Is there a backlash against MP3? We can only hope. My hopes for a successful high-quality audio format were dashed when SACD and DVD-Audio failed to become mainstream. I thought we were doomed to MP3 forever. Maybe not! The resurgence of vinyl as a viable audiophile medium began to give me hope once again. I’ve been excited to see consumers as young as college students wanting vinyl. I was thinking "at last, the voice of reason," but then I found out that much of that interest in vinyl has less to do with sound quality than with its collectability and packaging. That’s not a bad thing, of course--I've long been advocating appealing and information-rich packaging as a selling point for packaged media--but it doesn’t seem that audio quality is getting much attention! Lots of people are just ripping vinyl to their iPods and only keeping the records around for their sleeves. Strange perhaps, but at least vinyl, with all of its cracks and pops and wonderful full sound, is around if you want it--at least for some releases.

What’s really exciting, though, are two announcements made at CES this year that suggest Blu-ray’s potential as a viable medium for high-quality audio. First there’s Monster Music’s release of hip-hop artist Ludacris’s album Theater of the Mind. Monster's Kevin Lee took time out to speak with me about the March 10 release of this High Definition Surround SuperDisc (HDS). Part of Monster’s mission is to help consumers embrace the latest higher-definition video and music formats with this Blu-ray release that has exclusive footage and video as well. Lee said that Monster feels an audio-only disc is alien to consumers today, and that video is needed to sell the product. Although I am not sure I agree with that, I am anxiously awaiting this disc, since delivering high-quality audio is at least part of the motivation for creating the label: Kevin Lee’s father, Noel, created Monster Music because he is an audiophile.

Monster Cable was created 30 years ago to sell speaker wires. Lee said, "We have tried to help retailers demonstrate the benefits of surround sound for music and games, not just for movies. We probably set up 200 retail showrooms in which we hooked up DVD-Audio, SACD, PlayStations, TiVos, and iPods and programmed the remote so that the retail salesperson could demonstrate to the consumer how good a theater surround sound system could be. As you could imagine, the minute we left the room, no one knew how to operate the setup. But sound still continues to be a passion for us. With surround speakers we felt that there was an opportunity to give the consumer an incredibly new music experience you couldn’t possibly get with stereo. We also wanted it to be as close to high definition as possible without it being DVD-A and SACD."

What Lee says he disliked about DVD-A and SACD is that you needed specific players. Now, with Blu-ray, which seems to be the mainstream chosen optical disc format of the future, creating a music technology with amazing sound for that format seemed to make sense. "My father developed his own proprietary process with his know-how of surround sound mixing. He figured out how to get 12 points of surround sound."

The big challenge in marketing a new and improved format, has come in the form of content--or, rather, the lack ot it. "In the process of coming up with demonstration content for these home theater showrooms, we couldn’t come across relevant, current, megahit music that appealed to the masses," Lee says. That’s where the idea came from for Monster Music. "It was time to go to major artists in different genres." Ultimately, Monster worked on releases from 3 Doors Down, Ray Charles, Peter Cincotti, Al Jarreau, and George Benson, not to mention a surround mix of Vince Guaraldi's A Charlie Brown Christmas. The discs they came up with are called High Definition Surround (HDS) SuperDiscs.

While Lee said their discs have been successful thus far, they never created a hip-hop release. The idea was actually presented to Ludacris about three years ago. Monster funded the release, giving Ludacris’ label, Distributing Tha Peace, only the financial burden of taking the orders and manufacturing the discs. The album is finally ready for release. "We were so excited to have Ludacris with us to introduce the disc as CES." The Blu-ray release will cost about $25.

Perhaps, a little more ambitious, at least in terms of convincing consumers they need a new audio format, is the proposal by Grammy-winning recording engineers Bill Schnee and Doug Sax, who have teamed up with Pioneer Electronics in the hope of progressing an audio-only standard for Blu-ray Disc. Pioneer USA's chief loudspeaker designer, Andrew Jones, told me that there is no standard yet. However, Schnee and Sax are looking further at a standard that does not necessarily embed the audio into video streams, but rather does the job entirely independently. Both men do all of their recordings in 24-bit 192kHz and put music onto a WAV file into the data portion of the disc. If the player is capable of outputting that music directly digitally, you can then take it out and put it into a converter. If the player offers high quality with a digital-to-analog converter built in, you could go through those, Jones said.

Like Lee, Jones says there is a greater opportunity for Blu-ray audio than there was for SACD or DVD-Audio, because Blu-ray Disc players are the same machines used to play the mainstream movie format. In that sense it’s a no-brainer to purchase a Blu-ray audio disc.

