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is it me or sacd.

or is it my marantz sa-14. got dylan's "bringing it all back home" on sacd for christmas. asked for it specially due to rave reviews. couldn't believe the sound or more precisely the lack of - no bass, no foundation it seems to me. on vinyl bought 30 years ago/played on everything from a dual 1009 tt with idler wheel w/dual cartridge (old fart, i know) to present vpi mk2 /sme 5/van den hul ddt (not state of the art i know) - amongst the vinyl rush, rumble, wow & cartridge chatter bob has a throat, lungs, a body, not just adenoids - and the sssibilance is gone. harmonica sings, not screams, spits & sizzles. guitars are not just wires vibrating in emptiness but strings stretched taut over resonant wood boxes. sound emanates from a room, not a void. had same reaction to rolling stones reissues on sacd. ditto for sam cooke at the copa ("most realisric recording of a human voice ever" sez hp in the absolute(?) sound). might be me. my system. or sacd. or is it just the laphroig? (rant's end)
flacre
flacre OP
23 posts
 
Thanks to all for the comments & moral support. I agree with many of your comments, especially Nrchy who I think nails the sound quality variance on "Bringing It All Back Home" to a T.

And I hope I didn't offend anyone with my rant.

I agree the issue may well be the mastering & not the technology. However, what I still don't get is how some guy in 1964 with stone age equipment gets an apparently more natural (dare I say "realistic") sound than today's silicon fueled mastering suites.

If it's the amp (Unison Smart 845s)(and there's no reason it can't be the amp) why does my much abused 40 year old vinyl sound OK?

Oddly enough, a lot of current redbook CD releases sound great to me as well. I especially liked the sound quality on "Bob Dylan Live 1966 - The Royal Albert Hall Concert". Maybe I'm not picking good sounding SACDs. But what frustrates me is that I think the technology has a lot of potential (I do have some good sounding SACDs), but it's not going to become established unless it can be consistently heard to deliver the improved sound quality that's too often just promised. I'm a big Dylan fan and I was really looking forward to replacing my aging vinyl with the new SACD's. Now I'm not so sure. Do any of you have any other Dylan SACDs you would reccomend? Thanks.
rwwear
2,692 posts
 
I have found on many discs that they default to the surround mode and have no bass when played back in two channel mode. If playing back in surround unless you have good analog bass management or firewire digital, then there is no bass management. It is also important to make sure if you are playing discs in two channel that your player be set for two channel stereo mixdown in it's setup menu.
vinylphile7873
14 posts
 
Don't buy Alice In Chains on SACD. Sounds like your tweeters are broke.
eldartford
4,262 posts
 
Interesting: I note that everyone who is complaining about SACD and DVD-A audio quality cites Pop and Rock music. I really cannot comment on this, because almost all my discs are classical, and are clearly superior to the older media. Perhaps you need to buy one good audiophile classical disc and use it like a test disc to evaluate what SACD and DVD-A can do.
tfkaudio
589 posts
 
I have "Nashville Skyline" by Bob on SACD and I'm blown away by it. (But, hey, I thought "Bringing It" sounded great, too.)
I really like the sound of "Planet Waves", too.
Happy Listening.
TFKaudio
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