Relief? The New Digital Players

Of course with new technology the time to buy is never right but you have to take the plunge sometime. The audio industry is at a crossroads with the new formats-those in the know (inc. Mark Levinson)seem to confirm SACD is the best format.My worry is with DVD players becoming more common that DVD-A may have a long term advantage that will make it the prevalent format. Hopefully there be enough support for SACD to keep it viable but new audio formats have died before. Certainly the amount of titles in either format is limited at the moment. I think the main players will hedge their bets in the audiophile ensuring the new format players are also excellent normal CD players. As I stated earlier the new Marantz SACD player is getting reviews that confirm this approach. I also think built-in upsampling will have a major impact with audiophiles especially once the prices start to come down. Time will tell................. Ben

Jrg: Thanks for the info. and the site. $1500.00 is a real world price for a player. I will probably wait until there are a few more choices available. We are expecting a nice chunk of change and the deal is that I get to spend as much on gear as my wife does on a an English leather club chair. Pretty sweet deal, cause I like the chairs too. I have just been saying no to the purchase out of habit.

Too much premium for so little options in titles.... If they are throwing in better CD reproduction to lure the buyers to SACD for me still not good enough. I'd rather go with an upsampling DAC like Bel Canto or a good single box CD player instead for the moment.

Sony seems like they're trying to shove another format down our throats (when will they give up on the Minidisk?). I'm not saying that SACD isn't better...I don't know...but I don't see how a format with a relatively subtle improvement will ever go over with most consumers. Most people I know wouldn't hear a difference, and wouldn't see the need to upgrade. I think it's always bound to be a specialty item. It's probably Sony's way to sell $30 CDs to a specialty market.

I think it's going to be YEARS before both hardware and software manufactures make a new format widely attractive. So having conviction in this belief, I purchased a Levinson transport and DAC (used, but excellent) early last summer. So far I see NO reason for having any regrets-- this is the best sounding digital music that I have ever heard. Ben; upsampling is the same thing as oversampling, which has routinely been used in CD players for years. The ONLY reason to purchase an outboard upsampling device is if your CD player does not have very good DA Conversion, eg Levinson gear oversamples at about 346kHZ and is excellent, but does it internally. Any good high end CD player should not need an out board upsampler. I can't see that many SACD titles will ever be available. DVD-Audio has the best chance of succeding in a big way because of the success of DVD-Video-- especially those players that also accept CD. But it's going to be a long time before there will be many DVD-A discs available. The "mass market" is going to like CDs for years. And, the presence of DVD-A discs may bring the cost of CDs down which will make them even more attractive? The above is all IMHO. Does it make any sense? Cheers. Craig.