But there are other obstacles--namely, a cultural shift in which portability has become more important than quality, and the most common listening platform for music isn't even a disc anymore. "The media has stopped writing about, and consumers have stopped caring about audio. Audio has been redefined as an iPod."

While neither Lee, Jones, nor I, for that matter, expect Blu-ray audio to become the format of choice for audio, or expect consumers to junk their iPods, we all hope that consumers will be offered a choice as to how to listen to their music in the home, in their cars, and on their portable devices, and recognize the value of higher-resolution audio as a significant factor in their listening decisions.

Debbie Galante Block (debgalante at aol.com) is a freelance writer based in Mahopac, N.Y. 

The Authoritative Blu-ray Disc (BD) FAQ Has Moved!

Hugh Bennett’s The Authoritative Blu-ray Disc (BD) FAQ has moved to its new home at Hugh’s News (www.hughsnews.ca).

It can now be found at: www.hughsnews.ca/faqs/authoritative-blu-ray-disc-bd-faq

Disc Makers, the nation’s leading manufacturer of CD and DVD duplicators and printers, is proud to introduce the new Reflex Daisy Chain Series of duplicators. The Reflex Daisy Chain Series offers all the capabilities and quality of the standard Reflex series with the added ability to connect up to hundreds of towers together – all operated by a single source.

Reflex towers integrate industrial-grade DVD/CD burner drives – built for the most demanding production environments, and each includes a beefy 320GB hard drive that stores up to 63 full size DVD images. The 7-drive units have a throughput of 56 DVDs or 105 CDs per hour, while the 10-drive units can turn out 80 DVDs or 150 CDs per hour. The Daisy Chain Series allows users to mix 7- and 10-drive models, and because the duplicators are not drive dependent, users can add additional units when the need arises.

"A 10-drive duplicator may meet you needs today, but what about a year from now, or even five years from now?", asks Tony van Veen, President of Disc Makers. "This is an affordable solution for businesses to continually increase their duplication throughput, and the daisy chain technology eliminates the need to add additional staff to man the added duplicators."

Another key advantage of the Reflex Daisy Chain Series is the flexibility to quickly configure the duplicators to work together or independently dependant upon project needs. For example, ten Reflex 10 Daisy Chain towers could be used for 10 independent jobs of 100, or configured to do one large run of 1000. The flexibility created in just a few key strokes is a powerful time saving tool.

Regardless of job type, whether used on their own or connected, all Reflex Daisy Chain Series units are completely standalone and provide exact digital copies of your CD and DVD master discs.

To learn more about Disc Makers’ complete line of duplication hardware, visit www.discmakers.com/duplicators.

About Disc Makers

In business since 1947, Disc Makers is the nation’s leading independent CD and DVD manufacturer, offering a wide variety of products and services, including state-of-the-art automated printers and duplicating systems as well as complete CD and DVD replication and custom packaging for independent musicians, filmmakers, and businesses. The company’s state-of-the-art facilities are outfitted with the latest graphic, printing, and CD/DVD replication equipment and products, as well as in-house studios for mastering and post-production, DVD and CD-ROM multimedia authoring, and award-winning graphics design. Disc Makers manufactures and distributes a large selection of disc duplication and printing systems, as well as a full line of recordable media and disc packaging supplies. The company also offers a variety of additional services including custom design, packaging, distribution and financing, and produces the Independent Music World Series, the nation’s largest showcase series for independent musicians. Disc Makers main office and plant is located near Philadelphia in Pennsauken, NJ, and the company has regional offices in Los Angeles, New York City, the San Francisco Bay Area, Chicago, Seattle, Atlanta, Nashville, Puerto Rico and Boston.

Lite-On, a global leader of optical storage solutions, today announces a new line of internal DVD writers that deliver a maximum write speed of 24X on select DVD media, the fastest in the market. Select drives will also include Lite-On’s own LabelTag and SmartErase technologies – unique labeling and data erasing features for DVDs and CDs.

Compared to similar devices in the market today, Lite-On’s new internal writers offer the fastest DVD recording available with its DVD writing speeds of 24X. All drives will include new Lite-On technologies designed for true power users who are concerned with more than just writing speeds. Lite-On’s SmartErase technology will be included in all drive versions, and the iHAS624, available in Mid-May, will also feature LabelTag – a new solution in disc labeling.

"PLDS is proud to manufacture the fastest 24X writers in the market, especially with included technologies such as LabelTag," said Christine Hsing, Marketing Manager at PLDS. "LabelTag provides a cost-effective and flexible method for professional disc labeling, a great solution for today’s busy professional and people on-the-go."

LabelTag is a patented new feature that allows users to create a label ring on the data side of any standard recordable media – no special media required. Users are still able to add data after the making a label, making burning your label is just as easy as burning your data.

