Members seaneldon Posted December 21, 2005 Members Share Posted December 21, 2005 Oh god, I promised myself I would never join the "audiophile stereo system" cult, and then I heard a friend's SACD system with gigantic speakers and tube preamps and phonostages and poweramps and holy CRAP IT SOUNDS FREAKING UNBELIEVABLE. So I wanna get some of this stuff. So I'm coming here for some reccomendatons. My buddy's setup was a gift, he knows nothing. Does anyone here have SACD, and what other components are you using? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sonik Posted December 21, 2005 Members Share Posted December 21, 2005 I'd recomend getting a player that can also handle DVD-Audio. Which IMO (not trying to start anything!) is a superior format. But if you can hold out for another year or two I bet we just might see HD-DVD/Blu Ray audio/video disks. *drool* Anyway besides the increased fidelity is the surround sound aspect. Thats fairly easy to acomplish, though proper placement of speakers (and sadly listening posistion) is key. However to truley appreciate the increased fidelity you need some pretty sweet speakers and components. Plus having an appropriate room. It really depends on how far you want to take it. In general the best place to start is budget Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members seaneldon Posted December 21, 2005 Author Members Share Posted December 21, 2005 room acoustics are taken care of. i'll be using a room where i bring mixes from the studio. it's well treated. budget? ehhhhh...up to $3500 USD, hopefully lower. something where i can upgrade by adding, rather than selling. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members seaneldon Posted December 21, 2005 Author Members Share Posted December 21, 2005 also, i'm looking into building my own speakers from kits off of http://www.zalytron.com/, a store here on Long Island. really crazy stuff. i'm mainly looking for reccomendations for preamps, poweramps, and other components of that nature. check this out: (look familiar? haha) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sonik Posted December 22, 2005 Members Share Posted December 22, 2005 Your talking soley audio components at the moment right? 3500$ can certainly get you a pro-sumer grade audio system. Do you want to go surround? You can get crazy and go with a 7.1 (or even 9.1 though I havn't heard any media that supports this), but honestly I think 5.1 is plenty, plus it's the most common anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members seaneldon Posted December 22, 2005 Author Members Share Posted December 22, 2005 i'm going to keep it stereo for now...2.1 actually, and later upgrade to 5.1. i'd go 5.1 right away but the speakers that i am completely sold on are going to run me about $1900 for two, and i'll have to build the cabinets. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Stocklin Posted December 23, 2005 Members Share Posted December 23, 2005 Try this site. For speakers, save some time, cash, and headaches by purchasing a set of Event Precision 8's. Why spend gobs of cash on speakers to listen to music that was mixed on Precision 8's or Mackies? Mine are fantastic, and I have no desire to venture away from studio monitors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members doug osborne Posted December 23, 2005 Members Share Posted December 23, 2005 sonic777 gave the answer that I was going to, but we both made an unfortunate assumption. When you said SACD, we assumed you meant surround, but we understand that you've fallen off the high-end deep-end If it was a surround system, I was going to give you completely different advice, but spend a bunch on the player. You might want to go to Acoustic Sounds and check out the SA-CD players - they range from $999 to $9,380. Get as much amplifier as you can to drive your speakers (make sure you have a lot more power for the subwoofer than for the mains, and that you integrate it using an appropriate active crossover). You might even be able to drive the amps directly with the player and not get a preamp. Bryston makes some good stuff. When you can upgrade this to surround, you just buy three more identical speakers (avoid the horizontal center channel speakers), three more identical channels of power, and a surround processor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members the stranger Posted December 23, 2005 Members Share Posted December 23, 2005 I thought SACD was doomed? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members seaneldon Posted December 23, 2005 Author Members Share Posted December 23, 2005 Originally posted by Stocklin For speakers, save some time, cash, and headaches by purchasing a set of Event Precision 8's. Why spend gobs of cash on speakers to listen to music that was mixed on Precision 8's or Mackies? Mine are fantastic, and I have no desire to venture away from studio monitors. would you want NS10s as your home stereo speakers? no. but tons of records get made on them. but i don't want them in my living room. i had ASP8s. sold them for dynaudios. the speakers i plan on building are much sweeter sounding for home listening (not for studio) than my ASP8s would have been. no thanks. like it or not, $2000 speakers most likely sound better than $1200 speakers, especially if the $2000 speakers aren't price-padded for a well known brand name and the $1200 speakers are. Originally posted by doug osborne sonic777 gave the answer that I was going to, but we both made an unfortunate assumption. When you said SACD, we assumed you meant surround, but we understand that you've fallen off the high-end deep-end The REAL reason I'm not doing surround sound right now is because I've never heard something other than movies mixed in 5.1 or 7.1 that sounded better than the same music in stereo. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sonik Posted December 24, 2005 Members Share Posted December 24, 2005 Dark Side of the Moon 5.1 and Steely Dan's two against nature are both excellent surround mixes. But theres certainly nothing wrong with buying better 2.1 components than a cheaper 5.1 system. As for SACD's relevence, i'm not following the market but I really don't think it's going anywhere consumer wise. I just hope there isn't a format war with HD and Blu Ray. Unless players can handle both formats, but of course the companies that have a stake in either format will be proprietary. I love how greed can actually slow down progress somtimes. Sorry I think I went off on a tangent.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members doug osborne Posted December 24, 2005 Members Share Posted December 24, 2005 Originally posted by seaneldon ...The REAL reason I'm not doing surround sound right now is because I've never heard something other than movies mixed in 5.1 or 7.1 that sounded better than the same music in stereo. I'll agree with sonic777 here on PF DSOTM and SD 2XN are almost unlistenable in 2.0 compared to 5.1. I could give many examples. I'm mixing the Casey Fallen project in surround right now, and I'm frustrated that few will be able to hear these mixes - my 5.1 mixes in this case are far better than my 2.0 mixes. Again, I think I and a few others made an unfortunate assumption, that by saying SACD, you were sayng surround. Instead, you are saying 'audiophile' or 'high end.' You'll probably be spending $10,000 on a turntable next and buying obscure import LPs and $1,200 power cables... SA-CD is certainly not going to be a dominant format, and no hi-rez music BRD or HD-DVD format has been announced. the audiophile system you are lusting after will make your lowly CDs sound great, too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Watershed Posted December 27, 2005 Members Share Posted December 27, 2005 I only have one SACD, and I must say I am VERY disappointed with it.It's Peter gabriel's "Shaking The Tree" in SACD Stereo. And man, they've mastered ALL the bottom end out of it! I couldn't believe it. It's just all thin and gutless. I think the reason that SACD get such varying reports is because it depends on what disc you hear. I need to get myself a DVD-Audio disc and see how that goes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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