Surprised to get SACD playback

Loud & Clear

Yesterday I tried an "SACD only" disc, expecting to be greeted with silence. Didn't happen.

I hooked up a Sony BDP-S570 via coaxial to a Peachtree DAC iT X and inserted a Boston SACD (SACD only, not a hybrid). It played, and better than I've heard it before through the internal conversion of any of the players I've used before (Oppo, Sony). I assume it's being downmixed to PCM, although I'm not sure of the bitrate or frequency. The dac really brought these songs to life. Again, I didn't expect to hear any sound at all. I'm still not sure what's happening. But I like it and look forward to playing some of the other SACDs in my collection.

recoveryone

I think his point is that he has it connected via Coax, which most SACD players require analog output.

tonyb

I believe when connected with coax, the SACD player uses a down mixed stereo signal. It may be better than what your used to, but it's not giving you the full benefit of SACD.

Loud & Clear

tonyb wrote: »

I believe when connected with coax, the SACD player uses a down mixed stereo signal. It may be better than what your used to, but it's not giving you the full benefit of SACD.

Is it passing 24/96? Whatever it's doing is pleasing to my ear. My only experience with SACD players are the Denon 2200, a few of the Sony BDP's, and an Oppo DV-980H. This downmix into DAC presentation is more lively and dynamic sounding. Details jump out and demand attention. I'm going to roll with it.

PolkieMan

Most all of the higher model Sony Blu-ray Players will play SACD, the reason I selected Sony over the other brands.

Loud & Clear

DSkip wrote: »

To be fair, neither is that sony via analog.

That's the point. If you don't have a nice SACD player but want to enjoy your SACDs, and have a blu ray player and decent DAC, you can use the method I'm using for better results. Maybe there aren't a lot of people who find themselves in a similar situation, but if they are they can experiment with this and hear for themselves. Oh, and to correct myself, it's the Sony BDP-S580, not S570. It's possible that they behave differently.

SCompRacer

Loud & Clear wrote: »

I assume it's being downmixed to PCM, although I'm not sure of the bitrate or frequency.

SACD's copyright protection prohibits full resolution audio via S/PDIF. You are correct, it's dithered down PCM or LPCM. The L being quantization levels are linearly uniform where PCM quantization levels vary as a function of amplitude. Or something like that. Or they are the same. I'm buzzed ...lol

avs forum has a huge thread on your player. Lots of pages, might be some grains of specifics in there for you.

Loud & Clear

SCompRacer wrote: »

SACD's copyright protection prohibits full resolution audio via S/PDIF. You are correct, it's dithered down PCM or LPCM. The L being quantization levels are linearly uniform where PCM quantization levels vary as a function of amplitude. Or something like that.

Thanks. Figured you'd know the details within the details ;>).

It's pleasing enough that I don't feel like I would need an HDMI input or DSD decoding capability when searching for a future DAC. Some type of readout would be nice, though. I'd like to be able to tell the bit rate and frequency that the DAC is receiving. Neither blu-ray player nor DAC will tell me what's being sent or received. How rude.

SCompRacer

Somebody knows, they just aren't tellin...lol

Loud & Clear

Tried a DVD-A disc. Readout indicated the output was 24/96 LPCM. Next I'll try a 24/192 DVD-A disc and see what it says.

When I played the SACDs, it just said "Two Channel DSD." But I'm guessing it just assumed that I was using the analog outputs instead of coaxial digital, so I don't know what it outputs via coaxial.