Thankfully there are scant few LDs that I'm looking for these days, so I don't spend as much time searching for LDs as I used to.
I'm probably watching at least one LD a week, since I have a number I haven't watched yet.
I will admit that Animal Crossing: New Horizons has usurped A LOT of my free time as of late. To the point that I haven't had the time to play any other video games. Never thought I'd be wasting so much time catching fish and bugs and making dumb crap in a virtual world, but here we are . . .
I picked up "The Yes Album" on blu-ray audio this week. Haven't been able to listen to it yet, but doing a little more research as I had to imagine this had to be released on another hi-res audio media as well. Found that it also had a release on DVD-Audio. Funny thing is, the blu-ray and DVD-A are from the same company, Panegyric, released the same year and have all the same extras and mixes.
The Yes Album - Panegyric DVD-Audio
The Yes Album - Panegyric blu-ray Audio
The only difference of course is that the hi-res stereo mixes and 5.1 mixes are 24-bit/96khz Meridian Lossless Packing on the DVD-Audio while the blu-ray are 24-bit/96khz LPCM (both surround mixes are DTS, but MLP DTS on DVD-A and DTS HD Master Audio on the blu-ray.) One can easily come to the conclusion that they're from the same master.
I was thinking of also picking up the DVD-A version to compare, but it costs more than twice the blu-ray audio release these days, and I can't justify that purchase.
Panegyric has apparently released a few other albums "simultaneously" on DVD-A and BRA (all from Yes):
Yes - Close to the Edge DVD-A Yes - Close to the Edge BRA
Yes - Relayer DVD-A Yes - Relayer BRA
Yes - Fragile DVD-A Yes - Fragile BRA (getting an occasional error when that page loads)
Yes - Tales From Topographic Oceans DVD-A Yes - Tales From Topographic Oceans BRA
(notable difference on this one is that the stereo mixes say 24-bit/96khz MLP on the DVD-A, but 24-bit/192khz DTS-MA on the BRA. Odd since DVD-A supports 192khz stereo)
The company also released King Crimson's "In the Court of the Crimson King" on both DVD-A and BRA but those were 10 years apart, so no telling if they used the same master (I would assume not, with that kind of time span between them.)
Same here. Definitely looking forward to hearing the remaster and seeing if they fixed that audio issue in "Yours Is No Disgrace" where some of the sound in the right channel near the end gets muffled for a few seconds.
I guess that will still be there in the "flat" transfer and the "needle drop" transfer.
I've started to rip tracks from my DVD-Audio collection, so I needed something to portable to play those (large) lossless FLACs back (phone doesn't play them without some tinkering.)
Saw this little gizmo on Techmoan's channel some time back and though it was pretty neat. Plus I love the Sega Saturn, soooo . . .
Well here's the answer about the bitrate. I used MediaCoder to try to rip the audio from the Days of Future Passed DVD and the analysis of the track gave me this:
Went through some old issues of Widescreen Review magazine and found a few articles on DVD-Audio in the development stage and also the debut. Figured I'd share them here.
First is "Will DVD-Audio Ever Be Sound?" from the April 1998 issue of WSR. It does mention the 24-bit/96khz stereo capabilities of DVD-Video, so I must have either forgot about reading that part many years ago or skipped over it.
This one is "DVD-Audio: Boon or Boondoggle" from the Novemger 2000 issue of WSR
The writer was clearly in the SACD camp rather than give just an overview of the format upon its release (I guess he was asked to give an opinionated article rather than an objective one.) He even admits that there isn't any software available for the hardware save for demo discs--one wonders why he didn't wait to write this article until software actually was available. I believe the same writer gave an absolutely gushing review of SACD in another issue. If I can find that one, I'll put it in the SACD section.
If it's with a CLV disc, then this is most likely happening because your player doesn't have digital frame memory for pausing or properly scanning a CLV disc.
So for the heckuvit, I decided watch the movie for the umpteenth time but to compare the soundtracks, because that's the ONLY reason to hold onto the DTS LD. I fully expected the blu-ray to sound better (since you know, the DTS MA soundtrack on the blu-ray is supposedly 5+Mbps and the DTS LD is a mere 1.44Mbps), but impossible as it might be, the DTS LD still sounded more powerful than the blu-ray. I did the ol' Doug Pratt routine (Pratt being the man behind The Laserdisc Newsletter ) where he says "anytime I want to get my guests to jump in their seats, I just pop in the DTS LD of Jurassic Park and queue it up to the part where the goat leg drops on the jeep. Gets 'em every time."
