Mobile Fidelity has announced Brothers in Arms SACD (July 2013)

[ustas]

Just for info, not comments

Mastered from the original master tapes, and possessing a richness befitting the album

[Pottel]

and only 29,99 dollares??

[binone]

I DO have an SACD edition yet. What

[ds1984]

Different mastering, so nothing really new but it may just sound different. Add that this is a full digital recording, it will probalby sounds good but not necessary better than the Universal release.

And don't be fooled by the "Mastered from the original master tapes" mention because that don't tell you what exact generation of tape they had access to.

[herlock]

All this is a bit bullshit, there already was 25-year anniversary remastered by Chuck multi-channel SACD and DVD-A editions. So what could be new here ?
Keep in mind that SA-CD is bullshit. It adovcates two advantages over Redbook CD:
1)  Hig-rez, 96/24 recordings; We now know that there is no audible difference with standard 44.1/16 CD.
2) Mutlichannel. The idea of "surround audio" may seem nice on paper; in practise, it is a very artificial and difficult exercice. Instruments are separated in a less-than-natural way, it takes very expensive speakers to be placed just in the right spot, and to sit in a very precise place, to take advantage of this. And above all, the music itself has to be recorded in a way were multi-channel brings musical value. This could be true of Dark Side of the Moon, where lots of sound effects (e.g. clocks noise in Time) can create an ambience. I have real doubts for Brothers in Arms. If this is to feel like "I sit on the drummer's naps", what is the point ?

As I always say: care for the mastering, not for the media. The media is almost always good, unless you go for low-rate (128kb/s) MP3. Mastering is everything. Better a good master recorded on a plain 2-channel CD than a shitty master recorded on a 5.1 SA-CD !!

[ustas]

Different mastering, so nothing really new but it may just sound different. Add that this is a full digital recording, it will probalby sounds good but not necessary better than the Universal release.

And don't be fooled by the "Mastered from the original master tapes" mention because that don't tell you what exact generation of tape they had access to.

I agree, it will be different and it is not expected a huge improvement of sound. Referring to Steve Hoffman, previously he was requested to remaster of BIA:

I haven't read this thread. Did MoFi find an analog mix of this album to master to SACD? If so, I'm so there.

 AF tried to do this album but all we could find was the original PCM-1630 mix that sounded dreadful, thin, bright, bad. Then we found a 1630 EQ safety. That sounded worse. Then the band wanted to take that and make a NEW digital master adding more top end before approving. We passed.
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/mofi-dire-straits-brothers-in-arms-sacd-july-2013.318631/page-4

[ustas]

All this is a bit bullshit, there already was 25-year anniversary remastered by Chuck multi-channel SACD and DVD-A editions. So what could be new here ?

Chuck did the 5.1 mix only. The DVD-Audio and SACD were (to bad) mastered by Robert Ludwing. 

[ds1984]

All this is a bit bullshit, there already was 25-year anniversary remastered by Chuck multi-channel SACD and DVD-A editions. So what could be new here ?

Chuck did the 5.1 mix only. The DVD-Audio and SACD were (to bad) mastered by Robert Ludwing.

From what I read and understood, BIA is not the best candidate for such a thing as it was done at a time when digital technology was not at its best yet. BIA is not a modern DSOTM, the 80's one sounds now much more dated that the 70's one.

[Justme]

Very interesting topic, thanks for bringing that one up.

Further info on recording "Money For Nothing" (and some pics as well) is provided right there:

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/may06/articles/classictracks_0506.htm

[ds1984]

Very interesting topic, thanks for bringing that one up.

Further info on recording "Money For Nothing" (and some pics as well) is provided right there:

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/may06/articles/classictracks_0506.htm

Already poster here but always great to see it.
Just that he get it wrong when he refer to a Les Paul Junior used for MFN.

[Justme]

Already poster here but always great to see it.
Just that he get it wrong when he refer to a Les Paul Junior used for MFN.

