The plight of SACD....

I do feel bad for the "early birds" who spent a ton of money on a false promise that this medium was really the answer to their prayers...then again...if you make compulsive purchases...you usually get burned....at any rate...I wouldn't advise spending alot of cash on a SACD...

Twl, the more i read about the compromises and complexities inherent in the digital format, the more i am inclined to believe you about vinyl...
however, i also agree w/ ghostrider and others about if music's the thing, the largest catalog wins.

Most recently news articles have pronounced the death of CD players. Just no market since the mass market can buy a DVD player that also plays CD's and MP3's! Even some cheap Sony's can do SACD. Pioneer,that high-end brand, is making a univeral player. That's the future.

Like many here, I've been in this hobby for close to 30 years. I have owned many fine turntables over the years including Linn, Sota, VPI and am now quite satisfied with a Well Tempered Reference. I pretty much agree with TWL, and at this level vinyl sure has my vote. Much of the music I own on LP has never been released on CD and likely never will. And has anyone here ever heard a decent Beatles CD? I held out for close to ten years after the introduction of CD before buying my first CD player. Until Meridian came out with the their first modified player it all sounded so bad to these ears. But there came a point when there really wasn't any choice if you wanted new music that was only available in a digital format. Thanks to high end audio we now have some really excellent players, DACs and transports. And the quality of digital recordings certainly has improved a great deal since those early ear bleeding days. One thing that has not changed though is the quality of some recordings are much better than others. I have plenty of LPs that I love but have to leave the room to listen to. Same with CDs. In the end it is the music that really matters and that's the only reason I'm in this silly hobby. I find it very interesting that today there are far more high end tables and cartridges than there ever were in the pre CD days. And although it's a bit expensive, there are a lot of new remastered LPs coming out all the time.

One of the really nice things that has come out of all of the digital format wars is it has made it possible for those of us on a budget to own very high end DACs, players and transports. So many people have sold off their DACs and players because they are afraid of missing out on the latest technology or are afraid to be left holding a rapidly depreciating asset. I own a Audio Logic DAC I picked up on Audiogon for only a $1000 that comes close enough to the sound of my turntable with a CEC TL2 belt drive transport to keep me very happy. As good as it may be, I too do not expect SACD to last for all the aforementioned reasons. But there are plenty of redbook CDs, and with musical DACs like my Audio Logic going for pennies on the dollar I don't care. I feel like I have the best of both worlds and that makes me happy.

Well...reviews of Pioneer's Universal players have been mixed at best...best to leave sacd sound to Sony...they invented it...and are simply "licensing" it to promote the format...and the redbook sound on Pioneer's 45/47 elite series is supposedly pretty khaki...I will wait till more universal players are available...and at better prices....