Article: My First 24 Hours With MQA

[firedog]

Does it say anything of interest. LOL

Guess we'll see.

Thanks Chris for all the work invested!

 

I think it does. He gave pretty comprehensive answers to some of the doubts and questions people had about MQA.

[Sal1950]

I think it does. He gave pretty comprehensive answers to some of the doubts and questions people had about MQA.

Yes it is a very complete and admirable piece of work.

I guess we'll just have to wait till it becomes more available. Then measurements and listening tests can be done by the unbiased. Only then will we really know what's afoot in the game.

[cgiammona]

I have listened to all of the 2L testbench tracks (plus some full albums) in both MQA and 192/24. I agree that the differences are that the sound appears more analog and less digital. The clarity of hearing the instruments struck and released was apparent on the MQA versions. It will take a lot more listening to really say that MQA makes a significant SQ difference. I am using the Meridian Explorer2 with a Headamp BUDA and Audioquest USB and 3.5mm to RCA cables, Macbook Pro using Aduirvana. I have the Brooklyn on order.

[austinpop]

Since I don't have an MQA DAC, I was curious to hear what MQA files sound like on a non-MQA DAC.

 

To quote the 2L Test Bench site:

"... It sounds best through an MQA decoder which confirms this studio recording as you listen, but even with no decoder you will enjoy the deblur of the recording side."

 

But what is a good comparison for the MQA files? Let's look at what's available on the 2L site. Let's take a couple of tracks I fell in love with - BTW, if you haven't yet, just go listen to these samples, as there is some wonderful music here! The tracks I listened to repeatedly were:

1. Ubi Caritas, by Ola Gjeilo
   
2. Et misericordia, Arnesen's Magnificat.
   

 

The available resolutions (for 2ch) are: 24/352.8 (DXD - also the original recording resolution), 24/192, 24/96, 24/44.1 (MQA), and 16/44.1. There's also DSD64 and DSD128 versions, but I won't take us down the DSD vs PCM rathole.

 

My listening setup was an Ayre Codex DAC/amp feeding Sennheiser HD800 headphones.

 

The MQA claim is that the MQA files will sound better than the CD resolution. Yes - they do. But I would have expected that anyway due to the increased sample size from 16 to 24. So how much additional benefit did I get from the "temporal deblurring?" I don't know!

 

Then I compared 24/96 (non-MQA) with 24/44.1 MQA. To my ears, the 24/96 versions still sounded better. So if there was an additional benefit of temporal deblurring, it did not completely compensate for the 96-to-44.1 freq difference. BTW - I found this to be consistently true on several other tracks on the site.

 

So where does that leave me (us)? I guess the only way to tell if the temporal deblur benefits of MQA are audible on a non-MQA DAC, one would need both MQA and non-MQA versions of the music in the same "container," in this case 24/44.1.

 

However, I have found no samples of MQA music like this.

 

If you know of any, please let me know.

[Mike48]

MQA may sound good, but that doesn’t make it a good thing. It is a proprietary protocol that is incompatible with some of the most interesting developments in audio (DSP by, e.g., Devialet, Lyngdorf, Classe, DEQX), and it is a roadblock to further progress.

 

If we get MQA, we can kiss goodbye to all DSP, including digital crossovers, EQ, room correction, and speaker correction. MQA-encoded files are incompatible with all that, and MQA DACs are not allowed to have digital outputs of the restored material.

 

I sure don't want to go back to having to do all audio signal processing in the analog domain. Digital equalizers that I have used are completely transparent. I can't say that about analog equalizers. And some mild room correction has been really helpful in the bass. Ever try to come up with a bass trap that damps 20 Hz effectively? It's close to impossible.

 

MQA sounds like a power grab to me, one that outweighs any progress it represents in the field of audio reproduction.

[The Computer Audiophile]

MQA may sound good, but that doesn’t make it a good thing. It is a proprietary protocol that is incompatible with some of the most interesting developments in audio (DSP by, e.g., Devialet, Lyngdorf, Classe, DEQX), and it is a roadblock to further progress.

 

If we get MQA, we can kiss goodbye to all DSP, including digital crossovers, EQ, room correction, and speaker correction. MQA-encoded files are incompatible with all that, and MQA DACs are not allowed to have digital outputs of the restored material.