Sorry, that is why the article appeared so familiar to me ;-)

[ustas]

From what I read and understood, BIA is not the best candidate for such a thing as it was done at a time when digital technology was not at its best yet. BIA is not a modern DSOTM, the 80's one sounds now much more dated that the 70's one.

I assume that MK could sign an agreement with Mobile Fidelity to release back catalog in US due to he does not work with Warner Bros more. And it is not surprise that MoFi began with the most  famous album. May be all DS albums from "analog" era will be remastered by MoFi. But I would be happy if they will release solo albums like GH and STP. Both albums could be sounded better. Especially GH, which was recorded and mixed in analog and bad mastered using the HDCD technology.

[herlock]

From what I read and understood, BIA is not the best candidate for such a thing as it was done at a time when digital technology was not at its best yet. BIA is not a modern DSOTM, the 80's one sounds now much more dated that the 70's one.

I assume that MK could sign an agreement with Mobile Fidelity to release back catalog in US due to he does not work with Warner Bros more. And it is not surprise that MoFi began with the most  famous album. May be all DS albums from "analog" era will be remastered by MoFi. But I would be happy if they will release solo albums like GH and STP. Both albums could be sounded better. Especially GH, which was recorded and mixed in analog and bad mastered using the HDCD technology.

Agreed.
HDCD was a good idea at the time to offer dithering on normal CD.
But now it is obsolete: first, modern recording processes allow to dither without the need of a hardware decoder, so it has become pointless; second, and above all, since Microsoft bought the technology and actually killed it, you are now stuck with a bunch of HDCD-encoded CDs for which you can't find anymore a player to decode them ! Granted, decoding is not actually needed, and GH and STP can still sound fine on a normal CD player, but for sure, HDCD-encoced CDs sound worse undecoded than either decoded or if there were not encoded at all in the first place.
So basically, there is a need to re-record those old HDCD-encoded CDs without HDCD process. This would be a great opportunity.

[ds1984]

From what I read and understood, BIA is not the best candidate for such a thing as it was done at a time when digital technology was not at its best yet. BIA is not a modern DSOTM, the 80's one sounds now much more dated that the 70's one.

I assume that MK could sign an agreement with Mobile Fidelity to release back catalog in US due to he does not work with Warner Bros more.

I don't think so. MOFI only release limited series so they don't sign large scale distribution agreements. And the problem between Mark and WB does not mean that WB does not still owns the the back catalogue distribution.

[ustas]

herlock

1) For about 90% of HDCD releases with logo or without (which indicated as HDCD during playback) are not actually mastered using HDCD techology. It means that mastering engeeners did not use any HDCD filters. Or they just used Pacific Micronics A/D converter. In any case, the Pacific Micronics equipment (PM Machine One/Two or PM A/D converter) put the HDCD sub-code in the signal. You can see HDCD logo lights but there is nothing has to be decoded. Shangri-La and Private Investigations are mastered wihout HDCD filters and it does not require any decoder.

2) But another MK releases from 1996 to 2000, including GH, STP, Wag The Dog, Metroland and all sountracks remasters were mastered with Peak Extend filter (Wag the Dog also used LLE filter). I do not need any HDCD player more due to I use PC as a source, and there a lot tools to decode HDCD like Cue Tools or plugin for Foobar . All of it use HDCD decoder library taken from Microsoft software decoder.  So it is possible now to decode it to 24/44 wav or flac. Decoded signal does not have an actually 24bit resolution. It has floating bitrate from 17 up to 20bit (20bit on the maximum peaks, which are extened during the decoding and palyback).

ds1984

Audio Fidelity has the limited series. Up to 3000 or 5000 copies printed. A lot of AF CD sold out after 3-6 month after release. All MFSL CD/SACD releases since 2008 are still available. An unofficial investigation reports that  some MFSL releases were printed up to 25 000 copies.