicality chasing the resolution, that's one thing, but so far I haven't seen or heard any evidence of that. Once I get an ear on DSD done right.....hello Rich....then I'll make some more conclusions. But so far, SACD sounds good if the recording is good, the **** child redbook cd can sound just as good as some SACD, and to these ears anyway BR audio sounds just as fine as SACD......in as far as what I've heard to date anyway.

Maybe some of the audio nerds like storing their music in 5-6 different formats, but the majority don't. This is why these constant format wars never take foot and remain a niche market. Digital files, good or bad is the future, that's where the most use will be, that's where the money will be to be made, thus the industry will follow suit. Anything that furthers the quality of digital files will be welcomed with open wallets, and the bean counters know this.

I agree with you in all kinds of ways.

BlueFox

Leaving aside the discussion of which format sounds better, I just ripped my first Blueray audio disk, the Pure Audio version of Grrr! by The Rolling Stones. To do this I needed to buy a BR drive to attach to my computer, and two software programs.

This is the drive I purchased from Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001TVAU0E/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The software is one program to decrypt the files, and the other extracts the audio files to your hard drive. This link explains the two pieces of software needed.
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/content/473-ripping-blu-ray-easy-way/

So, how does it sound? Absolutely fantastic. These are the first high-res files I have tried, and they will not be the last. This Blueray Audio is a great idea so long as you rip them to a music server.

Of course, nothing ever works like it should when dealing with computers, so I had these issues.

1. Attaching the BR drive to my USB hub I got an over power error. I had to disconnect the hub, and attach the drive directly to the computer.

2. The software for extracting the audio files showed no files even though they were decrypted. Then I again used the decryption software to rip the BR to my hard drive. This took about 30 minutes, and the extraction software was able to see the files.

3. After this, it went rather smooth. While not a technical issue, this part was a pain in the butt. Since there was no metadata for the files, I had to edit the name for all 50 tracks in the extraction software. Once that was done I selected to encode the 96/24 files in ALAC to cut the storage space requirements in half. I have been very happy with ALAC for CD files, so why change now. Except they won't play. Need to contact Bryston about this deficiency.

4. I then tried one file saved as FLAC. This worked, so I then went through the whole process again of editing 50 song titles, and extracting them as FLAC files.

Once the files were extracted I copied them to backup, and onto the music server drive. Now I can easily select one file, or all files to play.

Life is good. I can't wait for Exile on Main Street to arrive.

tonyb

Glad your diggin' it Fox, but lets talk turkey here.

That's way too much headaches for the average person, or not so techy consumer. The way hi-rez audio is today, it amounts to a hundred different trial balloons to see what sticks. When they come out with one device or one computer that is built for good audio, is easy to use, and comes with software designed for good audio, at a reasonable price, then it will take off. Just too many different ways to screw stuff up or this not working with that....blah blah.

Some would say a higher end music server is such a device, but not really. While built for audio, your unable to add software to it like a computer. If they could take a good music server and incorporate that into a computer as an all in one with out compatibility issues, they'd have a seller.

Something like a Q-sonix or Olive, where you just drop the cd in and your done. But able to do other tasks we normally do on a computer Kinda like what the OPPO 105 did in combining many different pieces of gear, to cover the main formats.....with ease. We need such a device for combining computers and good audio.

Tornado Red

You can't stop progress, and some combination of streaming/server/computer I'm sure will be the way to travel. But I think it would be financially unwise to abandon a huge section of the baby boomers who wish to hold onto their shiny discs. Therefore,IMO, I think the death of that section of audio/video software will be very slow.

BlueFox

tonyb wrote: »

Glad your diggin' it Fox, but lets talk turkey here.

That's way too much headaches for the average person, or not so techy consumer.

I agree with that. :eek: However, now that I have it working, other rips should be much easier.

The way hi-rez audio is today, it amounts to a hundred different trial balloons to see what sticks. When they come out with one device or one computer that is built for good audio, is easy to use, and comes with software designed for good audio, at a reasonable price, then it will take off. Just too many different ways to screw stuff up or this not working with that....blah blah.

Some would say a higher end music server is such a device, but not really. While built for audio, your unable to add software to it like a computer. If they could take a good music server and incorporate that into a computer as an all in one with out compatibility issues, they'd have a seller.

I disagree with this. Computers make terrible music servers. They have mechanical noisy fans, electrical noisy power supplies, and spinning vibration inducing hard drives. Everything needed to conspire against quality sound reproduction. Use a computer for computing, and background listening, and a dedicated music server for serious sound.

The Bryston BDP1 and BDP2 are designed solely for accurate digital sound reproduction. They are Linux based computers with a Bryston designed power supply, and a Bryston enhanced high-end sound card (digital out). There are no fans, hard drives, or any other source of noise, and the drive attaches either through USB or NAS (BDP2). Files are read from the drive, stored in RAM, and then read from RAM for extremely low jitter.