Left the volume on my receiver at the same for both the LD and blu-ray. LD had more bass, more clearly defined rain sound effects, and that goat leg crashed onto the jeep with more "OOMPH!"
Yeah totally counter-intuitive with the technologies, but I guess we can chalk this up to a lazy soundtrack transfer since I guess Universal was more concerned with the look of the movie and the soundtrack was "good enough."
I'll probably still sell the LD, but it will still irk me knowing that when I watch the blu-ray again, I'll know in the back of my mind that this should sound better :lol:
After more snooping about for more SACD and DVD-Audio discs, I found that there was actually a name for these DVD-Video compatible 24-bit/96Khz audio discs before DVD-Audio came around.
Apparently they were called DAD (Digital Audio Discs.)
muddy_dad1.jpg
muddy_dad2.jpg
Haven't found anything far too interesting on the format--mostly Jazz, Blues, Classical. Only Rock I've found was a Pete Townshend DAD
Of course these all seem to be released by this company Classic Records , so it might not be the official name for the format, but just what they decided to call it.
EDIT : According to Discogs, DAD was "Series of reissues encoded at 24-bit 96 kHz on DVD media from Classic Records." So yeah, it was just what they called it.
Apparently they coined another title for a format-- HDAD . According to Discogs - "Series of reissues from Classic Records encoded with 24/192 PCM data playable on DVD-Audio players one side, and 24/96 PCM data playable on standard DVD players on the other.'
Pretty cool idea. Though realistically they could have just put both of those on a dual layer, single sided DVD couldn't they?
As pointed out in the 24-bit/96khz DVD Audio but not DVD-Audio thread, Classic Records released a unique format called "HDAD" which featured 24-bit/96khz DVD-Video compatible audio on one side of the disc and 24-bit/192khz DVD-Audio compatible tracks on the other side.
And it would appear that these are all stereo only.
Couldn't help but notice the ad for Argento's The Bird With the Crystal Plumage
Had to look up the Forum Theater here in NY to see if that place was still around. Alas, like most small movie houses, it is not:
Cinema Treasures - Movieland 1567 Broadway NY
Demolished in 1998
The movie that comes to mind for me when Jerry Gross is mentioned is Lucio Fulci's Zombie/Zombi 2 . His name even appeared on the opening title scroll on some home releases:
Since I couldn't find the threads that came up some years ago on the forum here regarding the "green marker" BS, this latest video from Techmoan shows another bit of optical disc snake oil taking the "laser scatter" bit to a whole new level (or should I say "bevel"?)
Shaving Compact Discs to Improve Sound (!?)
Apparently this device/process doesn't only want you to color the edge because of all those pesky errors from the laser bouncing all over the place inside the CD, but first SHAVE THE EDGE OF THE DISC so that it has a beveled edge!!
Despite that lunacy, it appears some "audiophiles" still swear by some things like this.
It's so telling when one technician stated this in the comments:
jgrimsley2000 I used to be a repair technician at a high-end consumer electronics store. I've worked on McIntosh, Lynn-Sondek, Luxman, Meridian, Denon, B&O and even the occasional Mark Levison amp...equipment of that quality. One day, the owner of the store introduced me to the owner of Kimber Kables (very expensive audiophile cables) He was making outrageous claims about his magic wires using terms like "imaging, sound-stage, acute focus and the like. I asked him if I could run some A/B comparisons against some decent but affordable cables we carried. He told me no, because technicians always want to measure differences with test equipment instead of using our ears. He said that our problem (technicians) is that we believe that if we can't measure the difference, then we assume that there is no difference. Audiophiles can get really defensive when it comes to their religion. Then this "audiophile" had to chime in later (not responding to the above--just a standalone comment):
legrandmaitre It never ceases to amaze me how many characters come out of the woodwork to take potshots at any kind of hifi tweak.
For me I've found that pretty well any CD will improve if washed, also if you mark the edges with a black or green pen - it works. One theory - these tweaks make life easier for the error correction circuitry, in turn there's then less stray emissions.
