Viewing and Listening Evaluation

DVD: The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift
While not particularly a heartwarming and Oscar-winning movie, this third installment was much more enjoyable than the second blunderfest of fast cars and loose women. I enjoyed the visuals and the Denon was able to show lots of clean lines (on the cars) and detail (on the actors and scenery) so that we got a very good feel for the real world excellence of this player. Discernable black detail was excellent, thanks in part to the resolution of the projector of course, and I felt as if nothing was missing from the intended picture. The screen captures never do the experience justice, but they may help give you a reasonable feel for the capabilities of this player.

DVD: The Greatest Game Ever Played
Sometimes it's good to just put in a non-epic movie and see how well the DVD player handles average material. While the story is excellent and the acting superb, The Greatest Game Ever Played won't dazzle anyone with its special effects or cinematic grandeur. Still, the Denon did a faithful job of pulling out detail in darker scenes (of which there were many) and detail, while a bit soft due to the cameras and lenses used, was accurate.

DVD: The Fifth Element (Superbit)
I've probably made it known to our regular readers (ad infinitum, I'm sure) that this is by far my favorite film of all time. Fortunately for me, it's also one of the best mastered DVDs ever to be produced. Edge detail is perfect (not overenhanced) and colors are rich with deep but visible dark scenes. This is one disc all videoholics should own. The Denon DVD-3930CI produced the finest rendition of this disc I've ever seen on my reference display. I had the fortune (for lack of a better term) of viewing this movie on its Blu-ray release - a butchered mess. The Superbit DVD is much better. Lower resolution perhaps, but a perfect master without the film defects or graininess present in abundance on the "so called" HD version. The screen captures aren't perfect due to my digital camera, but I could watch this film over and over again on this player.

I grabbed a ton of material for these listening tests, partially because I really wanted a good sampling of music, but also because our friends at AIX Records had just sent in a fresh batch of pristinely-recorded DVD-Audio discs. Many discs came with a DVD-Video side which we took the liberty of capturing for you to enjoy as well. These discs represent material that is recorded without any post processing - no compression and no effects boxes. Armed with a fresh batch of audio ammunition, I headed to my reference listening room which consists of an RBH Sound CinemaSITE system guided by a Denon AVR-4306 receiver. There are four subwoofers in the room, including two SI-1010Ps and a couple of Velodyne DD10s . Achieving excellent bass extension and a smooth response is not a problem. I utilized the analogue outputs of the player to send audio from the player to the receiver (in order to experience the DVD-3930CI's DACs) and all my audio cables were pre-soaked in kosher chicken fat for 6 hours to ensure they were fully optimized - OK, that last part is a joke.

DVD: Robert Plant and the Strange Sensation
This DVD was sent to us from V Entertainment Network who is handling some of the promotion of this new DVD. We popped it in and gave it a listen. Plant's rendition of "Black Dog" showed that his voice had lost some of its range over the years, but after a couple of listens I felt the direction had an interesting turn and lent some original and fresh character to a classic song.

In the original hit "Freedom Fries", percussion and lead guitar rule the roost and a funky, persistent bass lick add some texture and oomph to the track. Synth lines were clean and the track had this airy reverb that filled the room and seemed to have a smooth, unimpeded decay.

"Four Sticks" is yet another revised Zeppelin hit, and I really liked the tone of Plant's voice here as well as the general arrangement of the tune which maintained some of its "Mission Impossible" feel but relaxed a bit to allow a bit of ebb and flow to the tune. The slight mic feedback present on the second verse did nothing for me, but those things happen - and you certainly know it's authentic.

Vantage Point: Resolution
I slipped in Vantage Point's Resolution DVD from AIX Records and got a double dose of HD-recorded & mastered video combined with exceptional audio. After I took some pics I flipped over the DVD disc and queued up the DVD-Audio tracks for some HD listening. The first track, "Blind Sided", features Simon Phillips (who has played for almost everyone including The Who, Jeff Beck, Peter Gabriel, and Toto to name just a very few). His drumming style is focused and intense and this disc features him, not just as a player, but also as a band leader. Teamed up with Jeff Babko (bandleader for the Jimmy Kimbel Live show) the sound is simply amazing. The Denon brought forth pristine audio with fantastic piano that was vibrant and neutral and had a smooth reverb. The drums were almost hyper-analogue with no discernable compression to be found. A strong bass line chorus which mirrored the drums created a wonderful texture of sound in the listening room while the brass instruments rang through cleanly.

"Sting Like A Bee" featured an acoustic bass intro that I could feel in my chair. Finger noises cut through the room to my ears and the well-rounded lower mid-bass extension was superb. When the piano and cymbal rolls came in, the soundstage simply opened up and welcomed me in. Trumpets were clean and brassy, but without the compressed top edge you often hear in lesser systems and recordings. Decay on the drums and especially the cymbals was smooth and natural.

Lowen & Navarro: Carry On Together
"Compass Point" starts off this album with soft drums and stereo-miced acoustic picked guitar and mandolin. The vocals were well separated in the mix and I found that the Denon simply excelled at allowing the clean and clear audio through to my RBH Sound CinemaSITE system.

Starting off with some 12-string harmonics the title track, "Carry On Together", only gets better by adding tight harmonies into the intro verse. Tracks like this are exceptionally revealing and the DVD-3930CI was extremely transparent sounding. The DACs on this player are simply astonishingly good.

Steve Miller Band: Fly Like an Eagle 30th Anniversary Special LE DVD
Hearing the Steve Miller Band in 5.1 was a treat and allowed the infamous "Space Intro" to be put out in a very convincing surround sound - how it should have been done - were the format around at the time (Miller actually mixed the album in Quad). The DVD-3930CI delivered realistic drums and whisper accent verses in the surrounds - both of which were a subtle reminder of the DVD player's capable Burr Brown DACs. High frequency synth effects and a clear cymbal bell drive on through the song and Miller's vocals have that "classic but sultry" tone which certainly added to his popularity.

Track 4 "Serenade" has some chorused guitars along with doubled vocals and tightly mixed drums. All of this blended well within the listening room. Hearing this track on the Denon player made me want to cancel the afternoon's activities and settle back for the rest of the album. Dedicated fans of the Steve Miller Band will enjoy the DVD video performance of a 2005 concert at Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, CA., but video quality is quite poor. I am guessing this is partially due to the original masters, but mostly attributed to the level of compression required to fit everything onto the DVD. What was interesting was how well the DVD-3930CI handled the non-HD source content (resembling stretched 320x240 MPEG-1.) It looked absolutely horrific on another player. The Denon's deinterlacer circuits were obviously working overtime to make it presentable!

The funky "Take the Money and Run" put out that driving, upbeat sound that defined many of the Steve Miller Band's top hits. In the reference system, with the Denon cranking out this tune in 5.1 surround, it was a little like being at the studio's mix room listening in on my own private session.