hdcd vs cd

soundfreak1

My dac is capable of hdcd conversion.(adcom gda 700) is there a diff. In sound quality? And is it worth the price?( i assume there is a price diff.) worth checking out?

heiney9

You have to play HDCD encoded material. There are only a handful compared to regular redbook.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Definition_Compatible_Digital

http://www.goodwinshighend.com/hdcd.htm

Is it worth the extra cost vs. a std redbook? The price shouldn't be that far off. I would never pay extra for an HDCD unless it was a very rare cd in and of itself.

H9

cnh

Somewhere around here I have an old Panasonic/Technics CD changer that can do HDCD. Can't say I've heard much of a difference on it. But then again this is not your high end player!

cnh

Conradicles

I have quite a few HDCD's and love the way they sound on my NAD CD player. I can notice an improvement over a redbook CD.

Ern Dog

I have about 10 hdcd's and they all sound excellent. There is a recording label that predominately produces HDCD's and it's called Reference Recordings. Check it out. They mostly do classical and jazz.

soundfreak1

Im a jazzman. Mostly accoustic jazz. I will ck them out thanks. My cdp is not hdcp just the dac. Will the dac do the decoding. By itself?

heiney9

soundfreak1 wrote: »

Will the dac do the decoding. By itself?

Yes, because you will just be using your cdp as the transport. The 700 will be doing the digital decoding and analog conversion.

If I might make a suggestion to use the Coax connection between the cdp and dac and get a decent 75 ohm cable like this one *here* - Belden 1694A

H9

FTGV

The few HDCD releases in my collection are mostly mid 90's of the C&W genre and where IIRC priced on par with standard redbook.I guess Nashville studios where early adopters of the format but it did'nt seem to get the overall market penetration that the developers had hoped.Your 700 has a special digital filter IC that also functions as the HDCD decoder.Infact I believe the developers suggested that even redbook benifitted from the use of their digital filter.

soundfreak1

H9, i did an a/b conpairison and couldnt "hear" any diff. Between the opt. And the coax cable. but thats just my ears.

soundfreak1

Ftgv, on the 700 the hdcd decoding is not manual it must detect a hdcd format to decode or it not activated ( so i believe, as there is smiply a led to indicate a hdcd signal is being recieved and decoded.

FTGV

soundfreak1 wrote: »

Ftgv, on the 700 the hdcd decoding is not manual it must detect a hdcd format to decode or it not activated ( so i believe, as there is smiply a led to indicate a hdcd signal is being recieved and decoded.

Yes,if the HDCD decoder/digital filter IC picks up the HDCD flag it will automatically decode it.Standard redbook data will be processed by the same digital filter IC even though it does not have the imbedded HDCD data.

soundfreak1

i will just have to find a hdcd cd and try it amd see if i can hear a diff. Im also a alan parson fan so i'll try to find one of those to a/b. Hopefully he did some in hdcd.he did some fantastic studio work on his music as well as for the Beatles and pink floyd just to mention a few.will report back on. The comparison.

FTGV

Personally I think the sonic benifits of HDCD were overstated and a good sounding one was the result of good recording/engineering /mastering and would have sounded great even on standard redbook.My experience has been that well recorded HDCD's played via non HDCD decoding DAC's still can sound very good,the result of good recording practices in the first place.

Conradicles

FTGV wrote: »

My experience has been that well recorded HDCD's played via non HDCD decoding DAC's still can sound very good,the result of good recording practices in the first place.

Very well said.

FTGV

To add to that I suspect if a studio is/was willing to spend the money to adopt the HDCD format to begin with they obviously take their kraft seriously and sound quality can be assumed to be high on the priority list.

skrol

I have found that the HDCD's tend to sound very good even on standard CD players. I figured that HDCD was trying to make a go of it and more was put into the mastering to make it shine. I believe that they do sound a little better on a HDCD decoder but I have no way of doing an A/B comparison.

Vette C6.r

Just like regular Cd's some sound better than others.

I have a Rotel CDP that plays HDCD and some sound great. I don't believe that you can buy the CD with or without having it in HDCD format. It's either HDCD or it isn't.

I always think they sound much better IMO.