IS there such an animal?


Has anyone ever made (or still make) a player that plays SACD (doesn't have to be multi channel) AND decodes HDCD? My search so far has been futile.

secretguy

I have an Oppo and it plays everything!  I’m using an external dac these days, but everything still works as it should.

JD

What's wrong with an OPPO unit? Video circuitry is not enabled if only listening to music. It has a pure direct option which turns off the video circuit. 

Oppo don’t count? Or somebody else?

I never had one. Couldn't pull the trigger.

I guess I never had enuf reason.

@reubent  +1 Oppo players play pretty much ALL formats. Plus, all one has to do is "turn off" video processing and go pure audio only. In other words, video circuits are present but not engaged. 

Good luck, and Happy Listening!
 

Never really got a satisfactory answer the 1st time around. I don't want something with all the video circuits.

I will assume there is no such thing.

Most, if not all, Oppo players play SACD as well as HDCD. Just checked, my EVS modified Oppo DV-970HD plays both. A quick check of an old Amazon listing shows that the DVP-103 also list SACD and HDCD as formats that it supports.

HDCD (High Definition Compatible Digital ) is a proprietary audio encode-decode process that was a Microsoft developed product but discontinued way back in 2005. HDCD needed a bespoke decoding chip inside the CD player, in order to take advantage of the encoded information.

The  SACD (“Super Audio CD”) format was introduced in 1999 and developed jointly by Sony and Philips Electronics and intended to be the successor to the CD format. It was on its downward slope already by 2007.

it’s a binary decision tree choice ….. not both.

they had their short fleeting time in the sun. I’ve had both, and ignoring the multi-channel option, as technology continues to improve, my “vanilla” high-end redbook CD player smokes them both in audio 2-channel performance.