Has anyone purchased Pioneer's DV45a DVD player (or big brother Dv47). They play both DVD-A and SACD formats. Also, anyone have any feelings about these relatively new technologies?

Phil

Didn't do so well in this shootout:
http://www.hometheaterhifi.com/cgi-bin/shootout.cgi?function=search&articles=5

Thanks for pointing that out. I guess if I must have a player that will do both DVD-A and SACD, I'd be better off waiting until the choices grow or until one of the formats rise well above the other in market acceptance.

Phil

I have the Toshiba SD-4700 which does DVD-A. My worry about HDCD is that it's Sony...and we all remember what happened to Betamax.

Yeah...I remember Betamax. My wife remembers every time she goes in my closet and asks me to get rid of those two "black box" looking things.

I remember that battle. My desire/need for a video recorder didn't happen until my daughter was born. Luckily she was born after Betamax kind of bit the dust so it was an easy choice at that point. This time around it's just me being a restless kid wanting to play with cool new toys....NOW! Oh well, I guess I'll just have to regress back into being an adult and be patient.

Phil

There are some inexpensive players that will only do one format or the other. I recently bought a DVD-Audio 7-disc changer, but for under $250 I figure that if SACD wins out it won't be too painful to buy another player.

Crikey, I thought I was the only one with Beta machines still
I have two of them as audio recorders to mix down from my multi-track. They work great for that.

Yamaha just released a DVD player that supports both SACD and DVDA as well as doing progressive scan with the highly touted Faroujda processor. You can see it on my website here:
http://www.audioshop.on.ca/newproducts.htm

HDCD is now a Microsoft format! They purchased it from Pacific Microsonics a while back. Makes me wonder what Microsoft has in mind for the format.

In reply to:

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Makes me wonder what Microsoft has in mind for the format.

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My guess would be integration with Corona and the death of MPEG 4...

I recently purchased the DV45a on a whim. I was stunned when I ran across a particular DVD-Audio title (Richard Thompson's Rumor & Sigh), so I finally decided to take the multichannel audio plunge. $500 seemed like a reasonable price to test the waters (and presumably upgrade my DVD player in the process), so I went for it. I also bought a copy of Fleetwood Mac's Rumours for good measure.

My setup includes a Marantz SR5200, a pair of M22s, VP150, EP175 & QS4s. First impressions? Eh...yeah...whatever. Definitely more seamless/spacious than PLII, but still gimmicky to my ears. Select the two channel option, though, and there's a clarity present that's missing from the original CDs. Enough to justify another $10 a pop per CD? Not right now (for me, anyway). I haven't purchased a SACD title yet, but I'm not convinced there would be a chasm of difference between the two. Thankfully, the stereo sound on regular CDs is fine and the picture quality is a noticable improvement over my old cheapie JVC. Still, I suppose I was hoping to be a little more impressed with the Elite on regular CDs. But that's what dedicated CD players are for, right? Bottom line: I don't feel like I was robbed, but I approached the purchase with a healthy dose of skepticism.

Now I have my own question for anyone else who owns a DVD-Audio or SACD player running in 5.1: Has anyone else run into trouble with respect to inadequate power? The Marantz is rated at 90W per channel, and my normal listening levels aren't that high. But I didn't make it through one disc before the amp overloaded and shut itself down. I suspect the culprit might be the 6ohm rating on the VP150, but I'd be interested to hear feedback from anyone else.

- Mike