A response from the MVI website...

[DaneelOlivaw]

Wow I didn't know those ringtones on the Rush MVI aren't free (not that I use ringtones anyway but that's not the point). What the hell are they thinking?!

I also agree this format will fade away quickly, even before I knew about the ringtone issue.

As far as no hi-res tracks, my guesses are:

1) I'm sure their inclusion upsets the execs who think we're all pirates i.e. they don't want us to have what are basically master recordings of their music (even if it can be watermarked)

2) on a more practical note, there are a lot of dvd-audio players out there........but their owners have no idea that to hear hi-res surround music they have to connect the player's 5.1 analog output to their receiver's 5.1 input but will instead think "Why can't I hear anything through the Toslink digital jack?" (I worked audio/video retail for several years and know very few people ever read their gears' manuals). So after dealing with this, or finding out they have to buy an entire set of cables to make it happen, they return the disc. And few surround fans bothered to tell them they could choose an option on the player to play the disc as a dvd-VIDEO disc, thereby allowing access to the Dolby and/or DTS track which would be available via the player's digital output (not everyone fusses over sound quality like we do). ---> This could also be remedied if the dvd-audio disc was authored to include ALL its audio format offerings on the main audio menu, like many later DTS Inc. titles do.

Oh, and many player's still have crappy bass management for hi-res signals, if they offer it at all: "Why do the 4" woofers in my little satellites get distorted when I play these things?" Same with receivers because b.m. on their 5.1 input still seems to be very rare for models under approx $800.

IMO a series of fundamental hardware/software errors and short-term financial thinking really helped screw the dvd-audio format. Sacd was much better planned out IMO, though lack of good marketing - even if the iPod had never appeared - for both formats also helped to send both of them to their doom.

 

[neil wilkes]

As far as no hi-res tracks, my guesses are:

1) I'm sure their inclusion upsets the execs who think we're all pirates i.e. they don't want us to have what are basically master recordings of their music (even if it can be watermarked)

This cannot possibly be the way they are "thinking" (wrong word, wot!) because they are including 24/96 Stereo LPCM. It's only us surroundheads getting screwed over.

2) on a more practical note, there are a lot of dvd-audio players out there........but their owners have no idea that to hear hi-res surround music they have to connect the player's 5.1 analog output to their receiver's 5.1 input but will instead think "Why can't I hear anything through the Toslink digital jack?" (I worked audio/video retail for several years and know very few people ever read their gears' manuals). So after dealing with this, or finding out they have to buy an entire set of cables to make it happen, they return the disc. And few surround fans bothered to tell them they could choose an option on the player to play the disc as a dvd-VIDEO disc, thereby allowing access to the Dolby and/or DTS track which would be available via the player's digital output (not everyone fusses over sound quality like we do). ---> This could also be remedied if the dvd-audio disc was authored to include ALL its audio format offerings on the main audio menu, like many later DTS Inc. titles do.

This is lazy authoring. Warners were always guilty of this, as the DVD-A spec is grey here because it states "all imported VTS content shall (my emphasis) be pointed from the AMG of the Audio_TS". Not "can be", not "sometimes". In my dictionary, the word "shall" is defined as

(in laws, directives, etc.) must; is or are obliged to:

.
So, no matter if playing in a DVD-A player or not the lossy streams should be accessible from the same AMG as the High Resolution selections.
Fotr examples of how this should be done, see the 2 Bjork DVD-A releases "Vespertine" & "Medulla", as well as PT's "FOABP" and all my titles too.
Failure to do this results in a disc that is technically not DVD-Audio.
It's not exactly Rocket Science either. Simply create a group for Video Content, import the Video_TS, and set a track for each Video title present. In fact, it is actually harder NOT to do this as Sonic DVD-A Creator will throw an error if you imported a Video_TS and did NOT link or reference the VTS content. The disc will simply not compile. It's laziness, and inexcusable.
Or - in the case of a lot of the Warner titles - label interference, as I know the man who used to author for Warners, and he is very stringent on correct spec so if it has not been pointed, he was told *not to do it* for some reason.

Oh, and many player's still have crappy bass management for hi-res signals, if they offer it at all: "Why do the 4" woofers in my little satellites get distorted when I play these things?" Same with receivers because b.m. on their 5.1 input still seems to be very rare for models under approx $800.

IMO a series of fundamental hardware/software errors and short-term financial thinking really helped screw the dvd-audio format. Sacd was much better planned out IMO, though lack of good marketing - even if the iPod had never appeared - for both formats also helped to send both of them to their doom.

Problem here is the essential cheap nature of people.
Let's be brutally honest here - would you try to run a Mini Minor in a NASCAR event? Unlikely, so why in the name of all the gods would anyone in their right minds try to play a high resolution (or, come to think of it even a CD) on bloody Sub/Satellite setups that are seriously band limited and carry all bass signals in the bloody sub! Madness.
SACD was certainly not better planned. It was rushed out - despite Sony owning DVD-A patents - as a hurried development of DSD which was designed as an archival medium and not a playable one. The noise shaping required to make a single bit system (dare I say from a 2-bit company?) listenable is herioc to put it mildly, and the very fact that there are some SACD that sound simply amazing is a testament to the engineers making the masters rather than a thumbs-up for the format.
DVD-A is plainly superior in many ways, not the least of which is that it should (as you have already so rightly pointed out) be fully compatible with every single DVD player that is out there in the wild - over 500 million units last time I saw figures - whereas the number of SACD players is by comparison vanishingly small.
Plus of course DVD-A has the only DRM system that has not yet been breached.
I honestly believe there is more than just bad marketing at fault here. Admittedly, when you try to ask about DVD-A in the UK I have always been greeted with blank looks. I was even once told that I did not ought to be buying a DVD-A player at all because I had to use analogue interconnects, and this other machine had Dolby Digital which was - so I was told by a salesman with a deadpan straight face - plainly superior because it was digital. Hmmm. Shurely Shome Mishtake.
SACD was developed only because Sony refused to take part in a united format as that would mean they did not get all the royalties.
Greed, pure and simple.

 

[Ge Someone]

whereas the number of SACD players is by comparison vanishingly small.
Plus of course DVD-A has the only DRM system that has not yet been breached.

Yeah, but Sony can add the first batches of PS3's to the numbers cause they could play SACD, only they were launched at a time hardly new SACDs were to be found.
About the copy protection, I'd say SACD is even harder to copy (digitally) because it can only be played in "stand-alone" players.

I agree totally with the sentiment against MVI, too many people seem to think Dolby Digital is equal to 5.1. The music business should know better.