SACD Transport.. Need help

pravine

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I recently purchased Marantz SA8005..I understand the player cant send sacd signal thru digital out. My bad...

Kindly advise me.. if you heard any good SACD transport?

Thanks,
Pravin
 
I recently purchased Marantz SA8005..I understand the player cant send sacd signal thru digital out. My bad...

Kindly advise me.. if you heard any good SACD transport?

Thanks,
Pravin
Hi brother try any old high end bluray player, ,
 
I recently purchased Marantz SA8005..I understand the player cant send sacd signal thru digital out. My bad...

Kindly advise me.. if you heard any good SACD transport?

Thanks,
Pravin
I don't know any SACD players that can output DSD digitally, as it is a copy right requirement. Some folks were using hacked sony play stations to rip SACD into DSD rips if I remeber right.

I have a esoteric SACD player, that will output normal CD's via digital out, but not SACD.
 
@pravine - just curious , which genre you mostly listen to ?
I love 80's and 90's slow rocks, jazz, vocal jazz.. some stockfisch recordings... Instrumentals of Paul Mauriat's.. Gospel songs.. 90+ Ilayaraaja's. 1992 to 2005 ARR.. Of course many are there... Including Don Williams, Neil Diamond, David Munyon, David Roth..etc... Again many are there bro.. Music has no limitation..
 
I recently purchased Marantz SA8005..I understand the player cant send sacd signal thru digital out. My bad...

Kindly advise me.. if you heard any good SACD transport?

Thanks,
Pravin

Its not that straight forward. If i remember correctly, even if you use an SACD transport, it requires a compatible DAC. By compatible, what i mean is, the DAC should not only accept DSD input, but properly handshake with the transport using some digital key. I believe the output DSD from the transport will be encrypted and the DAC will have to decrypt it before doing the convertion to Analogue. If this is not the case, anyone can make a DSD rip from an SACD using SACD transport. For SACD decoding using the PS AUDIO SACD transport, you would need PS AUDIO DAC itself.

check this link and search for the query from "jerry95".

On another note, I too am using SA8005 and i am really happy about its SACD performance and like you, my Denafrips Terminator DAC is also in transit :).
 
I love 80's and 90's slow rocks, jazz, vocal jazz.. some stockfisch recordings... Instrumentals of Paul Mauriat's.. Gospel songs.. 90+ Ilayaraaja's. 1992 to 2005 ARR.. Of course many are there... Including Don Williams, Neil Diamond, David Munyon, David Roth..etc... Again many are there bro.. Music has no limitation..
Nice. Few similarities in taste - Stockfish , Dali recordings are audiophile quality. Don , Neil Diamond , Munyon too are in my listening list.

The reason I asked is - you have large number of original CDs (or even SACDs ) for all these and more ?
 
The reason I asked is - you have large number of original CDs (or even SACDs ) for all these and more ?
This is a good question as the number of published SACDs titles is quite less compared to regular ACDs.
 
Nice. Few similarities in taste - Stockfish , Dali recordings are audiophile quality. Don , Neil Diamond , Munyon too are in my listening list.

The reason I asked is - you have large number of original CDs (or even SACDs ) for all these and more ?
I have.. 10+ SACD in hand and getting around 25 used mint condition from US.. now stucked there... English close to 1K in hand..
 
Its not that straight forward. If i remember correctly, even if you use an SACD transport, it requires a compatible DAC. By compatible, what i mean is, the DAC should not only accept DSD input, but properly handshake with the transport using some digital key. I believe the output DSD from the transport will be encrypted and the DAC will have to decrypt it before doing the convertion to Analogue. If this is not the case, anyone can make a DSD rip from an SACD using SACD transport. For SACD decoding using the PS AUDIO SACD transport, you would need PS AUDIO DAC itself.

check this link and search for the query from "jerry95".

On another note, I too am using SA8005 and i am really happy about its SACD performance and like you, my Denafrips Terminator DAC is also in transit :).
Congrats for your Terminator... Mine Pontus on the way...

