SACD vs. DVD-A

pmckeealaska

Well, so far I have only amassed a few high-res albums, about 5 DVD-Audios and a comparable number of SACD's. Of the albums I own, it seems as if the DVD-A is superior to the SACD's I have, at least in 2-channel. Fleetwood Mac's "Rumors" and Steely Dan's "Gaucho" are the best sounding albums I have and they are both DVD-A. The SACD's that I own do sound better than their regular CD counterparts, but for many, the improvement in SQ is small. In fact, when I compared my regular CD version of Norah Jones' first album with my SACD version, the CD version actually seemed superior to SACD, at least to my ears.

Of the people on here who have both formats, which would you say has the superior SQ? I guess a lot of it would have to do with initial recording quality and other things also. Any thoughts?

AsSiMiLaTeD

SACD all the way for me...

I think that's the general opinion, but I could be wrong...

cfrizz

I am pretty much split down the middle & like both equally. However as you pointed out, the SQ of the original recordings will make all the difference when they transfer it to the hi res formats.

Danny Tse

Gaucho on SACD sounds excellent to my ears. And you did hear about the issue with the Norah Jones SACD, right?

I have only purchased one DVD-A.....Elvis' 30 #1 Hits.

pmckeealaska

No......I havent heard about the Norah Jones SACD......whats the deal?

Polkapops

I have to agree with cfrizz on this one - I own several of each format, but there are some that simply outshine the others.
The SACD discs that I particularly enjoy are:
Jeff Beck: Blow By Blow
Concord Records SACD Samplers #1 & #2
Pink Floyd: DSOTM
Alison Kraus & Union Station Live (Double disc)
John McLaughlin, Al DiMeola & Paco DeLucia: Friday Night in SanFransisco

On DVD-A:
Yes: Fragile
BB King / Eric Clapton: Riding With The King
Steely Dan: Gaucho
Bonnie Raitt: Nick Of Time

I own several more of each format, it's just that these seem to jump out at me, off the top of my head. And some of the above really shine in Multi-Channel as well. Just my .02 worth......:cool:

F1nut

Other thoughts.....DVD-A is dead as it has been known. Now, it's called Dual Disc and from what I've read the audio quality is not very good.

Whadyasay

The thing with the Norah Jones SACD is that the 5.1 mix is all screwed up. Bass is basicaly non-existent, and the placement/imaging is all over the place. However, the regular CD layer, as well as the 2-ch SACD layer, is quite good.

I haven't done any album to album testing between SACD and DVD-A, and even that might not be indicative of the comparisons between the two formats. I mostly listen to classic jazz, and there seems to be more available on SACD than DVD-A, so I'm more biased towards SACD. Most of the classic jazz SACD's I have ar 2-ch only, but there's a considerable improvement in fidelity over the regular CD's of the same album. I think acoustic instruments in particular benefit greatly from SACD.

Danny Tse

It was revealed in a recent issue of Stereophile that the SACD layer was authored from the pcm master used for the CD layer. You can read about it here....

http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/m.mpl?forum=hirez&n=191481&highlight=norah&r=&session=

While there was an uproar about it, there're other SACDs out there with similar issues. I guess if it was true, Blue Note could've done better.

gregure

Personally, I think SACD is the best audio format we have. I unfortunately do not have my system set up for SACD playback, but I have several hybrid recordings, and it is evident to me even on the PCM layer that this is the highest quality digital recording technique I have ever experienced.

Case in point: A few months ago I had the pleasure of going to a concert in San Francisco for a SF Symphony concert conducted my Michael Tilson Thomas. The sound of the orchestra has come a long way in MTT's tenure, and the beauty of sound they produce as an organic whole is wonderful. The opening to Tchaikovsky's Romeo and Juliet was so delicate and open sounding in the hall, with a real sumptuous sound from the clarinets. CD's have a come a long way in reproducing that sound, but have not really been able to capture that "live" sound. Until I picked up a copy of the new Mahler 3 recording from MTT and SFS on SACD/Hybrid. I was absolutely blown away by the precision and exactitute with which this new format captures the sound of actually hearing the music in Davies Hall. Woodwinds sound like woodwinds, brass chorales have a real ringing, full sound, and there is just a general openness and ripeness to the overall experience. Dare I say it, it's as if all of the overtones are retained in the recording. I have since picked up all of their Mahler recordings, Symphony 1 being my favorite so far. 2 is also excellent, but the organ in the finale is just too damn muted to give it a full overall impact, however every single tam-tam stroke is clearly heard over the orchestra and ringing bells, a rare feature in recorded versions of this symphony. Overall, these are the best recorded performances I have ever heard of these works. SACD, even in hybrid PCM format, is clearly the winner in the format war as far as I'm concerned.