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I am curious to know if SACD users are playing 2 or 5 channels set ups ,,and at which percentage ,,
Follow Ups:
As for the SACD layers, I listen most often to the stereo because my stereo system is much better quality than my MC and is in the room where I set to read and browse the Web. My MC system, in any case, is often in use for TV viewing and HT.Most of my listening is, in fact, to the CD layers ripped to my computer and played back via my USB DAC.
Bill Bailey
_______________
Good enough is good enough
the level of quality equipment I now have for 2 channel to expand to equivalent multichannel, I'd rather spend any additional money I have on even better stereo equipment.
Len
2 ch here.
because this is what my player supports - dvp-9000es.
i'm not upgrading because there are too few m-ch titles in my collection (which is mostly jazz).
Lately, I've been breaking in a 2-channel tubed preamp, so I'm doing a lot of 2 channel listening. My 2 channel source, amplification, and cabling are of higher quality than when I go Multichannel.Nevertheless, I tend to prefer multichannel. My latest comparisons have been with Dire Straits "Brother in Arms". I really liked the 2-channel version (especially with the tubed pre), but the multichannel was preferred. Multichannel also tends to be a winner with classical but the rear/center "inferior" components still seem to hold things back a bit.
Most of my SACDs are surround sound, classical genre. To me, even solo instruments sound more realistic in multichannel. I don't so much want to hear a piano recital in my family room as I want to be "transported" to the recital hall to hear it. Surround sound comes closer to that ideal.Although, for a lot of the studio recordings of rock/popular music, stereo is the less annoying option.
I listen in stereo with Hafler-type surround. In this set-up, I route an extra set of pre outs to a passive processor (called a PhaseSurround unit produced by Fine Line Audio in the mid-90's). This unit extracts the out-of-phase information between the two channels. I then run that signal to a stereo power amp and then to a pair of rear surround speakers. This gives a substantially more 3-D soundstage than coventional stereo. I've been using this type of surround set-up since the mid-80's and I would never go back to conventional stereo. This effect works best for naturally recorded acoustic music. For typical studio recordings, it doesn't really help (since there's no natural sound stage for those recordings anyway).
Mark
nt
...and it's gonna stay that way, but not because I don't like MCH--in fact, I experienced a wonderful MCH system last week, courtesy of a fellow inmate, and loved it. It's just that I don't have the space to do justice to MCH and, more importantly, I can't afford it!Russell
A Denon 3803 AVR isn't going to necessarily cut it except perhaps for the best MCH recordings out there.I going to focus more and more on listening with my Rogue tube amps for two channel. I wouldn't say I'm entirely done with MCH though but I don't see myself upgrading the Denon AVR anything soon.
nt
Robert C. Lang
although i will soon have a nuforce processor, i will probably listen to passive dynaquad in the foreseeable future. no front center needed, no more amplifier channels than just stereo, and i am well immersed from ALL sources.for those of you without the newest processors, DPL and DPLII will work nicely to your surround advantage.
...regards...tr
Maybe one day I'll look into multichannel. One of my many reasons for not being interested in surround is that I very rarely sit in the "sweet spot" for 2 channel. So I think that multichannel would be a waste.
Regards,
Geoff
At every opportunity
Robert C. Lang
sometimes Mono sounds like a good idea. Yeah that is 2 Ch.dee
;-D
nt
I use a stock Sony SCD-C222ES for multichannel playback in my surround sound system, and a Matt Anker modded Sony SCD-XE670 in my 2-channel system.
nt
IBSmiester
Open Your Ears....
always.
...my main system in the basement is 2-channel, and it's used about 90% of the time.My HT system is rarely used for listening as it's where the family usually has the TV on. I don't get much opportunity to listen in Mch, but enjoy it when I do.
Doug
Is there really a choice?
I have purchased many SACDs that are 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, 5.0 and 5.1.
Very often, actually, usually, there is no mention on the outside case what format is contained inside.
If there is, it is in very small print in an obscure area of the graphics.
Sometimes it's inside in the book, sometimes it doesn't appear at all.
When I noted this on the forum about a Telarc disc in 5.0, I was told it is really in 5.1 and my disc was defective. I exchanged it and the replacement was in 5.1.
