Question about SACD

[gus6464]

Today I was at best buy getting my wife a replacement cd for her Nine Inch Nails The Downward Spiral that she lost. I saw that they had both the SACD and the regular cd but I bought the sacd because it had an extra disc with some b-sides that she might like.

So I popped the cd in my car stereo on my way back from the store and I was just blown away at what I was hearing. Now I think I have a decent sound system in my car (Infinity Kappa Perfect components powered by 2ch amp, Kappa 3-way 6x9's in the back powered by a kenwood excellon deck, and a kicker solo baric L5 8in. sub) but CD's have never sounded this good. The songs were just so much more dynamic than the regular cd version that we used to have. There are so many new things in the recording that I noticed off the bat even on my car stereo that were just never there in the regular cd.

My question is if SACD's also improve the regular 2ch recording that is contained on them which can be played on the regular cd players. I mean if regular cd sounds this good now I am wondering how much better SACD will sound. Now I just want to go out and buy all of the Nine Inch Nails albums that are on SACD as well as an SACD player.

 

[MDS]

The 2 channel track on the SACD may be mixed and/or mastered differently than the same track on a regular CD. The levels may also be different and louder is often perceived to be 'better'.

 

[gus6464]

The 2 channel track on the SACD may be mixed and/or mastered differently than the same track on a regular CD. The levels may also be different and louder is often perceived to be 'better'.

Ahh ok and also is there a big difference in quality between sacd 2ch audio and regular 2ch audio if you were to keep it between the same cd?

 

[j_garcia]

I am not aware of them remastering the CD track for this disc. Yes, the SACD track is significantly better, however you cannot listen to SACD tracks on a standard CD player. This disc is a hybrid and includes a 5.1 SACD, 2ch SACD and CD tracks. What you most likely heard in your car was only the CD track.

This is the only album that is on SACD. With Teeth came out with a DVD-A Dual Disc version that is quite excellent except for the whole dual disc thing...

 

[gus6464]

I am not aware of them remastering the CD track for this disc. Yes, the SACD track is significantly better, however you cannot listen to SACD tracks on a standard CD player. This disc is a hybrid and includes a 5.1 SACD, 2ch SACD and CD tracks. What you most likely heard in your car was only the CD track.

This is the only album that is on SACD. With Teeth came out with a DVD-A Dual Disc version that is quite excellent except for the whole dual disc thing...

I heard the regular cd track on my car but the quality was still way better than the regular cd version that we used to have which is what made me wonder if sacd's are better even when not hearing them in sacd form.

 

[j_garcia]

It may have been remastered then. I have the original redbook and the SACD, I can give them a compare tonight and see if I can hear a difference. Quite often when someone releases a SACD version, they have gone back to the master and they may also remaster the regular CD tracks at the same time. Not always, but I have only listened to the regular CD tracks on the SACD a few times because the 5.1 mix is so good. On the second disc, the tracks are 2ch only for SACD but they are extremely well done also.

 

[Starmax]

Right, but...

The 2 channel track on the SACD may be mixed and/or mastered differently than the same track on a regular CD. The levels may also be different and louder is often perceived to be 'better'.

sometimes "louder" means you can hear details you couldn't have heard at all if the levels weren't higher...especially in the car.

 

[skizzerflake]

The cd tracks can't exceed the 44.1/16 bit format, so it must have been remastered or somehow perhaps that particular recording just hits all the good spots on your system. It would be interesting to try a regular cd of the same music and see if it sounds different. SACDs CAN improve the sound of previously released music (especially if the original was good quality analog) because of their superior sampling rate and bit count, but you won't hear that without a SACD player.

 

[gus6464]

Ahh ok cool I guess I will be picking up an SACD player. Anyone know of a fairly inexpensive good quality sacd player? Maybe like $100 or so, $150 tops but preferably $100.

 

[obscbyclouds]

Ahh ok cool I guess I will be picking up an SACD player. Anyone know of a fairly inexpensive good quality sacd player? Maybe like $100 or so, $150 tops but preferably $100.

For that price, I think your best bet would be an Oppo DV-970HD. Plays SACD and DVD-A (as well as almost any other disc you throw at it) for $149.