Even better, for the consumer, these devices are designed as a high-end advanced CD transport, but with much lower jitter. This means you just select via the remote a CD to play, and away it goes. Plus, you can select multiple CDs to play, put them in a random order, play random files from multiple CDs, create playlists of music types, create playlists of favorite songs, etc., etc.

Other than getting files onto the hard drive, it is easier to use than a regular CD player. However, I agree this process needs to be easier, and as time goes by, it will be.

steveinaz

I'd love to have that BDP-1 (or 2). If/when my SQB dies, I'll be going in that direction.

tonyb

I think your missing my point Fox. I didn't mean desk top computers as they are today. That we can agree on, lousy for audio. But, lets say you took the BDP 1 and added internet connectivity to it. Those electronics for computing being in the same chassis but separate. Would that not be something someone would buy ?

BlueFox

tonyb wrote: »

I think your missing my point Fox. I didn't mean desk top computers as they are today. That we can agree on, lousy for audio. But, lets say you took the BDP 1 and added internet connectivity to it. Those electronics for computing being in the same chassis but separate. Would that not be something someone would buy ?

Maybe, but that would be similar to putting internet connections into a CD player. Where that might be useful for a BDP type player is if you could stream lossless audio off the internet. Since you cannot do that at this point in time, adding internet connectivity would be nice, but not a deal breaker. Since the BDP connects to your home network, one benefit of it would be to allow Bryston to update the firmware remotely. Let me ask Bryston, on another forum, if they considered that.

As a side-note, Nirvana's Nevermind on Pure Audio BR arrived yesterday, hopefully Exile On Main Street ships today, and I can rip both this Friday. I bought an AC powered USB hub so that I can the BR drive into the hub versus the computer.

4xoddic

"System Requirement : Windows 98SE/2000/ME/XP/Vista/ Windows 7, not for Mac" <- HAL: "It can only be attributable to human error." 1968

Fox Says:

"The Bryston BDP1 and BDP2 are designed solely for accurate digital sound reproduction. They are Linux based computers with a Bryston designed power supply, and a Bryston enhanced high-end sound card (digital out). There are no fans, hard drives, or any other source of noise, and the drive attaches either through USB or NAS (BDP2). Files are read from the drive, stored in RAM, and then read from RAM for extremely low jitter.

Even better, for the consumer, these devices are designed as a high-end advanced CD transport, but with much lower jitter. This means you just select via the remote a CD to play, and away it goes. Plus, you can select multiple CDs to play, put them in a random order, play random files from multiple CDs, create playlists of music types, create playlists of favorite songs, etc., etc."

I just ordered 8 GB of RAM + 120 GB SSD for my 2009 MacBook Pro = no fans, hard drives, or any other source of noise, and the MBP attaches via a $15 Nuforce Impulse USB to my TEAC UD-501. I plan on plugging the BDP-51FD into the RCAs on the TEAC, to test against the MBP's drive. My next big task will be storage.

I agree with tony: "That's way too much headaches for the average person, or not so techy consumer." NOTE: I sometimes regret not accepting a computer specialist internship with the Department of Army Materiel Development & Readiness Command in 1980. But those were the days of FORTRAN & punchcards.


Regarding Jitter, see:

http://archimago.blogspot.ca/2013/05/measurements-bit-perfect-audiophile.html

Apologies to tonyb. for the myriad of test result graphs. Archimago makes this reply to the topic of "subjectivists." DISCLAIMER: I live next door to a family of evangelists. The LDS Church is 3 blocks from my house.

"I *try* to avoid arguments with hard-core subjectivist folks. Pointless. I'd probably have better luck with the evangelists that come by my door once awhile. I usually just remind them that I'm after accuracy from the gear; nothing more, nothing less - ALL of that can be measured by instruments more accurate than my ears/brain."

Still no emoticon for /sarchasm ?

tonyb

Not me, I love to argue.....ok, discuss is more appropriate. Graphs do me almost no good. While certain instruments can measure things down to the last detail, it still gives hardly no indication of how something will sound or how musical a piece will be. Accuracy is all well and good but I'd sacrifice some for musicality if I had to.

BlueFox

I just ripped the BR Audio version of Nirvana's Nevermind to the music server. This was a lot smoother since I knew what I was doing this time. I also added an AC powered USB 3.0 (2.0 compatible) hub, and now I can have the original hub with two hard drives, and the BR drive plugged in without getting an over power error.

I had previously ripped Nevermind from a CD I bought in the 90s, so I am able to do an A/B comparison between the two. First thing I noticed is the high-res files are louder. For comparison I used the pre set at 42 db for the BR, and 47 db for the CD. The BR is definitely clearer, and quieter, than the CD. On the CD, Kurt Cobain sounds like he has marbles in his mouth. With the high-res, you can understand him. Obviously, the music also is more defined and precise.

