kelly200269 Posted August 9, 2017 Share Posted August 9, 2017 3 hours ago, wklie said: 60-day Tidal HiFi / MQA Free Trial: http://tidal.com/masters/ Well, BLOW ME DOWN! I must admit, I was very biased against MQA when it was first announced/launched. After all, not ANOTHER codec, and surely the industry could agree on FLAC, DSD etc. Is this another VHS/Betamax, or Blu-ray/HDDVD battle? I was always settled on FLAC via Qobuz (or from my L1), but was thankful of my D1 for playing the few DSD files I had. Well, with MQA I'm literally speechless! How the hell can Chicago's '17' sound as good as this? I have this album on vinyl, CD and in 24/96, but NOTHING touches the MQA version. I have the D1 decoding MQA feeding the analogue outputs, directly into my Linn preamp, and I have never heard my D1 sounding as good as this. It literally sounds like a different player. I have also had the chance to compare other recordings, and the same findings apply: More 'depth' to rendition, more realism, and the notes seem to be clearer and 'stand out' more. It all adds to a much more musical experience all round. I read an article from Linn trashing MQA, but I seriously think that they have their heads in the sand. Oh, and I forgot, their players can't play DSD and MQA, can they? ;-) Even if Tidal doesn't survive the 'streaming wars', I hope that MQA lasts. THANK-YOU to all at Lumin HQ for adding this feature. I'm just so glad I bought a network player from a company with visionaries who keep looking forward, rather than from some Scottish company who are stuck in the past! lol wklie 1 Link to comment
AZ Craig Posted August 9, 2017 Share Posted August 9, 2017 Based on your experience, I signed up for the free trial as I had let my Tidal subscription run out some time ago. While the MQA sounds great, I am disappointed over how few of their albums are available on MQA. In total, I only see 457 albums across all genres and, naturally, many of the oldies were recorded in lower res formats. I'll give it 60 days and see if they begin to offer a more robust selection of MQA offerings before I decide to just stay with Qobuz. Music server: Two Lumin L1 music servers Digital to Analog Converter(s): Lumin S1, two D1s and a D2 Amplifier(s): Peachtree Audio Grand Integrated Loudspeakers: Martin Logan Summit X Headphones: Stax SR-009 Headphone Amplifier(s): Woo Audio WES Link to comment
George Hincapie Posted August 9, 2017 Share Posted August 9, 2017 2 hours ago, kelly200269 said: ...rather than from some Scottish company who are stuck in the past! lol I wonder who you are talking about? Link to comment
kelly200269 Posted August 9, 2017 Share Posted August 9, 2017 2 hours ago, AZ Craig said: Based on your experience, I signed up for the free trial as I had let my Tidal subscription run out some time ago. While the MQA sounds great, I am disappointed over how few of their albums are available on MQA. In total, I only see 457 albums across all genres and, naturally, many of the oldies were recorded in lower res formats. I'll give it 60 days and see if they begin to offer a more robust selection of MQA offerings before I decide to just stay with Qobuz. I've found that there are more MQA Master albums than just under the Masters tab in the Lumin app. if you search for another artist, or look in New Releases, you should see more MQA content. Maybe the Lumin app is still 'catching up' with the new MQA content? Link to comment
audio.bill Posted August 9, 2017 Share Posted August 9, 2017 12 minutes ago, kelly200269 said: I've found that there are more MQA Master albums than just under the Masters tab in the Lumin app. if you search for another artist, or look in New Releases, you should see more MQA content. Maybe the Lumin app is still 'catching up' with the new MQA content? Lumin's app is showing the MQA albums in Tidal which have been tagged appropriately, but that is only a small subset of the MQA albums which are actually available. As you found if you search for albums you will find many which have more than one version and often one of those available is in MQA. There is a spreadsheet which has a list of ~2700 albums on Tidal which are in MQA, and it hasn't been updated in a while so there are significantly more than that by now. Here's a link to that data for your reference: Tidal MQA Albums Link to comment
wklie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 The top-level Masters category is a human-edited recommended list maintained by Tidal. For a longer list, check out the spreadsheet link posted by audio.bill in the above post. Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
mav52 Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 4 hours ago, AZ Craig said: Based on your experience, I signed up for the free trial as I had let my Tidal subscription run out some time ago. While the MQA sounds great, I am disappointed over how few of their albums are available on MQA. In total, I only see 457 albums across all genres and, naturally, many of the oldies were recorded in lower res formats. I'll give it 60 days and see if they begin to offer a more robust selection of MQA offerings before I decide to just stay with Qobuz. AZ there is more than 457 MQA listed in Tidal Masters area. That 457 number is what Tidal stuck out there as some recommended list, check this running list out. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10VtON9VjMAt3uyHC2-Oo2MjIa3orv9DKZfwiRQKmTAA/edit#gid=945476039 PS that list came from the from community. https://community.roonlabs.com/t/discovered-tidal-master-mqa-albums/17975 The Truth Is Out There Link to comment