Without the forum, and because of the lack of a requirement to state the format, I would have never known.
Anyone else have this issue?
Ron
My listening room -- large as it is -- would not be conducive to multi-channel even if I could afford the expenditure.
I do prefer to listen to surround although some of the stuff is a litle quirky i.e. lead guitar or background vocals very localized in a rear channel.
I listen in 5.1 whenever the disc carries a surround track. However, my current sources are better on stereo than surround so I occasionally go back to 2-channel for the sake of ultimate clarity (plus of course for CD and LP). I regularly attend live symphony concerts and they are by default surround experiences so, despite endless controversy on this forum, surround ought to be more real, in theory if not in practice.The best thing I've heard so far is the SFSO/MTT Mahler 7th Symphony which is a very 'in hall' sound, better even than previous releases in this excellent series.
Dave
(nt)
In the first years (2002-mid2006) multichannel, while in the last 6 months 2 channel, only.
When you have an excellent 2 channel player, you don't feel any missing.
Anyway, I could listen to MCH by dvd player with SACD facility, but DSD is downconverted to pcm with all its limitions.
Howdy"When you have an excellent 2 channel player, you don't feel any missing." Conversely when you get to an excellent MC player you realize what you were missing :)
-Ted
Tried it both ways and always prefer the 5.1 mode on SACD. Many of the SACDs as well as DVD-As were recorded with surround in mind. Among my audio friends in my area, I seem to be in the minority who prefers surround over 2 channel.
I can't speak for classical releases but as far as pop, rock, jazz and blues there are very few titles I am familiar with that were actually recorded "with surround in mind". Most releases are catalog items. There are a few titles were a quad mix from years ago existed but even those were not recorderd "with surround in mind" That little nitpick aside I have been enjoying both DVD-Audio and SACD in multichannel whenever available.
. . . I have a couple of questions:When you're at a live concert, is all of the applause entirely in front of you, or is some or most of it behind you?
Have you ever listened from the side of your system (and facing 90 degrees from where you normally listen)? Do you really feel you can hear the back of the recorded space (club, auditorium, concert hall, or whatever) with only your two front channels?
When I "listen sideways" with my mismatched multichannel system, it's as if the back wall of my living room disappears, replaced by the actual acoustic space of the recording. Yes, my RF and LF speakers and amplification are quite a bit better than than my center, RR, and LR channels, but even so, I find the multi-channel listening experience so superior that I would never go back to two-channel if I can avoid it.
Of course everyone's mileage varies!
1. Some of it is behind me, unless I'm in the back row. Then again, I really don't care if I hear applause or not. I'm there to hear the music.2. Yes.
3. Yes, with recordings that have that "information".
Finally, there are a lot of things involved in musical enjoyment for me, including acoustical space. Others include lifelike timbre of instruments/voices, inner detail, texture of instruments/voices, accurate portrayal of harmonics, pitch definition, dynamics, etc. I could go on, but I suspect you get my point.
[When you're at a live concert, is all of the applause entirely in front of you, or is some or most of it behind you?]
Some of it is behind me, unless I'm in the back row. Then again, I really don't care if I hear applause or not. I'm there to hear the music.I see I wasn’t clear with my question here – see the discussion with Jim below.
[Do you really feel you can hear the back of the recorded space (club, auditorium, concert hall, or whatever) with only your two front channels?]
Yes, with recordings that have that "information".I guess I’ll just have to tip my hat to you. So you hear the rear information from behind you even though your sound sources are in front of you?
Finally, there are a lot of things involved in musical enjoyment for me, including acoustical space. Others include lifelike timbre of instruments/voices, inner detail, texture of instruments/voices, accurate portrayal of harmonics, pitch definition, dynamics, etc. I could go on, but I suspect you get my point.I not only get your point, I agree with your point!
Chris - My goal is simply to hear great music. I don't literally hear the rear information *behind me* (nor do I care), but I certainly hear a facsimile of the acoustic space the recording was made in (I'm using "facsimile" because that's all we're getting anyway, unless we're at the concert - Also, although I don't hear info behind me, I do have a feeling of being "enveloped" by the music). Also, my point in saying there were many things involved in musical enjoyment for me was *partly* because adding extra channels (and all that entails) naturally raises additional problems in getting some of those other things right.One additional thing, that might help you understand my perspective: I have friends who are jazz musicians. I get to see and hear them play in a lot of different venues, both amplified and unamplified. Sometimes that "venue" is simply someone's living room. In the latter case, clearly the size is more similar to the space in which I listen to my stereo, i.e. more similar than being in a big hall. I have never found the absence of bigger venue ambience or hall information to be something I miss. In fact, the advantage of hearing more clearly some of the other things I mentioned in my previous post more than makes up for that.
