SACD, Hybrid SACD

[dx052]

I have found a CD I am after on Amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gardenias-Lady-Day-James-Carter/dp/B0001BG4EO/ref=sr_1_6?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1295215119&sr=1-6 and here:

http://www.cduniverse.com/search/xx/music/pid/6416310/a/Gardenias+For+Lady+Day.htm

But I am not sure if it will play in my normal CD player, found it quiet strange that it came out only in that format!

 

[unfocused]

A hybrid SACD has a redbook CD stereo layer so you'll be fine.

 

[dx052]

Ah! Great....

 

[iMark]

dx052:

But I am not sure if it will play in my normal CD player, found it quiet strange that it came out only in that format!

I have a universal DVD player that also plays SACD. For a while the majors released quite a few jazz and classical discs in the hybrid format. A couple of the smaller labels (like Pentatone, Linn and BIS) still release hybrids as the standard for their discs.

I think it would have been the way forward for the record labels. SACD Hybrid is very flexible. You can use the CD layer in computers, cars etc and play the other layers in SACD equipment. Unfortunately the majors like Universal, Sony BMG and EMI no longer release (hardly) anything on SACD hybrid. It would have been a great step forward to keep audiophiles interested in buying discs.

I have a few hybrid SACD's that were released in the early noughties and are out of print. They fetch incredible prices now. It seems there's definitely a market for them, especially for jazz and classical. One example is a hybrid SACD from Decca, released in 2004: Janine Jansen playing Vivaldi's Four Seasons.

I don't have a multichannel system so I can only compare the 2 channel layers. I have to say that on my system the redbook files from in ALAC from iTunes upsampled through the DACMagic sound almost as good as the SACD layer.

I don't think the idea of SACD only discs is a good idea. I will not buy them because I can't use the discs for my iTunes library.

 

[dx052]

Thanks! thats good to know.

Shame it didn't take of, instead we have MP3s and another format which is about 30 years old.

 

[iMark]

dx052:
Shame it didn't take of, instead we have MP3s and another format which is about 30 years old.

Of course the format war with DVD-audio didn't help the cause. Sony built DVD players that would play SACD but not DVD-A. Panasonic built players that would play DVD-A but not SACD. It wasn't until Denon and Pioneer started building universal players that there was a bit more interest in both formats. It seems that the majors lost interest during the next format war between BluRay and HD-DVD. BluRay HD-audio might be the next move but at this rate consumers will never be interested again because of concerns about compatibility with existing equipment.

A couple of labels are now starting to offer hi-rez downloads for audiophiles. Maybe that is the future now. But it doesn't seem that the majors are interested in producing anything better than CD quality.

IMHO the majors have missed their chance to get into the hi-rez market. Hybrid SACD would have been great because of the backward compatibility with standard CD players. With a lot of discs on the market there would have been a major push towards buying universal players. I bought the Pioneer DV 565 in 2003 which plays both SACD and DVD-Audio. Both sound very good on my system but so do ALAC files through the DACMagic. Having a computer based system is much more convenient.

 

[manicm]

iMark:

dx052:

But I am not sure if it will play in my normal CD player, found it quiet strange that it came out only in that format!

Unfortunately the majors like Universal, Sony BMG and EMI no longer release (hardly) anything on SACD hybrid.

It's not that they hardly release any SACD hybrids, it's that they hardly release SACDs full stop. The majority of SACDs available are in fact hybrids across labels. And even in SACDs prime, a large chunk were hybrids.

 

[the record spot]

Very true; the only two SACD only discs I have are Billy Joel's "The Stranger" on Columbia and a BIS label release with all of Mendelssohn's strings symphonies. Four hours long!