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i have often suggested and would very much like if all sacd product were released in hybrid form. it would simplify things for the stores and customers and it seems that a single inventory would be better for everyone.why doesnt telarc do this just as chesky has now?
...regards...tr
Follow Ups:
I'm the senior recording engineer here, so I can only answer from what I know. Our prez, VP of Sales, etc. all probably could give better in-depth answers, but this is what I know:1. EVERY Telarc SACD is Hybrid CD-compatible and that's always been the case.
2. Chesky releases only a handful of releases annually with somewhat limited distribution. Telarc releases about 50 projects a year.
3. With so few annual releases, a label such as Chesky can make all those releases surround and SACD capable, especially in the relatively small quantities they press per title. That's not practical or cost-effective across 50 releases with bigger press runs and source masters coming from a multitude of in-house and out-of-house sources.
4. The difference in cost of CD vs. Hybrid SACD across 50 releases and in the numbers required for our distribution would be enough to make many titles unprofitable. If a title is potentially unprofitable, we won't be making it in the first place.
5. SACD manufacturing capacity is very limited worldwide as compared to CD. We cannot have a bottleneck in our everyday title manufacturing. We set a release schedule and stick to it. Sadly, most of music customers don't notice if they have a CD or an SACD in their hands.
6. The music retail business is not robust enough to allow us to charge a fair price for single inventory hybrid SACD in all the genres and markets we cover. If our wholesale price had to be reduced to that of CD-only, yet we're paying for increased manufacturing costs across 50 releases times bigger press runs, PLUS the cost of recording/editing/mixing/mastering of a stereo hi-rez, stereo CD, and surround hi-rez master for 50 projects a year, I think anyone could see it wouldn't be long before we'd be out of business.
In a perfect world, I know we'd LOVE to see a marketplace consisting of music fans that clamour for nothing less than high-resolution stereo and surround music recordings for their every music purchase. I don't think we're going to see that happen, despite our best efforts. Telarc is in the business of selling MUSIC, first and foremost and that's where our main focus is constantly. The fact that we've been able to make a mark with high-resolution SACD releases of much of that music at all is actually a bonus - and somewhat of a miracle, considering the music business climate, IMO. It's the support of folks like those on the Hi-Rez Highway that help make our SACD releases possible and that of other SACD labels. SPREAD THE WORD!!!
I hope this helps. Thanks, as always, for the tremendous support and enthusiasm for music and hi-rez stereo and surround!
Best Regards,
Believe me I have bought many in the past whereas this is the case on a store shelf! :)
As I note below, Pentatone and Channel Classics are issuing most/all of their discs as single-inventory hybrid SACDs. Not that you have any special knowledge of these companies, but how do they do it and (presumably) earn a profit? Perhaps their sales volume is much lower on most discs; also Telarc issues music other than classical where the economics of single inventory might be much different. In any event, could Telarc successfully implement a single inventory plan if it were limited to classical releases (assuming adequate SACD production capacity)?BTW, I have noticed that many music reviews of dual-inventory classical discs from Telarc are based on the CD, not the SACD. Obvioulsy, it would help the hi-rez cause to provide reviewers with only the SACD, but I assume this is because the physical SACD has yet to return from the production plant.
Thank you for your comprehensive response. I'll count my blessings. In addition to the hundreds of SACDs I own, including a giant portion of the Telarc classical catalog, I am *especially* thankful and appreciative for my recent discoveries of Heads Up jazz artists, such as Pieces of a Dream, Doc Powell, Gerald Easley, etc. Your 5.1 mixes are phenoms in and of themselves. I do understand better now why my plea to Dave Love at Heads Up for more SACDs of these artists is probably not practical.Congratulations once again on your Grammy triumph.
And, oh yes,I am spreading the word. See below.
And if at all possible sign George Duke!
Robert C. Lang
If you don't have Tierney Sutton's "Dancing In The Dark". Excellent in both 2 channel and MCH. One of my best SACDs for sound!
Well for one thing, it still cost 4x to 6x to make hybrid discs as it does to make single layer CD discs. For another thing, some players have trouble reading hybrids. For another thing, the original master recording may not have been done in "DSD". Finally, the authoring costs to make the SACD master are significantly higher than for CD.Pretty much the same reasons that none of the major labels routinely released hybrid discs.
i posted that question some 6 months ago and mr.bishop was kind enough to reply.His answer..COST,COST,COST.but i wonder now,with the demise of Tower record,Telarc classical volume has to have taken a hit. is cost efficiency still a factor with sales volume lower?????
I know that there's been a lot of buzz on this forum about SACD players having trouble playing hybrids, but I don't recall any talk about regular CD players having difficulies with them.Is this common?
< < Is this common? > >A hybrid disc has a semi-transparent SACD layer halfway through the disc and a reflective CD layer at the top surface. To read the CD layer, the laser has to travel through the semi-transparent layer twice. This obviously will degrade the signal to some degree.
I don't know how common it is for CD-only players to have problems like this, but it does happen to some degree.
Another problem is that some DVD players and DVD computer drives will see the SACD layer first and think that a DVD disc has been inserted. But it can't read the "DSD" information, so it just gives an error message and spits the disc back out.
Pentatone issues all its discs, both new recordings and remasters, as SACD hybrid only. Channel Classics issues all its new recordings (with one or two exceptions) as SACD hybrid only. While the cost for these SACDs is more than some companies charge for CDs, they are no more expensive than some smaller outfits like Hyperion are charging for CDs. So apparently a profit can be made selling only hybrid SACDs, although this model might fail with popular music.
,
nt
has done it, seems like costs would go down in short order if only hybrids were offered.i sure hope michael can ansewer this more adequately.
...regards...tr
http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/m.mpl?forum=hirez&n=164953&highlight=cost+Michael+Bishop&r=&session=
thimgs must have changed if chesky can do it now.
...regards...tr
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