SACD - what gives?

I join Mgottlieb and Tbone and the few others in the minority here who are still enthused about SACD. I find little of the high frequency problems Detlof has found, although I would have to say my system cannot be as revealing in that area as his Soundlabs, and perhaps my mods from Jerry Ozment have something to do with it as well (the latest transformer mod is even more pronounced in its improvements to my SACD player than they were with my DAC, which surprised Mr. O as well as me). As far as new recordings taking advantage of the medium, there are more and more classical recordings coming out in pure DSD recordings that really show off the medium's advantages over CD--the Telarc Vaughn Williams Sea Symphony and the San Francisco Symphony Mahler cycle are absolutely spectacular examples, and there are more and more of them, although admittedly the analog remasters still are in the vast majority here (much as it was in the early days of CDs as well). I still prefer a good LP on my vinyl rig, especially where the master tape isn't the greatest and I don't want to hear everything on it, but the glimpses of what SACD can be I've been getting from the most recent DSD releases are closing the gap on analog significantly and widening the gap between SACD and CD. All that said, I still don't think the medium will be anything more than a niche market; hopefully we'll at least get some good recordings and performances to listen to from the specialty recording companies or perhaps the orchestras themselves (LSO Live, perhaps, as they record in DSD, to go with the SFO).

Prior media, LP, Tape, CD, have never been able to convey the quality of sound inherent in the master tapes made even 40 years ago. SCAD can bring those master tapes into your listening room (assuming that the people who made the SACD didn't screw it up).

Eldartford is pretty much right, but part of the problem also is that some of those master tapes weren't so great to begin with, particularly with some labels who seemed to like to put mikes in musicians' laps or which had producers who wanted a "hot" mix to better catch your ear on a small transistor radio. In those cases, the warmth and lack of absolute ultimate resolution of vinyl are a Godsend, as they let you enjoy the music instead of hearing the recording.

When I attend a live concert, do we hear lots of details and something extra which is not "musical"? I would say "yes" we do, hope most people agree. If that did not prevent us from going live performance, it means that details or some noise will not kill a good music performance. For a properly set-up SACD and good engineering recording, I usually hear much less the machine added "edgy" sound than CD format.
If someone hate the details even though it is not "edgy", could I propose the performance is simpley not good? The orchestra simply did not perform well on the recording!?
I believe Beethoven will blame on the conductor or orchestra. Hardly I would believe he would blame on the machine which can bring out every note of his work.
If you were Michael Jordan, would you prefer a slot motion HDTV to show your move, or you like a blur tape and claim it is more "artist".

I've owned and listened to friends SACD players over the last few years, the one I owned having been moddified extensively taking it to a level well above the stock ( and quite good)unit. My previous impressions mirrored many of the above, it was good, often better than redbook, but not THAT much better. Throw in the software issues etc, and I guess I was less than enamored. Lost most of that gear in a spousal parting of the ways, and over the last year or so have re-geared, and in the process had the opportunity to listen to, and subsequently purchase the Meitner DAC 6 and transport. I have been reborn. This is like nothing I've ever heard. THIS is what I had in mind when I first heard of SACD: transparent, resolute, great bass without any of the digital "boom" that even the best redbook players had, musical and an ease of presentation that only vinyl had previously offered. Incredible micro-dynamics, and an ability to listen deeper into the music than I had previously experienced. No digititis, no fatigue, and seamless. I don't hear any problems with the upper registers, but then again I probably lost a good bit of hearing in that frequency range in the last year of marriage. And quite possibly Detlof has better hearing, I certainly respect and value his impressions. DSD recordings do sound a tad better than anolog sometimes, but not always, it seems to be recording dependent. Some of the DSD's sound so good it's like listening to a direct feed. So I really can't disagree with many of the above posts in their less than enthusiastic embracing of SACD, I was there. What I can say is my perspective has changed significantly after having heard this format through the Meitner. I hear the argument all the time that redbook is many times limited by the hardware, and redbook playback can be superb if the player gets it right. I think the same can be said of SACD. The software may not be the rate limiting factor. The difference between vinyl playback on a middle level tt and something such as the SME 30 or Rockport is amazing, and not because the mid level tt is not good. It's just very apparent how much more information the SME or Rockport extracts. I've found my recent experience with SACD to be similar. I'm not trying to convert anybody here, just relating my experience as a response to the initiating question. YMMV.