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High Definition CD or HDCD - What is it exactly?

I have an Audio Aero Capitole MKII and always thought it had the ability to read HDCD's. I thought this until recently playing an HDCD on a friend's CEC CD player which has a small light that appears that tells you that it is reading the disc as an HDCD. The improvement and realism in the sound was awesome. The realism in sound reminded me of SACD in many ways, although I don't have much listening experience with either HDCD or SACD.

What exactly is HDCD and why can't the Aero Aero (at this price point) play/read these types of CD's?

One more thing...I burned a copy of the HDCD, but the CEC player did not recognize the copy as an HDCD.

Your comments are appreciated. Thanks,
128x128gerryn

Showing 1 response by tbg

tbg
5,263 posts
 
Microsoft seems to have dropped this, but many performers insist of recording in HDCD. I have had two universal players that decode it properly. The first was the Lindemann 680D. I was shocked at the improved performance. My Exemplar/Denons also show a light with HDCD, but the performance jump is not as great.

If you can get the capability to play such disks as HDCD, go for it.

I have made copies of HDCD that do play as HDCDs.
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