Finally, just want to emphasis that this is my *perspective*. I'm not trying to say I'm right by listening to 2-channel, and that you are wrong for listening to multi.
****"Sometimes that "venue" is simply someone's living room. In the latter case, clearly the size is more similar to the space in which I listen to my stereo, i.e."****I do agree. I was in a "living room venue" with a live jazz band over the weekend (see comments below about the "New York Sessions" recordings) and I thought about then what you have shared here. The side/rear information is not *as* critical, but it is there nonetheless, especially in my venue the living room opened out to the entry hallway. Hopefully, any multi-channel recording of that type of venue would employ the subtlest of rear channel participation
****"Finally, just want to emphasis that this is my *perspective*. I'm not trying to say I'm right by listening to 2-channel, and that you are wrong for listening to multi".****
However, if a multi-channel listener has her/his system set up properly and if that same system is also used for two channel listening (by definition the two channel system would also be set up properly) then they are in a great position to compare the two layers and decide which one sounds the most like the real thing to them. A two-channel only listener does not have that choice.
Robert C. Lang
HowdyI'll take issue with "However, if a multi-channel listener has her/his system set up properly and if that same system is also used for two channel listening (by definition the two channel system would also be set up properly) then ..." as well.
I'm a big fan of more absorption (vs. diffusion) in my setup. I like my MC room to be as dead as possible without being uncomfortable. I have all direct radiating front ported speakers ... For MC I'm certainly not a fan of live end dead end or dipoles or bipoles ..., tho lots of people get great sound with them in a stereo system.
Also, for example, in my system with MC material you are totally immersed in a very deep soundstage: you don't even think about how deep the soundstage is... When I use stereo material the soundstage is foreshortened by my front wall. With my equipment I could pull the speakers further into the room to make the stereo soundstage better, but that would shrink my 20' ITU circle for MC (since my rear speakers can't move back.)
Don't get me wrong my stereo isn't bad, but I sure would have set things up differently if I wanted it to be better and didn't care about MC.
-Ted
OK. I'm confused. What specifically do you take issue with in my statement (that I slightly modified below). If I used the word "optimal" instead of "proper" would that do it?Do you use your multi-channel system as the primary system for two-channel listening? It sounds like you have "tilted" your system toward multi-channel over two-channel listening. Would you characterize that as being a correct assumption on my part?
Are your 5 primary speakers equidistant from the listening position?
Does your system double as a Home theater system? (That is definitely *not* part of the equation I was illustrating).
Sorry about all the questions.
Robert C. Lang
HowdyWell, I read a part of your statement (perhaps erroneously) as "If your system is setup properly for MC then it's properly setup up for two channel." I further inferred (once again perhaps erroneously) that you also meant to imply that a system that's optimized for MC is also optimized for two channel. That I couldn't agree with. Now that I re-read your post I possibly assumed to much.
Anyway to answer your questions:
I listen almost always to MC. I still enjoy my thousands of CDs, but more these days I listen to single tracks from them vs. whole MC SACDs.
I certainly have done almost everything I could to optimize for MC even if it meant that stereo had to suffer. Tho when I could make stereo better without compromising MC I did that. The biggest exception is that my front speakers cost at least twice as much as my rears or center :)
As I mentioned I do have a 20' ITU circle (including the sub) which implies that they are equal distant...
My system does include a 50" plasma which compromises my center speaker height, but I choose to live with that since we do enjoy Tivos and DVDs.
