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SACD/DVD-A and 2-channel recordings

I had wondered if it would ever be the case that only multichannel recordings would come out leaving us 2 channelers in the dust. I was told by a dealer friend of mine that Sony professed to always include a remastered 2-channel SACD layer with every SACD whether it is multichannel or not.

I am wondering if anyone else has heard this and whether this is also the case for DVD-A?

Thanks,
pardales

Showing 3 responses by bomarc

bomarc
501 posts
 
Given the ubiquity of the Walkman and the boombox, I'd say it's highly unlikely that we'll ever stop getting disks that are playable in a two-channel system.

You may have misunderstood your dealer friend, however. The second layer on a hybrid SACD is CD, not 2-channel SACD. As for DVD-A, there was something recently about hybrids that would play on CD machines, but I'm not sure there are any on the market yet.

The more challenging question is whether record companies will take as much care mastering a 2-channel version anymore. It's also possible that the two-channel option of the future won't be a separately mastered layer at all, but an on-the-fly mixdown of the multichannel version.
bomarc
501 posts
 
Pard, you're right. When you said "layer," I thought of hybrids, but yes, a multichannel SACD includes a 2-channel version on the SACD layer, whether or not it's a hybrid disk.

It's on the DVD-A side that you get a mixdown if you've only got a two-channel set-up.

There's still the question of the quality of the mastering on the 2-channel version. See the recent storm over Dark Side of the Moon.
bomarc
501 posts
 
Quite true, Cal, in this particular case, but I think it's symptomatic of a larger danger. When the primary product is a multichannel recording (as the DSOTM SACD release certainly was), any included 2-channel version may be just an afterthought. And when there are SACD boomboxes and SACD Walkmen, will 2-channel SACD mixes be as awful as most pop mixes are nowadays?
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