Is HDCD dead?

My former PS Audio DAC had HDCD decoding, which sounded good on all 5 of my cd's with HDCD. My new Northstar Design DAC doesn't have HDCD decoding and sounds way better with the 495 cd's that are not HDCD decoded. So....

Generally I love the HDCD playback on my Cary 303/300. It can be a little edgy with some material, but where it is edgy it appears to be due to the mastering of the disc rather than the Cary. Of course, running it through the tube output takes that edginess right off on the few discs that don't sound better in HDCD.

I'm not to sure on other disc with HDCD.But what ever they did on those Grateful Dead Remasters are nothing short of a miracle.Listen to the disc "Reconing",the track China doll is so holographic its scared me.Garcia voice is suspended about 6 feet above my speakers and on the redbook cd his voice is about eye level.Is this in the remastering or is it from hdcd??

Spaz...It's the mix. An extra 4 bits of resolution would (perhaps) have other benefits. HDCD is/was a very clever idea to live with the 16 bit CD. The extra 8 bits of DVDA or SACD are even better, and come with higher sampling rate, and that's why HDCD is dead. (Except that the technology may live on for video, which is why Microsoft bought it).

As stated above there are some new releases and remasters still being released in HDCD. I have Arcam players and they decode HDCD. I like the HDCD playback more, but don't detect a quantum leap in playback, just cleaner, or maybe more focused.

Like the others, I am able to compare the Dead remasters in HDCD to the original CD release, and the original vinyl. All different in many musical respects.

I am glad I have it, but, I don't know that I would go out of my way to have an HDCD decoding player vs. having a quality player. If I go to upgrade away from the Arcam, I would be looking for the best regular (Redbook) playback I could afford. 98% of my CD's are not HDCD.

Spaz, Garcia hovering 6 feet above? You sure that's not the mushrooms you just ate? :>)

Jim S.