Yeah I hope someone does crack it, I am tired of having to check whether a CD has copy protection etc before I buy it. I am sure this doesn't conform to Phillips Red Book standard for CD specs.
Anyway I thought that if better than 16 bit quality was needed then DVD audio was the way to go at 24 bit. This new micro$oft format is yet another compromise at 20 bit. From what I can find out it works by truncating the 16 bit output to 15 bits too, thereby reducing the original musics quality for those who don't have a special cd player.
It Sucks!