Here's a post with a summary of my room and a link to some (slightly out of date) pictures of my room: http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/hirez/messages/224992.html
My system description: http://cgi.audioasylum.com/systems/3367.html
-Ted
Ted: I recently dropped a chunk of change on a new Krell EVO system (SACD player, preamp, stereo amp), Martin Logan Summits and some inexpensive Nordost Valhalla speaker cable. My partner thinks I'm crazy, but I keep telling her I'm a paradigm of restraint compared to many audiophiles. Would you mind if I show her your systems page to prove my point? TIA.P.S. How can I incorporate my 20-year old 19" Toshiba TV into my audio system if it has no RCA jacks? My adamant refusal to mix audio and video may be an ideological anachronism, but I'm stickin' to it.
HowdyDon't forget about MikeL's system :) http://cgi.audioasylum.com/systems/663.html
-Ted
did you notice that Mike's system is 2-channel and he keeps his audio separate from video? Of course you did! :)
HowdyHe's thinking about MC, but isn't fully decided at this point. His room was designed to support MC and he has the 6 channel DAC6... I don't think he's going to acquire 2 more Rockports tho :)
-Ted
I checked out your picture gallery after I sent my last post. Impressive indeed.
Robert C. Lang
HowdyI need to take more pictures now that a few things have changed (as if 8 Gigs of the new house isn't enough :)
-Ted
OK. I think I have a good picture now. Actually, at some point I think the topic of in depth look at multi-channel set-up is worthy of its own thread.I took the approach that what's best for two-channel (mostly for depth of soundstage and imaging, etc.) is also best for multi-channel (if, of course, the center and rears are also set up in accordance to ITU requirements and not impeded by furniture or what not). There are specific requirements for front speaker placement (when used for stereo) that I was not going to mess with. (They work best 82" from the wall out on the floor). Fortunately, the room can accommodate both (optimum two-channel, given the specific placement requirements for the front speakers as well as all the other MC speakers). This was made unquestionably easier because I didn't have a TV between the speakers. (Believe me I had to fight hard to keep a monster TV out of the room). So, the two-channel speakers are absolutely optimized (with respect to placement). I did compromise a bit on placement of the rears but nothing to *materially* compromise the performance of the multi-channel sound and they still meet minimum ITU placement specs. All speakers are equidistant (9' 4") from the listening position. So even though the two-channel is performing at its absolute zenith the multi-channel whips it every time. And if I could improve the performance of the two-channel (there may be some crossover tweaks I can make) the multi-channel system would automatically also be improved.
Robert C. Lang
HowdyThe size of my ITU circle was constrained primarily by the width of the room and secondarily by the position of the door just beyond the right rear speaker. After putting the center speaker as close to the front wall as possible I calculated the listening position from the rears and center then placed the front left and front right. Since it sounded great in MC I then left it alone :)
Even tho we took different routes for calculating speaker placement, my more point was that people claim to get value from other things (e.g. dipoles, rear firing tweeters, room lenses, ...) for stereo that I just don't believe in for MC. This was more where I was coming from when I was talking about optimizing for MC vs. stereo.
As I read your system description I chuckled: just today we were out looking for a place to get custom cut slabs of granite or marble :)
In any case as I've learned there are many ways to a great system. I know you enjoy yours like we enjoy ours.
-Ted
****However, if a multi-channel listener has her/his system set up properly and if that same system is also used for two channel listening (by definition the two channel system would also be set up properly) then they are in a great position to compare the two layers and decide which one sounds the most like the real thing to them.****I have a couple of "problems" with this: first, I don't agree that the two channel system would be set up properly *by definition*. I'm assuming set up includes room treatment, speaker placement, listening position, etc. Second, re what sounds most like the real thing: each person, of course, would be free to use there own criteria, and "like the real thing" is not necessarily what I would use - i.e. *if* by "like the real thing" one means rear hall ambience, etc. Third - and this raises a new issue - let's say for x amount of money I can put together a 2-channel or multi-channel system. I would choose the purity, texture, timbral accuracy, etc. of the two-channel system every time, *if* I had to sacrifice those to get back-of-hall information. Again, just my personal preference. I don't see a right or wrong here; and, I suppose, if I had unlimited money and could build my own room and system, I would make a serious effort at multi-channel that would match (or exceed) my two-channel in every way. I certainly have not heard that multi-channel system yet, but that's not to say it isn't possible.
