Hi Mahesh,
I appreciate the response. However, I should state that I have no desire to go multi-channel at this point. It's not practical in my apartment, and why expand to 5 channels when I can't even get my mains to sound good?
I do think the DVD-audio discs sound pretty good from this unit; in general, I found them to sound a bit smoother than CDs from my Yamaha, though they also had less detail.
It's the analog two-channel dolby digital output that I have a problem with; I am convinced that DVDs are performing well under par for my system. There are two things I could do: spend $500-$700 on a refurbished HK 325 or 525, or spend the same amount on a better DVD player.
Both would give me new, better DACs. However, since I have no use for surround sound at the moment, I would rather get the Denon DVD-2200 because a) it supports SACD as well as DVD-A, and b) it provides bass management for both hi-rez formats, which avoids an additional analog->digital->analog stage.
I guess there's not a lot of general awareness of DAC differences, but it's hard to ignore after you live with it first-hand. My whole point was that the M22's revealed this huge discrepency to me; they gave me much more resolution from CDs, but only marginally more resolution from my DVDs.
-Cooper
