Consequently, when using the DSP-A1 you can zero out the DVD-S1500’s bass management with all SACD sources (remember, DVD-A is locked in with no bass management to begin with) and then get uniform bass management from all inputs, analog or digital: CD, DVD-A, SACD, DD, and DTS. The result is that a reviewer like me can not only enjoy the musical sounds of these new formats the way they were meant to be enjoyed, but can also do critical comparative listening without being haunted by the prospect of mal-adjusted (or non-adjusted) bass management screwing up my conclusions.
Unfortunately, the DSP-A1 does not have distance compensation with the six-channel analog inputs. (It obviously has them with all DD and DTS digital inputs.) However, and fortunately, in my middle system all of the speakers are nearly the same distance from the listening position, so the distance- compensation adjustment (with DVD-A, in particular) can be zeroed out. Yes, my middle system is ideal for evaluating these new surround technologies. OK, why waste more time. Let’s cut to the chase: Yamaha vs. Yamaha.
What does this last sentence mean? Well, it means that I took a very good CD recording (one that I still consider a reference standard for two-channel PCM audio sound), and after applying some very good Yamaha DSP surround enhancements that the DSP- A1 offers, compared it, A/B style, to the same recording produced with SACD surround technology. The recording was the Heinrich Biber and Johann Schmelzer recording Seventeenth Century Music and Dance from the Viennese Court (Chesky CD173 and SACD 262). One advantage with this particular comparison was that the relative levels between the two presentations were very close, thereby eliminating the typical “louder sounds better” phenomenon.
The main-channel speakers were Dunlavy Cantatas, reviewed by me in issue 87, and still installed in my middle system, with the Cantatas pulled out from the front wall several feet and positioned about 9 feet apart. The surround speakers were wide- dispersion Allison Model Fours, located well out to the sides, somewhat behind the listening position and about six feet from the floor. (Room-power response curves I ran on all of these speaker systems can be found in issue 95.) The contest also included the front “effects” channels the DSP-A1 offers with its hall- simulation modes, and the speakers up there (on the front wall, six feet up and essentially flanking the Cantatas) were a pair of modified Radio Shack mini- speakers. (I had modified them by replacing the tweeter and crossover network with Allison versions and using better acoustic stuffing inside of the box.) The subwoofer in this system is a Hsu TN1220, reviewed by me in issue 67.
The listening room is roughly 17 x 22 feet, with an
8-foot ceiling and the listening position was about 10 feet from the axis between the main speakers. If this face off were not able to highlight the surround, bandwidth, and noise-level advantages of SACD, nothing else would be able to, either.
In this case, the SACD release was a 4.1 job, with no output from the center channel. Because of this, rather than let the DSP-A1 apply surround enhancements to the CD that included a derived center feed, I chose to make use of one of its standard Yamaha DSP hall simulations, notably the one labeled “Hall C.” (The processor’s manual says that Hall C simulates a European, “classic shoe-box type concert hall with approximately 1700 seats.”) This function has the left and right channel signals go to the left and right main speakers unaltered, with DSP applied to the side/rear surrounds and the front “effects” channels. This is in contrast to the SACD version playback, which had only the left and right mains and the left and right side/ rear surrounds active. This channel-count difference will mean a lot, as we shall see.
The results? Well, the surround-sound SACD sounded better than the CD when the latter was played back with only two-channels in operation. (It is easy to switch to straight-stereo CD playback from any of the Yamaha DSP modes to compare processed and unprocessed playback.) It would be hard to see how the result could be otherwise, given the impact of the surround channels with the SACD version.
However, I think that the CD won the contest by a slight margin when the Yamaha DSP hall-simulation circuits were engaged.
Yep, with the CD, I believe that the incorporation of those two “effects” channels up front, in addition to the standard hall ambiance applied to the rear/side surrounds, managed to simulate a concert-hall sense space better than what the SACD release could deliver.
Now, this is obviously a matter of subjective opinion and some listeners would have no doubt preferred the SACD version, mainly because of the somewhat tighter soundstage focus. However, I felt that the front “effects” channels opened up the sound and allowed the CD to sound better than the SACD version, particularly with tight-focus main speakers like the Cantatas. Please note that no matter which version might be preferred, the contest was no walkover. We are discussing a taste-related issue here.
OK, let’s think about this a bit. It is possible that the SACD was not originally mastered with surround sound in mind, being engineered by the very talented Miguel Kertsman way back in 1997. My guess is that the Chesky engineers had to work with the material in such a way when producing the later multi-channel version that they essentially had to simulate surround sound from a mix that was originally set up to deliver a fine two-channel program. That with their obviously very good studio processing hardware they still could