Last week I just received three XRCDs. The first was the 1957 recording of Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition conducted by Fritz Reiner. It's amazing what the JVC engineers did with that recording. Reiner's rendition was very spirited.
Also, got a nice XRCD by Ondekoza for those of you familiar with these amazing drummers from Japan.
The third XRCD was James Newton Howard's famous Sheffield Labs recording of JNH and Friends. They've done a great job of highlighting the Yamaha synths while making them sound very natural. However, they screwed up by transposing tracks #2 & 3. Still a great effort. This recording was used as a reference in car stereo circles in the early '80's when it was released, but to my ears always sounded thin and recorded with the levels set too low. JVC has done a great job with this one.
