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Anyone still excited about HDCD ?

With all the talk about SACD an DVD-A no one seems to bring up HDCD. Note: I not looking for a HDCD vs SACD battle here.. I will be picking up a universal player for my HT system but for 2 channel I decided SACD did not buy me much especially given the lack of software. I just picked up a redbook player that includes HDCD so I thought why not give it a try.. and I like it. It seems to me that there are more choices for high end player that include HDCD than SACD (altough this seems to be changing) I have my cd player behind me in the room which makes it really easy to do a blind A/B test. It HDCD sounds better to me than normal decoding. I mostly notice a deeper, bigger soundstage. Naturally it does not do multi-channel but then again multi-channel has a whole set of requirements and issues that 2 channel does not. While it may not be "perfect" (since nothing ever will) or not as accurate as SACD/DVD-A maybe HDCD is good enough for 2 channel...
btrvalik
lugnut
1,190 posts
 
To clarify my above post, shortly after the purchase many manufacturers began complaining about the increased cost for using the chip in their players. I know I'm cynical about Mr. Gate$ movtives, but give me a reason not to be.
rwwear
2,851 posts
 
I know that Krell has stopped adding it to their processors because of the higher cost.
lafish
151 posts
 
loads of recordings at my area uses HDCD technology. So, there are someone to support it.
pehare's avatar
pehare
831 posts
 
not necessarily excited but it seems like alot of the cd's i buy these days are hdcd. lucinda williams, dead reissues, chris isaak, buddy miller, ryan adams, mark knopfler, etc. glad i bought that used cary 303/100 for $950 now.....happy accident.
golden_ears
224 posts
 
The 96/24 and 192/24 DACs in the CD and DVD players coming out now are rendering HDCD irrelevant. They make fidelity accessible without needing a "decoding" chip.
I've heard HDCD discs (I have several) played on a 192/24 player that I brought home for evaluation, and they sounded better than they did on my player that had the HDCD decoding chip. I sold the HDCD player.
HDCD was also being used as a marketing tool by some music companies that, unfortunately, issued badly-recorded music. HDCD cannot help a recording that was engineered by morons.
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