Do HDCDs sound terrible on non HDCD players?

HDCD does tend toward a particular sound, which some people might not like. I believe Art Dudley of Listener magazine once described the format as sounding "phasey."

In any case, that quality would not (should not) be apparent on a non-HDCD player. And that Shady Grove disc has always sounded very, very good to me, with both HDCD and non-HDCD players in my system.

HDCD is supposed to have a lower noise floor - that is what I was told. So HDCD encoding give a lower noise floor.
I'm thinking they should sound better on all machines since generally they are better quality recordings to begin with.

I looked at my Shady Grove CD, and it is HDCD. In any case on my Planet it sounds as good or better than non HDCD Garcia/Grisman discs that I own.

-Patrick

HDCD v. 'normal' CD - there is no case! Normal CD without HDCD filter reads only 8 bit information chunk. CD player with HDCD filter reads all 11 bits giving better sound quality. Thats all. If somebody hears something special on HDCD if it listens on normal CD player it means only, that it is 'normal' sound of this CD. It can't be more sharp or whatever performance because of HDCD coding.

Otherwords, HDCD contains both information: standard CD for standard CD players and extended HDCD what is visible only if CD player has HDCD filter. Please, no ignorance!