wklie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 6 hours ago, kelly200269 said: Well, with MQA I'm literally speechless! How the hell can Chicago's '17' sound as good as this? In case you want to read a long answer: http://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/mqa-time-domain-accuracy-digital-audio-quality Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
kelly200269 Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 8 hours ago, wklie said: In case you want to read a long answer: http://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/mqa-time-domain-accuracy-digital-audio-quality Thanks for this. It's all a bit 'over my head', but my ears seem to support what they are saying. Just out of interest, what's Lumin's opinion on MQA? I know you support it now, but do you feel it sounds better than Hi-res PCM? Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 On 8/9/2017 at 9:48 AM, wklie said: Lumin released Firmware 9.01 to Fully Decode MQA. Lumin offers the most flexible MQA settings in the market. This post explains the Lumin MQA Settings. Currently this post applies to Lumin S1 / A1 / T1 / D1. Hi wklie, Does the Lumin device support for Full Decode MQA apply to network streaming your own MQA files (ie, provided by a UPnP/DLNA media server on your own network), or is it just for the TIDAL Masters streamed from the TIDAL Hi-Fi online service? If it does also apply to streaming your own MQA files, what happens if you select the Off Mode for MQA when streaming your own MQA files? I'm assuming this is not possible when streaming your own MQA files, even if you have logged into TIDAL Hi-Fi: On 8/9/2017 at 9:48 AM, wklie said: Off Mode: - This is case A in the article. - Starting from Firmware 9.01, if MQA is set to Off, Lumin retrieves the 16/44.1kHz version of Tidal master instead of the 24-bit version for any MQA decoding. John We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
wklie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 3 hours ago, kelly200269 said: Just out of interest, what's Lumin's opinion on MQA? I know you support it now, but do you feel it sounds better than Hi-res PCM? Based on users' feedback, I think it's safe to say that for many albums, decoded Tidal MQA usually sounds better than Tidal HiFi. I think offering a choice is important. In the same way that Lumin allows a variety of different control points to be used, including but not limited to Lumin app, Roon, Kazoo app, Kinsky app, Bubble DS Next, JRiver, etc., Lumin offers the choice of PCM, DSD, and MQA. I think it's far better for a manufacturer to allow users to actually hear MQA and determine whether they like it or not (especially when it's free to Tidal HiFi subscribers), than to say certain formats are bad and prevent users from having a chance to hear them. audio.bill 1 Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
wklie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 3 hours ago, Cebolla said: Does the Lumin device support for Full Decode MQA apply to network streaming your own MQA files (ie, provided by a UPnP/DLNA media server on your own network), or is it just for the TIDAL Masters streamed from the TIDAL Hi-Fi online service? If it does also apply to streaming your own MQA files, what happens if you select the Off Mode for MQA when streaming your own MQA files? I'm assuming this is not possible when streaming your own MQA files, even if you have logged into TIDAL Hi-Fi: Lumin supports MQA decoding for all methods of access including OpenHome UPnP, native Tidal, USB storage, and Roon RAAT (Lumin is the first manufacturer to support MQA decoding over RAAT). For local MQA files, if MQA mode is Off, the MQA music (usually delivered as 24-bit 44.1/48kHz) will be played without MQA decoding (unfolding) to both analog and digital outputs, and upsampling to DSD is allowed. Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 Excellent, thanks for that wklie! 10 minutes ago, wklie said: For local MQA files, if MQA mode is Off, the MQA music (usually delivered as 24-bit 44.1/48kHz) will be played without MQA decoding (unfolding) to both analog and digital outputs, and upsampling to DSD is allowed. Ok, so for local files, MQA off mode equates to MQA passthrough mode without the upsampling/volume control and analogue output restrictions. We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
