Sales of Music DVDs Lag Amid Fretting by Consumers.

DVDs are definitely a hot-selling video format, but it may take some time for the new DVD music discs to catch on.

New classical and jazz titles in the DYD format became available this month at the Virgin Megastore on Sunset Boulevard. On the first night, excited customers bought up 30 percent of the store's DVD music stock, but sales have slowed since then.

Many consumers are leery of the new format, especially after spending hundreds of thousands of dollars a decade ago replacing their LPs with CDs. DVD music discs can't be played on regular CD players. They work only on DVD computer or TV players. Some consumers fear they'll have to replace their entire CD music collections to keep up with the new format.

Virgin officials are quick to point out that isn't necessarily the case. CDs can be played on DVD players, so there's no need to toss out the old discs.

"You can keep your CDs and get DVDs to complete your collection," said Anthony Deen, vice president of retail development for Virgin Entertainment. "There will be gems people will be interested in."

Those gems might be remastered recordings, but most likely the best recordings will be new arrangements composed specifically for the DVD music format.

DVD music discs are meant to be played in six-channel surround sound. (The discs can also be listened to in traditional two-channel surround sound or over a two-speaker stereo setup, but that sort of defeats the point.)

"At first it's a little disconcerting," Deen said of six-channel surround sound. "It's like being right up on a bandstand. So that's interesting, to hear part of the music play behind you."

While the discs are currently only available at the Sunset Megastore, they'll be hitting shelves in Burbank soon, and then will be rolled out chain-wide.