I just want to say that after my exchange with Ted and after thinking about it some more my *by definition" statement is clearly not correct and you were correct in calling me on it. I do believe that if you can squeeze the very best two-channel out of your system and at the same time place the center and rears where they are "suppose" to be in relation to the mains that both (two channel and multi-channel) can sound their best and that then both can be fairly compared. But Ted has reminded me that that is a *tall* order in many/most situations. Anyway, thanks for your ears.
Robert C. Lang
Thanks for your follow-up message. Ted's example of room treatment is an example of the type of thing I was thinking of. It has been enjoyable conversing with you. It's great when these forums serve as a place for us to share information, points of view, etc - as opposed to when people get into a false right vs wrong arguments. Thanks!
When you quoted me and wrote **"like the real thing"*** you left off two very key words, *to them*. The quote should read "like the real thing to them". That addresses the entire issue you had about "personal preference" which I was aware of and accounted for in my response.Regarding the "by definition" issue, it is true a properly set up two channel system is not spelled out as a specific requirement for good multi-channel in ITU specifications. But it is certainly implied. I methodically set up my multi-channel system, including the use of pink noise measurements and in the process I made my two-channel system, around which my multi-channel was built, the best it has ever sounded. To be sure, I should have accomplished this long before I upgraded to multi-channel, but the recommendations that pink noise measurements be used to optimize a multi-channel system and the specific ITU requirements that state that all speakers be equidistant from the listener "forced" me to optimize my two-channel system in the process.
Sure there are compromises to be made along the way, with any system, two-channel or multi-channel. But given the constraints of these compromises the two-channel portion of a multi-channel system (again assuming that you plan to do serious two-channel listening) should sound as good as it would if you had no multi-channel set-up. But even slight compromises in favor of multi-channel over two channel in a given system should not materially interfere with the listener’s decision to decide which one s/he prefers in a direct comparison.
One thing I am patently clear about, it is hell of a lot easier and definitive to make comparisons between multi-channel and two channel than between "Redbook and SACD" or between "SACD and vinyl", between "PCM and DSD", between Redbook and vinyl", "amp A and amp B, and on and on, that listeners in this forum and elsewhere seem to be able to accomplish with an absolute certainty. And they make these comparisons involving different systems on different days and sometimes different decades! Making a comparison in a single system between multi-channel and two-channel, in which are *clear* differences, with the convenience of the brilliantly implemented two layer SACD, is a slam dunk.
So, I will say again: if a multi-channel listener has her/his system set up properly and if that same system is also used for two channel listening then they are in a great position to compare the two layers and decide which one sounds the most like the real thing *to them*. A two-channel only listener does not have that choice.
Your issue regarding costs and choices, I agree with 100%.
Robert C. Lang
"When you're at a live concert, is all of the applause entirely in front of you, or is some or most of it behind you?"Depends on where I sit, though I've never gone to a concert or jazz club to listen to the applause. I'd note, too, that having spectatored rehearsals as well as the actual performances, the latter always sound somewhat different, the result of having the warm-body room treatment of a capacity live audience installed in the performance venue. By far the vast majority of the recordings I listen to haven't been performed before a live audience, so unless the producer and engineer have inserted something to simulate one, what I hear in those recordings won't sound like what I hear in a live performance from my tenth-, fifteenth-, or twentieth-row seat, anyway.
"Do you really feel you can hear the back of the recorded space (club, auditorium, concert hall, or whatever) with only your two front channels?"
Depends on the recording--and to no small degree on speaker placement and room acoustics, particularly its diffusive envelope, something I've spent some time fine-tuning in my more or less dedicated listening space. Altering that envelope will indeed induce "collapse" into the speaker plane and behind it, but with proper positioning the sonic presentation blooms into the room, achieves non-window, spatial-cue ambience--and in some cases (again, recording-dependent) moves the applause in a live-performance recording forward of the speaker plane.
So you're right--the mileage varies.
Jim
http://www.geocities.com/jimtranr/index.html
"When you're at a live concert, is all of the applause entirely in front of you, or is some or most of it behind you?"Depends on where I sit, though I've never gone to a concert or jazz club to listen to the applause. I'd note, too, that having spectatored rehearsals as well as the actual performances, the latter always sound somewhat different, the result of having the warm-body room treatment of a capacity live audience installed in the performance venue. By far the vast majority of the recordings I listen to haven't been performed before a live audience, so unless the producer and engineer have inserted something to simulate one, what I hear in those recordings won't sound like what I hear in a live performance from my tenth-, fifteenth-, or twentieth-row seat, anyway.
