Eldartford, the center channel on this disc is blended in pretty much with the front L/R channels with very little use of solo center info. I know some disc's use center for soloist but this one is pretty much equal across the front three channels on my system with just about the right amount of rear channel blend. Paints a pretty nice picture from the listening chair. You may want to return your disc as it must have a defect. I also have a DVD audio player and have one disc (Grateful Dead American Beauty) out of all my DVD audio's that will not let me play the dvd audio layer for some reason (bummer) have to listen to it in DD for multichannel. I think both format's are great and like you said in your post, there is no clear winner and depends on mastering of disc.
Multichannel Silence
I use a Pioneer DVD 45-A which plays both DVD-A and SACD, so naturally I am comparing the formats. Also, I have used a center channel speaker since long before even matrix (SQ) multichannel: my room layout dictates this because stereo speakers would be about 16 feet apart.
I conclude that DVD-A can sound just as good as theroetically-superior SACD, and SACD spatial effects can match DVD-A. IT ALL DEPENDS ON MASTERING TECHNIQUES OF THE PARTICULAR DISC.
One SACD baffles me. Sony Multichannel disc of Hilary Hahn (violin) playing Brahms Concerto in D Major. Poor Hilary is chopped in two and deposited in the corners of my room, with silence in the center! Another Sony Multichannel disc, Midori and Nobuko Imai, (violin and viola) Mozart Concerto in E-Flat Major, has all channels playing appropriately. However I note that Sony has two versions of the Midori disc, one Multichannel and one Stereo. No stereo version is listed for the Hahn recording, but I wonder if one really exists, and I got it by mistake.
Perhaps someone out there has the Hahn "Multichannel" disk and can tell me what they hear from the center channel.
I conclude that DVD-A can sound just as good as theroetically-superior SACD, and SACD spatial effects can match DVD-A. IT ALL DEPENDS ON MASTERING TECHNIQUES OF THE PARTICULAR DISC.
One SACD baffles me. Sony Multichannel disc of Hilary Hahn (violin) playing Brahms Concerto in D Major. Poor Hilary is chopped in two and deposited in the corners of my room, with silence in the center! Another Sony Multichannel disc, Midori and Nobuko Imai, (violin and viola) Mozart Concerto in E-Flat Major, has all channels playing appropriately. However I note that Sony has two versions of the Midori disc, one Multichannel and one Stereo. No stereo version is listed for the Hahn recording, but I wonder if one really exists, and I got it by mistake.
Perhaps someone out there has the Hahn "Multichannel" disk and can tell me what they hear from the center channel.
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