Tvad,
I certainly belong to the first group you have mentioned and although I enjoy music from whatever source and rig, I am after "the absolute sound" with an ear trained on live music from early childhood on. Hence what many here would call "good sound" for me is far from it, if I would listen critically to gear and not just to the music. After having had a chance to hear how Carver cleverly does his sound-shaping I found it artificial and euphonic, wouldn't have it. I'd probably have the same reaction with the H-Cat, because for me, these attempts destroy that what is real in spacial information in a good recording, where you can recognize the hall, with their induced artefacts. I don't like that, because I want go get as close to the real thing as possible. So if I am familiar with a hall, know how music sounds there from my favorite seat and I have recordings from the self same hall, am able to hear how the sound is reflected from the walls, can hear the side reflections and the back of the hall in the recording as the music spreads out in my room, there is indeed a sense of what one might call holography, because you can sense the body of the orchestra within the hall, can, if the score permits, even identify say the first violin, cello etc. If there is a soloist playing with the orchestra, his or her instrument can have its own holographic image, even bloom in the sense of air as I have tried to describe it.
I have, in my career as an audiophile. tried to enhance this by artificial means, but found that it destroys the "gestalt" of the original recording. There are of course many ways that lead to Rome, to the enjoyment of music in our home and luckily we are all free to find our particular ways to aural happiness.