wklie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 One more difference: in MQA passthrough mode, the front panel and the app will show the MQA authenticity and MQA sample rate. Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 Yes, understood. The display needs to reflect the mode selected. We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 4 hours ago, kelly200269 said: Thanks for this. It's all a bit 'over my head', but my ears seem to support what they are saying. Just out of interest, what's Lumin's opinion on MQA? I know you support it now, but do you feel it sounds better than Hi-res PCM? Hi Kelly, Perhaps you could give us your own opinion, though not using TIDAL as the source. This is because there's no way of telling whether TIDAL Masters MQA tracks have come from the same original source as any hi-res conventional PCM version of the same tracks you may already have. Certainly the suspicion, by some, is that the majority of the 16/44.1kHz CD resolution TIDAL HiFi tracks are not derived from the same source as the TIDAL Masters MQA tracks. However, using the free files available to download from 2L Label's test bench, you can confidently make a direct comparison, as all the available resolutions and encodings, including MQA, have been confirmed to have been derived from the same DXD source: 2L High Resolution Music .:. free TEST BENCH An interesting comparison would be fully decoded MQA vs all available hi-res & CD resolutions of the stereo 'normal' FLAC files (including DXD). Another one, perhaps, would be to compare undecoded MQA with CD resolution FLAC. John We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
kelly200269 Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 19 minutes ago, Cebolla said: Hi Kelly, Perhaps you could give us your own opinion, though not using TIDAL as the source. This is because there's no way of telling whether TIDAL Masters MQA tracks have come from the same original source as any hi-res conventional PCM version of the same tracks you may already have. Certainly the suspicion, by some, is that the majority of the 16/44.1kHz CD resolution TIDAL HiFi tracks are not derived from the same source as the TIDAL Masters MQA tracks. However, using the free files available to download from 2L Label's test bench, you can confidently make a direct comparison, as all the available resolutions and encodings, including MQA, have been confirmed to have been derived from the same DXD source: 2L High Resolution Music .:. free TEST BENCH An interesting comparison would be fully decoded MQA vs all available hi-res & CD resolutions of the stereo 'normal' FLAC files (including DXD). Another one, perhaps, would be to compare undecoded MQA with CD resolution FLAC. John Hi John, Yes, I take your point concerning the 'origin' of the files, both MQA and standard Hi-res FLAC files. I have many of the MQA Masters as 24/96 stored on my L1, and comparing the two is interesting. The MQA Masters seem less 'blured' and less 'mushy'? It's as if the MQA Master has 'snapped' the music into focus. I'm hearing details in the music that I haven't heard before, and timing seems much improved. It's a little like the difference between 16-bit, and 24-bit files. I was using the Digital-out from my D1 to feed a Chord 2Qute DAC for listening before, as I thought this improved on the D1's output, but I think MQA straight from the analogue-outs of the D1 now sounds better, when comparing the same pieces of music. I was very cynical of the promises MQA made, but after (albeit brief) listening, I'm now a convert. Link to comment
George Hincapie Posted August 10, 2017 Share Posted August 10, 2017 This thread has caused me problems. I was considering the new Aries G2 with the new Metrum Onyx/Jade DAC, but now I am thinking about the Lumin A1 again. Argh... Does anyone know how I could trial an A1 in the UK? Does Lumin ever update their devices? In terms of DAC chips or other hardware changes? Also, has anyone seen the black A1? Does it look really nice in the flesh? Or is silver the better choice? Link to comment
George Hincapie Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 Any thoughts on my last post? I know the only way to know for sure is to dip my toe but grateful for advice. Guess my reluctance is just am so used to having a seperate DAC. Link to comment
BlueSkyy Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 On 8/10/2017 at 7:20 PM, George Hincapie said: This thread has caused me problems. I was considering the new Aries G2 with the new Metrum Onyx/Jade DAC, but now I am thinking about the Lumin A1 again. Argh... Does anyone know how I could trial an A1 in the UK? Does Lumin ever update their devices? In terms of DAC chips or other hardware changes? Also, has anyone seen the black A1? Does it look really nice in the flesh? Or is silver the better choice? Lumin is very responsive when it comes to provided corrective and perfective firmware changes to their units. I've owned both the A1 and the S1 and have nothing but high praises for the devices and the company. Although I cant be sure, I highly doubt that any of these devices were designed to be hardware upgradeable over their anticipated life span or the company would have touted that in their advertising literature. I have seen the black A1 and prefer the silver anodized aluminum case even though all of my other equipment is black. The only potential hardware "upgrades" that I can think of are aftermarket power supplies available from vendors but, with the S1 OEM power supply I think they are already well beyond the point of diminishing returns with their beautiful design. YMMV when it comes to replacement power supplies (or fuses or other tweaks). George Hincapie 1 Denafrips Terminator + DAC fed by a Denafrips GAIA DDC, HTPC running JRiver MC, iFi PRO iCAN Signature headphone amp, Marantz AV8805, OPPO BDP-105 for SACD ripping, Sony UBP-X100ES for watching and listening, McIntosh MC1201s Front L/R with Bryston powering the remaining 5 channels, B&W N-801s, B&W HTM-1 in Tiger Eye, B&W 801 IIIs on the sides and in the rear, JL-F212 sub, ReVOX PR-99Mk II, Rega P10 and Alpheta 3, PS Audio Nuwave Phono Amp, Audeze LCD-4 and LCD-XC, UE18 IEMs, Sony CD3000 rebuilt, Sony VPL-VW995ES laser projector, Joe Kane Affinity 120" screen, Cables: Cardas Clear Beyond speaker, Wireworld Platinum Elite 7 RCA, custom (by me) XLRs using affordable, quality parts 🙂 Link to comment
