Confusing of XRCD, HDCD, AQCD, LPCD, Bluspec CD ..etc

Hi all,

i have been quite long time didnt buy CD.
recently i found tht there is alot of audiophile CD stated as
LPCD
Bluspec CD
XRCD
SACD
HDCD
K2HD
etc...

Would like to ask which format is actually the real quality ? best buck for money ?

SACD and HDCD are the real McCoys.

SACD requires a SACD capable player. You can't play SACD on your CD player unless the SACD has a redbook layer. SACD with a redbook layer are called Hybrid SACD. SACD has the best sound among all you've mentioned. SACD is encoded in DSD and is 1-bit, has a sampling rate of 2.8224 MHz. Comparatively normal CD is 16bit, 44.1Khz. If you play a hybrid SACD on your normal CD player you'll get normal CD sound. And I believe the multiple layers can be detrimental to the overall CD quality. I could be wrong.

HDCD will play on any CD player but to realize the benefits of HDCD you'll need a HDCD capable CD player or DAC. Otherwise you will not hear the enhancements embedded within the 16 bit signal. HDCD encodes the equivalent of 20 bits worth of data in a 16-bit digital audio signal by using custom routines.

Now the rest I believe are just marketing jargons. Somebody correct me if i'm wrong.

U guys forgot another one !! The BLUE cd !!

I think he mentioned Bluespec CD. Is that the same as Blue CD?

BLUE CD ? Hmmm..........

Anyway those Blue-spec CDs are typically from Japan. Their main claim is that the blue-ish property allows the laser to read the pits better and thus less need for re-reading and less reading error. So, less jitter and also more accurate data - less error recovery needed.

I've quite a number of HDCD encoded albums which I'm very much amazed by its overall musicality and gives me a sense of more musicality being achieved. I may have compared some HDCD encoded tracks and non HDCD encoded tracks of the same song and the HDCD ones wins hands down. The non ones sound flat and uninvolving. I suppose it boils down to how they remastered the tracks and I hear the differences. Yes, my dac and CDP are both HDCD capable. Time to dig them out and listen to them again, its been too long stored away.
There are some albums that I have that do not have the HDCD logo there, but once played, the HDCD light comes on. One of them is the US pressing of Dave Brubeck Time Out album on Columbia. However not all the tracks are HDCD encoded. There's one or 2 gold CD early pressing of Cai Qin thats also HDCD encoded. MingGe and Jian PinZhe album. I think they very sought after by now. The HDCD logo isn't printed on the inserts.

Hi,

Thank you everyone for explanation !!

Recently alot of CD shop selling series of Remastering K2HD CD with pricing around Rm100 - Rm129.90.

normally HDCD & SACD is selling around how much ?

I think a lot of so called "audiophile" cds are downright overpriced here.

SACDs in the normal shops (like Rock Corner, or Victoria music in Atria) usually are over RM100. The 1-U Rock Corner gave me a 5% discount on my SACD but it was still over RM100, even with the discount. HDCD I remember are selling for a bit cheaper. Those audiophile CDs like XRCD, Blue-spec CD, SHM-CDs and so forth are all highly priced, typically RM70 and above.

In the CD-RAMA fair recently (heh-heh, here I go again, sorry), there were some what is claimed to be XRCDs and SHM-CDs going for offer price of RM38. The one collection of Tsai Chin I bought, extracted from XRCDs and Blue-spec CDs and put into a CD which is dark blue in colour, sounded very good. Musically though, that 7CD collection of old songs is much better.

In the KLAVS, they usually have lots of such CDs and SACDs on offer so it might be worthwhile to save up for the KLAVS. It's only 4 months or so away.

>.<" 4months to go ....

u go to CD-RAMA Again !? still got fair ?
tomorrow i go 1U take a look ....