Glenn Richards wrote:
Don Pearce wrote:

That is a big difference, but why would they bother to do it that way?
Far easier just to master the whole thing 6dB lower - it certainly
won't be running out of dynamic range at the bottom end. I speak as
someone who owns an Arcam Alpha 9, an HDCD player (very ashamed of
myself for falling for it).

Two words. Loudness war.

If you master it 6dB lower then it'll be 6dB quieter than everyone
else's CD. And that would never do.


But an HDCD disc doesn't play back correctly on a conventional player -
it is actually distorted. When it is played back as intended it is
identical to mastering 6dB lower and allowing the high peaks. So
loudness doesn't come into it.

But by using HDCD's Peak Extend you can satisfy the marketing droids at
the record label ("louder is better" etc) without ****ing off people
with decent kit too much.

My DVD player (Arcam DV79) does HDCD decoding and does it rather well.
One of the few DVD players that produces decent audio output from CDs
(whether HDCD or not).


I've not yet found a DVD player that does a poor job of CDs - what on
earth have you been buying?

LAME can take a 24-bit WAV and dither it back down to 16-bit. The
results speak for themselves. And yes, the difference you can hear is
as spectacular as the difference you can see.
What do you mean?

On the decoded version the snare drum "snaps" more, the mushyness and
overcompression is all gone.


No, I mean about seeing the difference between 24 bit WAV, and 24 bit
dithered down to 16 bit by LAME. I've done this (although not by LAME,
just within a DAW) and as far as visibility goes, there is no difference
- I can't hear one either. Do you mean that LAME does really poor
bit-depth reduction?

d