How about using Bluray players like Sony ES1100 or any good currently available in market?? We need to try... Using I2S...
 
How about using Bluray players like Sony ES1100 or any good currently available in market?? We need to try... Using I2S...

IMHO, any SACD player from reputed manufacturers wont be just outputting the DSD from SACD without proper content protection. Maybe there is some chinese product out there that does just the same. You have to search for that.
 
Its not that straight forward. If i remember correctly, even if you use an SACD transport, it requires a compatible DAC. By compatible, what i mean is, the DAC should not only accept DSD input, but properly handshake with the transport using some digital key. I believe the output DSD from the transport will be encrypted and the DAC will have to decrypt it before doing the convertion to Analogue. If this is not the case, anyone can make a DSD rip from an SACD using SACD transport. For SACD decoding using the PS AUDIO SACD transport, you would need PS AUDIO DAC itself.

check this link and search for the query from "jerry95".

On another note, I too am using SA8005 and i am really happy about its SACD performance and like you, my Denafrips Terminator DAC is also in transit

Fm Miany has tried to explain it best in the above post. I have tried this about 12 years back on a Sony player and it didn't happen due to encryption.
 
I am using I2S input on my Sabaj D5 to listen SACDs played on my Sony UBX 800M2. HDMI ARC outputs to a HDMI to I2S converter/ bridge which outputs DSD over I2S to Sabaj D5 via HDMI connector.
 
This seems to be a fairly active thread, so clearly there is an interest in the topic.

I am listing some Facts on SACDs

1. The SACD (Super Audio CD) was jointly invented by Sony & Philips... who also invented the CD and the SPDIF (Sony Philips Digital Interface Format).


The SACD was invented as a successor to the CD, capable of several improvements over the CD. These include:

a. Better Quality Sound than the CD. A COMPLETELY different digital mode - (Single Bit) DSD for SACD compared to (Multi Bit) PCM for CDs.

b. 30 minutes longer duration than a CD (which could barely accomodate some Classical Music pieces)

c. Upto 6 Audio Tracks, compared to 2 tracks on CD.

2. The SACD Holds 4700 MB (Similar to a DVD) compared to approx 700 MB on a CD.

3. SONY's strategy was to own Copyrights to a Large library of Software, and leverage this commercially with Hardware that it would manufacture and license. Hence Copyright protection was an EXTREMELY Important aspect of the SACD Format.

The SACD License makes it ILLEGAL to output the Digital bits off an SACD, outside the SADC Player.


Hence:
a. A SACD Player will output the SACD Digital data ONLY to the DAC Built inside the player. or
b. Output the digital bits IN AN ENCRYPTED FORM that would be recognised only by a specific external decoder (DAC) which in essence would be considered a 2 box SACD player.

HENCE A UNIVERSAL SACD TRANSPORT IS ILLEGAL, AND WILL NEVER EXIST AS A PRODUCT IN THE FREE WORLD WHERE COPYRIGHT LAWS ARE ENFORCEABLE.

6. SACD Data can be ripped / captured as an iso image of the disc, USING (3rd Party) HACKS / Workarounds. (A few BlueRay Players and some other players like many OPPOs can be used for this)

This iso disc image can then be used to extract the DSD Tracks by software (Details available on request).

7. The closest you will get to a DSD "SACD Transport" is to rip SACD isos or download them, and play them via your DSD capable DAC.

You will certainly need a computer to play the SACD ISO.

8. The SACD ISO file is typically 2 GB to 3 GB per
SACD.

9. Freeware (eg Foobar with its SACD Plugin) is freely available to directly play an SACD iso or convert it to individual tracks in DFF and DSF formats, both formats offer similar audio quality playback. JRiver will also play SACD isos seamlessly.

DSF: DSD Storage Facility (DSF) files allow the inclusion of metadata. (Artist name, Album Name & artwork, track names etc etc.

DFF: DSD Interchange File Format (DFF) files don't allow any metadata tags to be saved for browsing & serching), hence its use in a music library is limited.