I also added Tom Petty's two disk Anthology to the server today, but that is just CD quality.

Loud &amp; Clear

A few years before I heard of blu ray audio, I was begging for blu ray audio. In fact I wrote a brief post here, where I wondered aloud about the likelihood of the format developing music only discs. It made so much sense. Everyone already has a player and the resolution is fantastic. Such an easy integration unlike the other attempts at high resolution digital. And now here we are - "Damn the Torpedoes" arrived yesterday. Ask and you shall receive.

BlueFox

Exile On Main Street arrived a little bit ago. It is currently being extracted to the hard drive, and then ripped to the music server. It will be fun comparing it to the SHM SACD later tonight.

tonyb

I say you run the BR disc threw the player instead of burning it for comparisons. I think the BR audio has some legs to it, more so than the other formats.

Tornado Red

BlueFox wrote: »

Exile On Main Street arrived a little bit ago. It is currently being extracted to the hard drive, and then ripped to the music server. It will be fun comparing it to the SHM SACD later tonight.

I would love to hear your thoughts as well BF, on the BD-A and see how it compares to your SHM.

BlueFox

tonyb wrote: »

I say you run the BR disc threw the player instead of burning it for comparisons. I think the BR audio has some legs to it, more so than the other formats.

The SACD player is a Sony XA-5400ES. It does have an HDMI output if you have a pre that accepts HDMI and can decode DSD, or a DAC with the same features, but in my two channel system I have neither. So, for the comparison I switch between input 1 (music server) and input 2 (SACD).

Tornado Red wrote: »

I would love to hear your thoughts as well BF, on the BD-A and see how it compares to your SHM.

First observation is the ripped BR is slightly louder than the SACD. Most likely, the balanced output of the DAC is slightly higher than the balanced output of the Sony. Incidentally, both players are connected to the pre (Pass Labs XP-20) via balanced Shunyata Zitron Anaconda ICs.

Anyway, after adjusting the volume, both sound great. An open, spacious sound that is not fatiguing at higher volumes. However, after switching back and forth, I have to give the nod to the BR Audio. The music seems to have a deeper soundstage with a quieter background, and is more precise. A note starts at some point in space, and stops at another point. The edges are more pronounced, or better defined.

This very well might be due to using Shunyata Zitron Alpha power cords on the file player and DAC. These power cords remove digital noise generated by digital devices and reflected back onto the power lines. The Sony is using a Zitron Cobra, which the Alpha is based on. Also, the Bryston BDA2 DAC is better than the DAC in the Sony. Before, when I was using the Bryston BDA1 DAC, I felt the two players were, by and large, equal in sonics. However, the BDA2 is clearly a better DAC.

Anyway, you can't go wrong with either format. I personally prefer the power, versatility, and convenience of the music server over the single disk SACD player.

Tornado Red

Appreciate your thoughts, thanks. I only have the one BD that is pure audio so far, and I find myself playing it a LOT. The bottom end is SO good, it makes my DSW550 and 660 subs sound very musical, and listening to it for extended intervals is not tiring in the least. Of course I haven't heard Breakfast In America on SACD, so hard to compare. The Oppo is my delivery system for both. Given that the recordings are created equal for both formats (from the same masters, etc) would you say they are that close that it could come down to price point? I really enjoy my SACDs but if this format takes off even a little bit I could envision myself partaking frequently...

BlueFox

Price wise, the SHM SACD cost me $50, while the BR Audio cost $30. So, that is in its favor. Sound wise, it is a toss-up, at least for me, with a slight preference for the BR. However, the lack of copy protection on the BR is a big plus. Being able to put these high-res files on a music server is a tremendous benefit.

BlueFox

Nirvana's In Utero arrived yesterday. I am really liking this BR Audio idea. Hopefully, the trickle of titles will turn into a flood. Even better, let's hope we start getting new releases recorded and mastered right from the start as high-res audio.

mytime

BlueFox wrote: »

Nirvana's In Utero arrived yesterday. I am really liking this BR Audio idea. Hopefully, the trickle of titles will turn into a flood. Even better, let's hope we start getting new releases recorded and mastered right from the start as high-res audio.

Would be nice. So is the transfer a good one?

BlueFox

Don't know. Haven't listened to it yet. Maybe Friday, or Saturday at the latest, I will rip it.

Loud &amp; Clear

BlueFox wrote: »

Nirvana's In Utero arrived yesterday. I am really liking this BR Audio idea. Hopefully, the trickle of titles will turn into a flood. Even better, let's hope we start getting new releases recorded and mastered right from the start as high-res audio.

That's the key. If people would just start recording and mastering in at least 24/96 onto blu ray, we'd get some really great sounding new releases. I would also like to see dacs with an hdmi input. So far I've only seen one, the Essence HDACC, which includes an hdmi input with blu ray in mind.