SmartErase, which is included in all new 24X DVD writers, provides users with a permanent solution for erasing discs with confidential data. With SmartErase, users can be sure that private and sensitive data is securely erased and cannot be recaptured.

These new DVD writers will be available in the following versions:

• iHAS324 - 24X SATA with SmartErase; available in Mid-March
• iHAP424 - 24X PATA with SmartErase and LightScribe; available end of March
• iHAS624 - 24X SATA with SmartErase, LightScribe and LabelTag; available in Mid-May

For more product information, visit www.liteonit.com.

The management of DOCDATA N.V. today announces that docdata media Ltd. in Telford (UK), a part of the docdata media division, has sold its complete business activities for CD and DVD replication and Audio Cassette manufacturing to Sound Performance Manufacturing Ltd., a subsidiary of the UK based Sound Performance Ltd. This transaction includes the sale by docdata media Ltd. as per the transaction date of 30th of January 2009 of its business activities, tangible fixed assets, stocks, customer contracts, trade creditors and personnel and staff. Details on the financial characteristics of the transaction will not be further specified at the specific request of Sound Performance.

Docdata media Ltd. realised a revenue of about GBP 6 million with a positive net operating cash flow in 2008 and had total assets with a book value of about GBP 3 million at 31st of December 2008.

The management of DOCDATA N.V. expects that the sale of the replication activities in the UK will not have an adverse influence on the positive development of the Internet Service Company docdata. For the Telford site, management believes that this transaction will result in higher production volumes by adding the Sound Performance customer base. The existing labour contracts with the personnel and staff of docdata media Ltd. will be taken over by Sound Performance on the same conditions.

Michiel Alting von Geusau, CEO of docdata: "I strongly believe that this agreement with Sound Performance, who has been a long time reputable customer for docdata media in the UK, is in the best interest of our employees in Telford. When Sound Performance approached us with the idea for this transaction, we realised that a true win-win could be achieved."

Since 1994, Sound Performance is an established full service provider with offices in London (United Kingdom), New York (USA), Paris (France) and Kortrijk (Belgium), offering a one-stop shop solution for all manufacturing and printing needs for all formats, including CD, Vinyl, DVD, Cassette and Video. In addition to the manufacture of CD Audio, CD-ROM, DVD, Vinyl, Video and Audio Cassettes, Sound Performance also offers a full reprographic service and manufactures all associated packaging and print. For further information, please refer to the website: www.soundperformance.co.uk.

Chris Marksberry, CEO of Sound Performance: "We are delighted with this agreement, as there is a fantastic fit between the two operations. The factory site in Telford is superbly run and it will complement our existing brokerage business, offering our clients a unique combination of products and services."

www.docdata.com

]Recent earnings reports from several major Hollywood studios indicate steep declines in home entertainment revenues despite growth in Blu-ray Disc sales. Recently, studio executives acknowledged that falling DVD sales may be a reflection of shifts in how people watch films, even if the economy were not in recession.

Until now, how much each factor has contributed to changes in consumer spending on home entertainment has not been clear. The results of a recent survey by C.A. Walker Research Solutions, Pasadena, Calif., among 13 to 64 year olds indicate that nearly two in five consumers report decreased home entertainment spending (38%). The impact of this decline is reduced by the 22% of consumers who report increased spending.

When looking at total respondents, a greater portion of the decline in DVD sales is attributable to the economy (59%) rather than alternate entertainment options (23%). However, among younger people 13 to 24, a greater percentage attribute their decline in spending to alternate entertainment options (41%) and less to the economy (35%).

Consumers report shifting their spending to alternate entertainment options such as DVD rentals through subscription or kiosks (Netflix, Redbox), watching streaming videos online, using their cable provider's video-on-demand service, visiting social networking sites, and watching existing DVD libraries.

The remaining 18% are attributable to "other factors," which may include those who are holding off purchasing a Blu-ray Disc player but are not buying DVDs either. One of the respondents explained, "I am buying less [sic] DVDs as we can rent them and watch them on TV. Plus they keep changing and upgrading, that it's no use to buy them as they will soon be obsolete."

"Looking at the data as a whole," says Debbie Kreger, Ph.D., Group Vice President at C.A. Walker, "it would imply that the primary contributing factor is the current economic crisis. However, the role of 'other entertainment options' should not be overlooked. The results among 13 to 24 year olds imply that even when the economic crisis has come under control, this core demographic segment is likely to continue spending less on traditional home entertainment."

This survey was conducted by C.A. Walker Research Solutions in cooperation with Esearch. Methodology: 1,016 people age 13 to 64 completed a survey online between February 6-8, 2009. For more information please go to www.cawalker.com.