I don’t go to concerts to listen to applause either, but the point of my question is that, in a live-music situation, the listener has an acoustic space behind him (where some or most of the applause comes from, depending on where he’s sitting), and even if there’s no actual applause originating from that space, I believe this space holds some not insignificant components (e.g., spatial cues) of what makes live music sound live. When the sound of this space behind the listener is replaced by the walls of one’s listening room, or is transferred via the recording process to sound which originates in front of you, I’d guess that the chances of one’s home playback environment to provide an accurate image (which correctly positions all the audible real estate of the actual recorded space, including the space behind the listener – where the applause often emanates) is a bit reduced.
"Do you really feel you can hear the back of the recorded space (club, auditorium, concert hall, or whatever) with only your two front channels?"
Depends on the recording--and to no small degree on speaker placement and room acoustics, particularly its diffusive envelope, something I've spent some time fine-tuning in my more or less dedicated listening space. Altering that envelope will indeed induce "collapse" into the speaker plane and behind it, but with proper positioning the sonic presentation blooms into the room, achieves non-window, spatial-cue ambience--and in some cases (again, recording-dependent) moves the applause in a live-performance recording forward of the speaker plane.
I hear you, and I appreciate that the sound from two speakers can be perceived forward of the speaker plane. (I’ve had that experience too with, as you say, the right kind of recording.) But does even a properly placed two-channel system in a dedicated room move the applause so far forward that it mimics the original recorded space behind you as well as in front of you? That’s one phenomenon I have not experienced. Mind you, I’m not saying that it can’t be done with two channels, only that I’ve never experienced it myself.
Audibly so (in properly reared systems, anyway), and here are just a few examples:Maurice Jarre's theme for "Grand Prix", spiced up with Brad Miller-recorded race cars looping the entire room in "More Than Music: The Mystic Moods Orchestra" (a MoFi reissue of Bainbridge LP BT 6201, OOP). This recording was a staple of four-channel demos in a series of two-FM-station (K101 and KDFC) simulcasts of quad program back in the '70's in the San Francisco Bay Area. Hearing the cars whiz around them while listening to the two-channel LP has caused more than one visitor to ask if my tube traps (especially the ones behind them) were speakers.
Sergei Prokofiev's "Chout" (Walter Susskind cond. the London Symphony, Everest CD EVC 9019). Produced and engineered by Bert Whyte in 1958, this recording produces a believable illusion of a large concert hall acoustic that extends behind the listener. I hear a similar effect with the Whyte-produced Tchaikovsky "Francesca da Rimini" (Stokowski cond. the "Stadium Symphony Orchestra of New York" [the NY Phil], Everest CD 9037) and in Steve Hoffman's remastered LP version. "Similar," not "identical", because the former was recorded in London's Walthamstow, the latter in Manhattan Center, suggesting that the difference in ambient spatial cue perception is less a reflection of listening room acoustics than what's embedded in the recording itself. And I haven't even mentioned the so-called "Spatializer" recordings or others that employ gimmickry to achieve a spatial illusion.
Which brings up a point raised by your comment "when the sound behind the listener is replaced by the walls of one's listening room". I believe the assumption of some is that the walls aren't in play with a multichannel system. But walls (and other room appurtenances) are still a factor, since even multichannel doesn't function in a vacuum and has to contend with room acoustics--a point demonstrated when I salted a friend's quality-system MCH listening room with a just a couple of traps that imparted more definition to the acoustic space.
Jim
http://www.geocities.com/jimtranr/index.html
Jim – Thanks for your thoughtful responses! I can't resist commenting on your first sentence however:Audibly so (in properly reared systems, anyway). . .
No pun intended, I assume? (Properly reared systems?) Anyway, on to the the substance of your post:
. . . the difference in ambient spatial cue perception is less a reflection of listening room acoustics than what's embedded in the recording itself.
I couldn’t agree more! Of the recordings you cited, I have only the Stokowski/Francesca. It’s a fabulous recording, and you certainly can hear how Manhattan Center contributes toward the overall sound. But even here, I just don’t hear the “behind sound” from behind. (And even if this recording should be released in the current series of Everest HDAD/DVD-Audio releases from Classic Records – with the 24/96 three-channel option – I still won’t be expecting to hear that rear information, because all three channels will still be in front of me.)