P.S: "Rip SACD with a Blue ray Player" is an authoritative thread on SACD Ripping...
 
Last edited:
This seems to be a fairly active thread, so clearly there is an interest in the topic.

I am listing some Facts on SACDs

1. The SACD (Super Audio CD) was jointly invented by Sony & Philips... who also invented the CD and the SPDIF (Sony Philips Digital Interface Format).


The SACD was invented as a successor to the CD, capable of several improvements over the CD. These include:

a. Better Quality Sound than the CD. A COMPLETELY different digital mode - (Single Bit) DSD for SACD compared to (Multi Bit) PCM for CDs.

b. 30 minutes longer duration than a CD (which could barely accomodate some Classical Music pieces)

c. Upto 6 Audio Tracks, compared to 2 tracks on CD.

2. The SACD Holds 4700 MB (Similar to a DVD) compared to approx 700 MB on a CD.

3. SONY's strategy was to own Copyrights to a Large library of Software, and leverage this commercially with Hardware that it would manufacture and license. Hence Copyright protection was an EXTREMELY Important aspect of the SACD Format.

The SACD License makes it ILLEGAL to output the Digital bits off an SACD, outside the SADC Player.


Hence:
a. A SACD Player will output the SACD Digital data ONLY to the DAC Built inside the player. or
b. Output the digital bits IN AN ENCRYPTED FORM that would be recognised only by a specific external decoder (DAC) which in essence would be considered a 2 box SACD player.

HENCE A UNIVERSAL SACD TRANSPORT IS ILLEGAL, AND WILL NEVER EXIST AS A PRODUCT IN THE FREE WORLD WHERE COPYRIGHT LAWS ARE ENFORCEABLE.

6. SACD Data can be ripped / captured as an iso image of the disc, USING (3rd Party) HACKS / Workarounds. (A few BlueRay Players and some other players like many OPPOs can be used for this)

This iso disc image can then be used to extract the DSD Tracks by software (Details available on request).

7. The closest you will get to a DSD "SACD Transport" is to rip SACD isos or download them, and play them via your DSD capable DAC.

You will certainly need a computer to play the SACD ISO.

8. The SACD ISO file is typically 2 GB to 3 GB per
SACD.

9. Freeware (eg Foobar with its SACD Plugin) is freely available to directly play an SACD iso or convert it to individual tracks in DFF and DSF formats, both formats offer similar audio quality playback. JRiver will also play SACD isos seamlessly.

DSF: DSD Storage Facility (DSF) files allow the inclusion of metadata. (Artist name, Album Name & artwork, track names etc etc.

DFF: DSD Interchange File Format (DFF) files don't allow any metadata tags to be saved for browsing & serching), hence its use in a music library is limited.

P.S: "Rip SACD with a Blue ray Player" is an authoritative thread on SACD Ripping...
Wow.. thank you so much for very detail information..
 
Thanks, to you Pravine & and 9 others that liked my post. :)

I have been listening to SACD iso Rips for several years, and today have a collection of almost 1 TB of SACD iso rips.

To my ears and on my setup, SACDs (actually their iso files) have a very distinct sound. I have a Lot of Classic Rock (Fleetwood Mac, Pink Floyd, Dire Straits etc) as Red Book CD rips, Hi Res ( 24/44.1 to 24/192) and SACD Rips, allowing me to compare the different formats.

Ofcourse, most are mastered differently, sometimes I feel the SACD Layer and the CD Layer on the same disc sound so different that they must be different masters!

SACDs play approx 20 dB softer than PCM Red Book and HiRes files (Volume control needs to be cranked up accordingly). SACDs also have a smoother sound, with HF that is less etched and less emphasised. It is not less HF... some could probably refer to it as more refined HF ? I wonder....

The over all presentation is smoother and with better flow. on the other hand, Hi Res has more of a Stop-Start / impulsive sound with higher PRAT. Hi Res is more "Audiophile' to many listeners, while SACD is smoother ....
 
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