One and a half Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 How does the Lumin work with JRiver, very curious about this. Is Jriver's output the network streamer selection, rather than a connected DAC or some other end point? Or is Jriver the DLNA server and the Lumin 'pulls' from the server. AS Profile Equipment List Say NO to MQA Link to comment
BlueSkyy Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 39 minutes ago, One and a half said: How does the Lumin work with JRiver, very curious about this. Is Jriver's output the network streamer selection, rather than a connected DAC or some other end point? Or is Jriver the DLNA server and the Lumin 'pulls' from the server. The Lumin is one of the "zones" in JRiver. JRiver acts as a control point I guess. That's the extent of my working knowledge. Denafrips Terminator + DAC fed by a Denafrips GAIA DDC, HTPC running JRiver MC, iFi PRO iCAN Signature headphone amp, Marantz AV8805, OPPO BDP-105 for SACD ripping, Sony UBP-X100ES for watching and listening, McIntosh MC1201s Front L/R with Bryston powering the remaining 5 channels, B&W N-801s, B&W HTM-1 in Tiger Eye, B&W 801 IIIs on the sides and in the rear, JL-F212 sub, ReVOX PR-99Mk II, Rega P10 and Alpheta 3, PS Audio Nuwave Phono Amp, Audeze LCD-4 and LCD-XC, UE18 IEMs, Sony CD3000 rebuilt, Sony VPL-VW995ES laser projector, Joe Kane Affinity 120" screen, Cables: Cardas Clear Beyond speaker, Wireworld Platinum Elite 7 RCA, custom (by me) XLRs using affordable, quality parts 🙂 Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 1 hour ago, One and a half said: How does the Lumin work with JRiver, very curious about this. Is Jriver's output the network streamer selection, rather than a connected DAC or some other end point? Or is Jriver the DLNA server and the Lumin 'pulls' from the server. Lumin streaming devices work with JRiver just like any other standard UPnP/DLNA renderer - you have the option of: either using JRiver Media Center's built-in UPnP/DLNA control point to control the playback of the renderer streaming audio files from any UPnP/DLNA media server on the network; and/or using JMC's built-in UPnP/DLNA media server to provide it with audio files (from JMC's own media file library) to stream from over the network. JMC's UPnP/DLNA media server has been designed by JRiver to only provide the UPnP/DLNA renderer with descrete audio file tracks, not the (realtime) digital audio signal produced by JMC itself decoding & playing said audio files through its audio engine - if that's what you mean by JRiver's "output" to an "end point". However, JMC's UPnP/DLNA media server can be configured to apply some of its DSP functions to alter the original file tracks while streaming, ie, it can transcode the audio data contained in the file being streamed, even convert it to another audio file format. Incidentally, Lumin streamers support both standard UPnP/DLNA streaming and OpenHome (aka UPnP with Linn extensions) streaming. JRiver Media Center can only control standard UPnP/DLNA renderers, but can provide audio files over the network for both types of streamer. We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
Cebolla Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 On 8/10/2017 at 4:15 PM, kelly200269 said: Yes, I take your point concerning the 'origin' of the files, both MQA and standard Hi-res FLAC files. I have many of the MQA Masters as 24/96 stored on my L1, and comparing the two is interesting. The MQA Masters seem less 'blured' and less 'mushy'? It's as if the MQA Master has 'snapped' the music into focus. I'm hearing details in the music that I haven't heard before, and timing seems much improved. It's a little like the difference between 16-bit, and 24-bit files. I was very cynical of the promises MQA made, but after (albeit brief) listening, I'm now a convert. Without knowing the provenance of the hi-res files when comparing with MQA, I'd personally be more inclined to remain skeptical. However, comparing the 2L sample downloads I mentioned, would certainly go a long way to removing those sorts of doubts. We are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us. -- Jo Cox Link to comment
wklie Posted August 12, 2017 Share Posted August 12, 2017 3 hours ago, One and a half said: How does the Lumin work with JRiver, very curious about this. To use Lumin with JRiver, in Tools / Options / Media Network / Add or Configure DLNA Server, add 24-bit Audiophile DAC. Turn on the option for Bitstream DSD (DoPE). Peter Lie LUMIN Firmware Lead Link to comment
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