 

[krabapple]

Ahh ok and also is there a big difference in quality between sacd 2ch audio and regular 2ch audio if you were to keep it between the same cd?

If the same 2-channel mix and mastering were used, it's unlikely there'd be any audible difference due to the format.

 

[krabapple]

I am not aware of them remastering the CD track for this disc. Yes, the SACD track is significantly better, however you cannot listen to SACD tracks on a standard CD player. This disc is a hybrid and includes a 5.1 SACD, 2ch SACD and CD tracks. What you most likely heard in your car was only the CD track.

This is the only album that is on SACD. With Teeth came out with a DVD-A Dual Disc version that is quite excellent except for the whole dual disc thing...

I have Downward Spiral on DualDisc (there's a DVD-A version on it)

 

[j_garcia]

Yep, I had them both, but the SACD was better to me so I sold the DVD-A. Plus, the DVD-A lacked the bonus tracks that are on the second disc.

I have them both with me today at work and I will do a comparison on my headphones.

 

[j_garcia]

Just compared the two and I don't hear any meaningful difference between the two. CD vs CD track on the SACD.

 

[tbewick]

SACDs CAN improve the sound of previously released music (especially if the original was good quality analog) because of their superior sampling rate and bit count, but you won't hear that without a SACD player.

I don't know of any listening tests that have shown SACD to be audibly superior to CD.

Sample rate and bit count:

SACD is 1 bit and requires a high sample rate (64 times the Nyquist rate) because the quantization resolution is so low. CD has a sample rate of 44.1 kHz which allows the full audio bandwidth to be captured. Note that very few people can actually hear up to 20 kHz. With TPDF-dithered 16 bits, the dynamic range available across the audio bandwidth is 93.3 dB, with zero modulation noise and distortion. More dynamic range is available using noise shaping. Using the TPDF-truncated, bandlimited output of high quality ADCs allows a performance approaching this theoretical limit to be attained.

 

[mr-ben]

I own both the original CD, as well as this new set. In short, the SACD set contains three versions of the album: a new 2-channel mix in the SACD portion, a new 5-channel mix in the SACD portion, and the original CD mix on the CD layer. Any improvement you hear in the CD layer compared to the original CD is probably in your head. I immediately noticed differences in the SACD layers in the mix though, I've always assumed that the CD layer matched the SACD 2-channel layer on all discs, but I guess that's not true here.

 

[j_garcia]

I don't know of any listening tests that have shown SACD to be audibly superior to CD.

CD is definitely capable of excellent sound, however it is quite apparent when listening to any good SACD that there is a HUGE difference with SACD. On a few SACDs I have, there is no comparison between the CD track and SACD tracks (2ch). Others, the difference is less noticeable, so it comes down to the specific master/mix that occurred. I have CDs that come very close to the level of SACD, so I am not saying that CD can't achieve similar levels of quality, it is just that they normally aren't that well done.

I've always assumed that the CD layer matched the SACD 2-channel layer on all discs, but I guess that's not true here.

The 2ch SACD tracks will never be the same as the 2ch CD tracks. On well mastered discs I've always found the 2ch tracks to be better than the CD tracks, and even in some cases better than the multi-channel tracks.

 

[krabapple]

CD is definitely capable of excellent sound, however it is quite apparent when listening to any good SACD that there is a HUGE difference with SACD.

(sigh) The only thing apparent so far, at least in terms of what's been proven, is that SACD and CD layers will likely sound different when the mastering is different. (E.g., Dark Side of the Moon).

What's funny is that for all the hype about 'Super Audio' (and DVD-A), no one -- not Sony, not Meridian, not no one -- seems to have ever come up with the slam-dunk 15-out-of-16-correct-DBT evidence that the same source, mastered the same except for one being dumped to CD and the other to SACD/DVD-A, played back at the same level on good, flat players, over the same system, sounds different. From the hype you'd expect this to be ludicrously EASY to demonstrate, as hi-rez is supposed to be *obviously better*. But no one ever did it...and now SACD and DVD-A have more or less withered on the vine. (But here comes HD-DVD and Blu-ray audio....)