Which brings up a point raised by your comment "when the sound behind the listener is replaced by the walls of one's listening room". I believe the assumption of some is that the walls aren't in play with a multichannel system. But walls (and other room appurtenances) are still a factor, since even multichannel doesn't function in a vacuum and has to contend with room acoustics--a point demonstrated when I salted a friend's quality-system MCH listening room with a just a couple of traps that imparted more definition to the acoustic space.
I don’t disagree here either. Certainly, walls and the items in the room affect our perception of the sound. So you’re right: multi-channel has to contend with room acoustics too. But in general, I find multichannel more forgiving of room acoustics. (And I know there may be some listeners here who disagree with me about this.)
Finally, if you get the chance, try to hear the recording of Mendelssohn’s Lobgesang Symphony on the Nishimura label (DVD-Audio and possibly only available in Japan at the moment). Recorded with five omnidirectional microphones, it’s the nearest approximation to live I’ve heard in my own home, even though the resolution is only 24/48.
It's how I play the game.Like so many other things in life, you won't know what you have with "behind" sound until you've lost it. You'll certainly notice its absence, for example, if you shut off the rear channels while playing a well-recorded four-or-five-channel disc with subtly-encoded (i.e., more or less natural) rear ambience. The same is true here if I alter the diffusive envelope by removing or simply changing the orientation of a few "behind" traps.
The Wild/Fiedler Gershwin RCA SACD three-to-two mixdown is a (one of several) case in point. The Mohr-Layton (Rhapsody, American in Paris) and Delheim-Salvatore (Concerto, Cuban Overture, I Got Rhythm Variations) productions differ from each other in their soundstage signatures (mike selection? placement? mixing decisions?), but in each instance they project "outward" to the extent that altering the diffusive envelope behind me (e.g., by orienting one or more traps to absorb head-on rather than randomly reflect the output) will collapse the presentation.
With this recording (and with the Francesca), it would be interesting to know what you'd hear if you moved your rear speakers completely out of the way. I'm not suggesting that you schlep them around, especially if they're hefty floor-standers, but in a previous incarnation I learned early on that dormant speakers behind the listening position--larger ones in particular--had a tendency to create a degree of suckout or otherwise affect what was heard from the listening chair.
More important than any of this, though: I'd like to see someone pick up the Everest ball and release some more of that fine catalog on SACD.
Cheers,
Jim
http://www.geocities.com/jimtranr/index.html
I have followed your approach to room treatment with some interest.I wonder if, with your careful attention to detail in optimizing your room for 2 channel playback, you have duplicated what I get with MCH. One of these days we may talk you into MCH. If we do, when you do similar optimization for MCH, it should sound truly spectacular.
Stereo only.
Unless the disc is only available as a 2 Channel SACD, the Surround Sound SACD track is always the preferred playback method here.
I purchase only SACDs that have a surround program. Listening for fun is ALWAYS in surround.
Best Regards,Michael Bishop
Recording Engineer
Hard to imagine it in 2 channel, it is very agressively mixed for surround, and very fun to listen to.
two-channel, whether the source is SACD, CD, or LP.
Jim
http://www.geocities.com/jimtranr/index.html
HowdyI'd probably be happier with a phantom center channel since I have video in the middle, but still it's almost always MC here. About the only think I listen to in stereo even tho MC is available is "Time Out", I can't stand having the echos of the cymbals which come out of the center at a different height than the original cymbals :)
-Ted
I've found only a few SACDs where two channels sounded better than the surround mixes. In those few cases, the surround ambience was allowed to swamp the front channels as well as the surrounds. Most disks are not mixed that way.Even the two vs three channel RCA's tilt heavily to 3 channel, IMO.
Of course, using five full range Thiel's may help influence this preference.
Harry
I have a multi-channel set-up but probably prefer the 2-channel mix on SACDs about 85+% of the time.
So I ditched the 5.1 set-up and just stuck with 2 channel for the whole system. I don't feel I'm missing anything with movies either - although I don't really watch many action flicks. Mostly dramas and comedies.
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