I have a £12k system and biggish (3000+) collection. VDH cabling throughout. I also have a mains purifier and nice Furutech mains cables - both these additions have transformed my system. I'm partially sighted.
Even now in 2022, people start shouting the odds and getting really angry about these tweaks and so called snake oil. Apart from insulting these characters in the following way:
1) your hearing can't be much cop 2) your system must be crap 3) stop listening to plop like Oasis
There may be something else going on!
I think it's to do with neurodivergency - for want of a better word - or to put in a more down to earth way, maybe the difference between those of us who are artists, writers or musicians - and people with scientific backgrounds. Apart from anything else it's the ability of creative people to articulate what they're hearing - to DESCRIBE the differences they hear (which OP says "goes over his head"). Scientists need to believe by measuring something, artistic people believe because they can sense, hear or see something. Just because you can't measure something does NOT mean it doesn't exist, it just means scientists haven't yet gained a full understanding of what is going on.
Check out Jay on Youtube, he's a highly intelligent guy WITH a scientific background who has gone beyond this training because he has heard enough gear to learn that it's not all about the science and measurements. He CAN hear these differences. I actually laughed out loud when I read that one!
Acquired another DVD-Audio release that has 24-bit/96khz LPCM (wasn't getting it for that reason, just discovered that it had it), but it has another odd aspect to it that perplexes me. It's Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys:
It's a dual sided disc. DVD-Video compatible on one side and DVD-Audio Advanced Resolution Surround on the other. The DVD-Video side has both 24-bit/96khz stereo and mono, but a note on the liner and the back about remastering is what caught my eye the most . . .
Beach_Boys_-_Pet_Sounds.jpg "Remastered...using the HDCD process"?!?!?
Even has the HDCD logo on the back where the other audio logos are.
Was going to try playing the DVD-Video side in Windows Media Player to see if the HDCD flag came up, but I forgot that Microsoft took out DVD playback in WMP so you'd have to buy a DVD player app from the app store.
Might try hooking up the Panasonic DVD player I found at a thrift store that has HDCD capabilities later on (just moved recently so I'll have to dig it up), but this is definitely the first HDCD related DVD (video or audio) I've ever come across.
Got my Diggstown LD autographed by Louis Gosset Jr. diggstown.jpg And got this shlocky movie autographed by Lou Ferrigno and Jess Harnell. cage_.jpg The latter I got kind of as a joke just because I wanted to see Harnell's reaction. You see, he didn't actually play a part in the movie (and he's probably thankful for that.) He sings a song in it (a really bad one.) Seeing as how he's Wakko Warner from Animaniacs I figured he'd have a nice reaction to it. He didn't disappoint. His eyes got REALLY big and said "Wow, I remember singing that song! It was probably my first gig in Hollywood! Can I sign it 'Wow!' because I've never signed ANYTHING for this movie?!?"
Since we're talking about CD-i, here's an interesting video on the development of the ill-fated and oft-ridiculed Legend of Zelda games for the system:
I bought a new DAC yesterday. Actually it is a Technics CD/SACD player with network capabilities ( Tidal/Spotify/USB playback/internet radio ). It contains a high quality DAC and I only read very good things about it. It cost me 2500 € and in my opinion it was worth every penny. The internal DAC is a hundred times better than the one inside my Denon AV receiver. I have never heard CDs and FLAC files with such extreme accuracy and depth and detail. I have played a lot of music since yesterday and this does not sound any worse than my record player. In fact I am starting to like it more. It has the depth that I knew from my record player and doesn't have the flat sound then I knew from my all my previous DACs. It sounds absolutely fantastic and better than expected. One of the reasons I bought this thing is because I am starting to get tired of the vinyl hype. I used to buy good albums for 40 € upwards and I simply refuse to pay this amount of money for a single album. What is the point in buying new vinyl that was mastered using digital wav files pressed onto vinyl ? I bought a lot of CDs for 1 € each at the local flea market and they sound absolutely magnificent on this player. Anyway this was a very good investment and it also has a digital input ( coax / spdif ) so I can connect my laserdisc player to it which is great, too. I feel the same way about new albums coming out on vinyl. Really no point since it's all digital. Only vinyl I buy these days are old 12" singles.
Thanks list
