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I think SACD sounds a LOT better than DVD-A. It's also still real hi-fi - you don't need the TV on to play your music! And is it just me, or does the CD dual layer sound much better than the equivalent vanilla CD?

I've only seen one or two cheap Sony players in person (each a DVD player, actually) and never heard one. The impression I get is they are not real. SACD has attained no market position in five years!

Listened to some of the very well recorded Audio Quest CDs on SACD on the Classe Omega and the same music on JVCs XRCD and preferred the XRCD more body and low end detail.

SACD not so much better than the best of today's cd's that it can justify the higher price

To my ears, they sound more "true" than red book CD. Warmer, and not as harsh. While others are writing up the inherent flaws with SACD and that red book could still potentially outperform it (!), I think maybe the idea is to offer a bump in quality to those who don't want to go goofy buying fancy DACs and all the rest of that audiophile stuff.

I hope that SACD succeeds. It sounds great and works seamlessly in my two-channel high-end system. On the other hand, I am irritated by DVD-A and its dependency on menus and home theater systems. I make many SACD purchases of titles that are unknown to me, however, I would not even consider purchasing a DVD-A of my favorite album of all time.

So far, so good; however, as with the other formats I own or have evaluated (LP, CD, DVD-A), SACD is also dependent (maybe even more so) on the quality of the mastering-all the extra bits and quantization levels in the world cannot correct for a bad engineering job at the source.

I truly like the new format. On most of the recordings I have (approx. 50), the sound is so much more open, fuller, detailed, on and on. I hope that manufacturing plants are built or converted to produce the hybrids. I fee that the sooner this is accomplished the better it will be for the format and the record companies.

I've had an SACD player for about 18 months now and amassed about 110 SACDs (I owned about 30, all hybrids, prior to buying the player) I think for the most part, it is pretty wonderful. Definitely, on average, a solid improvement over CD. But as with any format, some titles can be hit and miss: either the original source is lousy, or the mastering job is faulty. While I would gladly buy an SACD for any music i buy, i don't restrict myself to that format. Some CDs can sound great, and if the sonics are not stellar, so what? as long as the music is inspiring and enjoyable, i can always tolerate less than audiophile grade sonics. I've recently returned to vinyl. i certainly see why people love it sonically: warm, great timbre, and musical. do all LPs sound great? no...as with CD/SACD, they also rely on the original source, the mastering process, and the pressing. given the convenience and sonics, i'd take SACD over CD and LP. But in a real world, i'll take whatever i can get. all the media can sound quite good and offer musical satisfaction.

Haven't heard it, period.

Are you kidding? The first time I heard SACD on my video system, played on a Sony DVD player, my jaw dropped. I ran out and bought a Sony SCD-1 for my stereo system. While SACD is not analog, at least I can listen to digital now without dying a death of a million pin pricks

vinyl junkie

For a digital medium it is by far the best that I've heard. Does the consumer need another format war ? Does he need a high quality format to rip to mp3 or play on his hitb? We the audiophiles of the world should embrace this technology and encourage the uneducated to accept it also.

Thank goodness for SACD. I'm speaking as a musician and not so much as an audiophile. I just wish there were more titles. The latest and greatest in CD hardware and media have shown great advances in sound lately, but the latest and greatest of SACD just sounds more natural and enjoyable to me. I can't wait to be on a recording that uses DSD and makes it to SACD!

I went with okay. I have very limited experience so I do not feel I'm a good judge. I had about six of the same recordings in both SACD and CD. I had a dealer's top of the line Phillips SACD player and compared it to my MSB Gold DAC. I thought there was very little difference, but I felt the more expensive MSB Gold to be better. For the most part I could not hear any real difference. As I've said many times before there are way too few titles on SACD for me to be interested. I never believed SACD would be a success. Unbelivable just how bad the marketing was done.

There are no SACDs with music I like on them, so why should I even listen to the format?

I am buying SACD in small numbers. It is somewhat better, sometimes GREAT. A Lot of this stuff is just CD recycled.

I find SACDs to be less fatiguing. Sometimes when listening through Stax headphones, the sound is like magic.

I think it is a bit better than CD, but not by an overwhelming amount, and certainly not by an amount that the average listener will care about at all.

It really is pretty good. The overall sonic difference is there even when heard through low budget systems. But i must also admit that i was very well satisfied with the cd sound and i am tired of trying to cath up with new technologies.. I collect music and i want to know for sure on which format to rely for the years to come..

SACD can sound dull and undynamic due to less leading edge roughness than CD. Sometimes need to turn up the volume to appreciate how good it is!

With New Age / Ambient music as my mainstay, SACD doesn't have enough of what I like to check it out.

When done well it's wonderful (e.g. Peter Gabriel's "Up"). But I've also heard several mediocre discs.

I've found SACD (like pretty much any other medium) has the potential to offer fantastic results, but more often than not the limiting factor boils down to the skill of the mastering engineer and the quality of the source tapes. In the end, I'll take an SACD over pretty much any other format (over CD for sound, over vinyl for convenience), but I can live with any format as long as the music is good.

sacd is not as good as well recorded vinyl, but much better than 1st or s2nd generation red book. non-audiophiles can easliy distinguish between the three formats, and have universally chosen the vinyl,sacd,cd order of best liked recordings in my room.

I love SACD and prefer to purchase an SACD over a redbook CD any time.

I feel that it is everything it should be at this point. The best SACD to me, is Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road. This is the one that hooked me. But it does boil down to the remastering.

There in no question that SACD out performs CD, it has many of the positive points of great analog without all the fuss. Only real complaint is the small catalog, come on Sony, start releasing new releases in hybrid and tap that huge catalog.

Are we being re-sold old inventory? Seems like it!