I would suggest that the obvious answer is:

JA wants people to buy the recording.

And, explain to me why this is bad. What is this about, the MUSIC or the technology?

Yeah, props to JA for keeping high fidelity recordings accessible to as many people as possible by releasing on CD.

that was a paradoxical statement if ever there was one.

Well, in order to make money, one must sell a particular quantity of recordings, for instance.

One must also be able to efficiently produce, etc, and put to disc (or whatever) the recording.

Therein lies the problem with many "hi res" formats. Small market, difficult tools ...

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JA seems to take every opportunity to show his support for the higher res technology, in print and on this forum.

Yup.

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In reviews we find him referencing the Hi-Res files that only he has on his laptop of his recordings. He doesn

Hey, I don't know what your talking about but you got guts and guts is enough. Nobody can accuse you of following the flock off the cliff. Do you believe in the Virgin Mary, rgibran?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYxEIyNA_mk

...

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Yup. The sound of the hi-rez masters is what I am regard as the final product. But the sound of this CD is by no means "ho-hum" - it has both a very high dynamic range and a solidity to the stereo imaging that surprised even me. I did the downsampling from 88.2kHz to 44.1kHz using the sample-rate converter in Bias Peak 6 set ot its maximum quality, which runs at around 5x real time on my Intel MacBook, ie, each minute of music takes around 5 minutes to convert. I also experimented with redithering to get the sound of the 16-bit data as close as possible to the 24-bit quality.

Pardon, 'redithering'? Dithering is mandatory when converting from higher to lower bitdepths (cf. Lipshitz & Vanderkooy, who recommended the now-standard triangular PDF dither). Do you mean you tried several different kinds?

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And lately, if I am correct, he has taken to traveling about the country giving demonstrations on the superiority of the technology.

Yup.

If that refers to the sort of 'dem' you described doing at the ListenUp! salon, it may have been a 'dem' of something, but not likely a dem of the superiority of high rez to Redbook. The 'dem' you described doing at the Colorado high-end salon -- a seamless four-step comparison with hi-rez lossless to start and a questionable 2003-vintage 128kbps mp3 codec at the end -- does not constitute a demonstration that the stuff in the middle sounded different from the sound at the beginning. Nor can a 'dem' where listener expectation of difference was not controlled for, nor results actually tabulated in any statistically meaningful way, reliably 'demonstrate' that real difference was heard -- except to the faithful.

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I also experimented with redithering to get the sound of the 16-bit data as close as possible to the 24-bit quality.

Pardon, 'redithering'? Dithering is mandatory when converting from higher to lower bitdepths (cf. Lipshitz & Vanderkooy, who recommended the now-standard triangular PDF dither). Do you mean you tried several different kinds?

Of course. What other meaning could be gotten from what I wrote? There are a large number of redithering algorithms available, combining some sort of dither (to optimize the decimation to the smaller bit depth) with noiseshaping of some flavor (to preserve the original resolution as much as possible in the region where the ear is most sensitive). Which algorithm is optimal depends on the music's dynamic range and spectrum, so I use that which, to my ears, gives the closest approach to the sound quality of the original 24-bit file.

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If that refers to the sort of 'dem' you described doing at the ListenUp! salon, it may have been a 'dem' of something, but not likely a dem of the superiority of high rez to Redbook.

In your opinion, Mr. Sullivan, and I see no point in arguing with that opinion.

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The 'dem' you described doing at the Colorado high-end salon -- a seamless four-step comparison with hi-rez [uncompressed] to start and a questionable 2003-vintage 128kbps mp3 codec at the end -- does not constitute a demonstration that the stuff in the middle sounded different from the sound at the beginning.

In your opinion, Mr. Sullivan. But with respect, your opinion, is irrelevant. What matters is the opinions of those who participated in the demonstration -- see http://stereophile.com/news/music_matters_in_may/ -- and those 200 people seemed to find it both enjoyable and informative.

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Nor can a 'dem' where listener expectation of difference was not controlled for...

You have made this point on other forums and I still don't grasp why the listeners would have any "expectation of difference." As far as they were concerned, the Messiah excerpt you described was just another in a series of musical examples of claimed high quality. They had no idea that there was anything unusual about the musical sample being played.

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nor results actually tabulated in any statistically meaningful way, reliably 'demonstrate' that real difference was heard -- except to the faithful.

Why do you always have to demean that which to you have not experienced, Mr. Sullivan? I have never claimed that my dems were formal tests, nor were they intended to "prove" anything. As I have repeatedly told you, my primary motive for the dems I presented in Colorado last month to to allow people to hear my hi-rez recordings from the master files under optimal conditions. I really don't grasp why you are so fixated on these dems.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile

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For SACD or DVD-A release, the authoring would have to be done by an outside contractor, which would make the retail price too high for the sales volume required.

John, I was discussing this with Jim T. and since both these formats are near dead we were wondering and speculating about PCM on DVD-V. It will handle up to 24/96 and would avoid the authoring, or not?

I'd thought about offering a hand-burned DVD-V or DVD-A, perhaps signed by all the band, but it would have to be expensive. Just how much, I have no idea, nor do I know what people would be prepared to pay. We did overprint the Digipack of Live at Otto's, so the packaging would at least look the same.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile

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I had hoped you provide a little more real world take on the possibility of my question. A little Googling would indicate a hybrid DVD could be produced for somewhere between 50 to 100 percent more than your current CD release. So instead of a cost of $1.00 each or less, a hybrid DVD with CD as well as hi-res PCM layer would cost $1.50 to $2.00 each. Hardly reason to not offer a Hi-Res version IMHO. I believe all other costs would be equal and was the basis of my question.

My apologies for contradicting you, but the cost-per-disc, in the quantities we would need pressed, would be higher than you quote. In addition, the authoring for SACD and DVD-A or -V, as I mentioned in my earlier response, would be much higher than the $0 it costs to master a CD. We would have to price the disc at $25-30, and I suspect that sales would be too low at that price to get back the investment.

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I shouldn

When I heard "more expensive," I thought 50 bucks or more. At 25 to 30, I promise to buy two.

I think you should go for it.

It would also be a great conversation starter!

download idea is great... let folks burn their own DVD-A discs.

and your target market being what it is...you would probably do quite well with DVD-A or SACD, since most of us chase the highest fidelity.