Beware of SACD Transports -- they probably will not work with your favorite DAC

Right. If the SACD encryption scheme is anything like that used for DVD, or Blu-Ray, the concept was a closed system that did not permit users to access the raw digital stream at hi-rez, to avoid piracy issues. The only way to decode the encrypted material was to use a licensed device and that did not afford a digital output that was ’in the clear.’ This was done through a patent pool as I recall, with licensing arrangements among CE manufacturers of hardware and "software" content owners, who did not relish the idea of putting out hi-rez copies of their content on an ’open’ format.
I don’t really do much with SACD- in fact, i only installed digital audio in my main system in the past 6 months, but have an Oppo that I use in the home theatre system. As I recall, one can use the analog outputs from the Oppo to play back SACD by letting the internal DAC and decryption function occur entirely within the Oppo box; I also recall that the hdmi output on the Oppo, which goes into an AV pre-pro (used mainly for AV, not for music listening), should be able to decode the SACD. But, the quality of the AV pre-pro, while sufficient for my purposes for movies/TV shows, isn’t something that I would normally use for serious music listening. As to transports and DACs that are within this protocol, I have no idea. I suspect that the huge uptick in stand-alone DACs has occurred after SACD already dwindled in the marketplace. I also suspect that the cost of the license to permit SACD decryption on a DAC otherwise intended for two channel audio would have only added to the retail cost of the DAC and was probably viewed as a limited market, but i’m speculating.

Jafant 

yes, I prefer the Sony/Bryston combination to the stand alone Sony SACD

The transport and the DAC have to do a handshake to output the DSD off a SACD. I believe DCS can do it using a pair of AES/EBU XLR cables. PS Audio does it by using a highly modified Oppo transport that paid for the license. The DSD is only available through the I2S output using an HDMI cable.So you would need a Directstream Memory Player and one of their two Directstream DACs. The fact that they use a HDMI cable, does not mean it is outputting HDMI.

As said, some HT Receiver, like Denon could play DSD through an HDMI cable, because they bought the licensing from Sony, and you still usually have to use their universal Blu-ray, DVD, SACD player.

If you go over to the Computer Audio forum, there is a script that you can use with some Oppo players, I believe the 103 105, and a few others. You load it on to a flash drive, and it will give you the data off a SACD disc, which would then be loaded to a PC or a dedicated player like an Aurender, using it through the USB output to a DAC that will decode DSD.
Usually you need both the transport and DAC from the same company. Mix and match seldom works.
If a company makes a SACD transport with no DAC, they will have a DAC that can play the SACD.

I've been griping about this for years. All of these so called high resolution DACSs are nearly worthless because you can't get high resolution audio into them without HDMI. Bryston has the right idea. PS Audio uses their proprietary HDMI input that only works with their transport. Bluray audio fixes most of the problems with SACD if you have a good processor.