 

I sure don't want to go back to having to do all audio signal processing in the analog domain. Digital equalizers that I have used are completely transparent. I can't say that about analog equalizers. And some mild room correction has been really helpful in the bass. Ever try to come up with a bass trap that damps 20 Hz effectively? It's close to impossible.

 

MQA sounds like a power grab to me, one that outweighs any progress it represents in the field of audio reproduction.

Perhaps Lyndorf, Devialet, DEQX, etc... Will work with MQA Ltd to implement a complete solution. I don't think anything prohibits this.

[Don Hills]

Perhaps Lyndorf, Devialet, DEQX, etc... Will work with MQA Ltd to implement a complete solution. I don't think anything prohibits this.

 

Ka-ching.

[hornytoad]

MQA is lossy , correct ?

[The Computer Audiophile]

MQA is lossy , correct ?

If you compare it in the traditional bit to bit sense then yes it's lossy.

[Sal1950]

I very much hope it fails to gain hold in the marketplace. When you balance the positives against the negatives I don't see it's worth. The filesize reduction will be yesterdays news in less than 5 years and it's claims of SQ improvements are highly debatable. To jump into a closed system with it's many very real sacrifices should be enough to give us all serious thought.

[The Computer Audiophile]

I very much hope it fails to gain hold in the marketplace. When you balance the positives against the negatives I don't see it's worth. The filesize reduction will be yesterdays news in less than 5 years and it's claims of SQ improvements are highly debatable. To jump into a closed system with it's many very real sacrifices should be enough to give us all serious thought.

Do you feel the same way about DTS, AC3, etc ...?

 

i hope it succeeds because I want more choices in the marketplace. Even if I don't use MQA I still want fellow music lovers to have the choice. If it succeeds, I don't think it will limit other choices, but one never knows.

[Sal1950]

Do you feel the same way about DTS, AC3, etc ...?

 

i hope it succeeds because I want more choices in the marketplace. Even if I don't use MQA I still want fellow music lovers to have the choice. If it succeeds, I don't think it will limit other choices, but one never knows.

 

I've nothing against choice Chris, but as you said "one never knows" And the moves MQA has made shows their intent to keep it a total proprietary closed system with intent of locking all others out.

Tell me do you believe that suppliers such as Tidal will continue to offer a non-MQA streams if/when they start to put it's CD quality streams thru MQA? How long will download people like HDTracks continue it's standard offerings? What of the CA members beloved DSD availability?

I see the whole thing as a marketing grab by Mr Stuart and Co looking to a future where darn near everything musical going out will be paying licensing fee's to them.

Nice job if you can get it.

[firedog]

Listening to MQA | Stereophile.com

[Distinctive]

The most important issue for me is that MQA should not degrade anything, sonically opposed to providing better SQ.

I am still reluctant to the proprietary side of it, though.

I am also in agreement with those who claim that the bandwith-saving is insignificant in a few years time. Who cares about mp3 vs flac today?

[Mike48]

Perhaps Lyndorf, Devialet, DEQX, etc... Will work with MQA Ltd to implement a complete solution. I don't think anything prohibits this.

 

Perhaps that's right. Even if so, MQA would reduce choice in the marketplace, and it would render all present DSP devices obsolete. They all would have to be redesigned, with all DSP functions built into an MQA-approved DAC, because MQA prohibits digital output of the unencoded stream. That would include any kind of digital crossover, room correction, equalization, and so on. I don't think it's a pro-consumer choice to require all of that to be done in the same box as the DAC. It stifles innovation by companies such as miniDSP, for example, and it limits audiophiles' choices of products.

 

Technically MQA is another HDCD -- a proprietary scheme that may or may not survive. Let's instead do some non-proprietary research on what really improves sound quality and find an open solution to the perceived problem. THAT would be a lot more interesting.

 

MQA is a move to gain a lot of control over the audio market, and I don't care for it.

[Sal1950]

MQA is a move to gain a lot of control over the audio market, and I don't care for it.

 

Exactly, you and I are in 100% agreement over this. Regardless of SQ, I will oppose however possible allowing Meridian to put a stranglehold on the digital music delivery market.

Which codec currently dominates HDA delivery, FLAC. A open source product from the cooperative minds of hackers the world over.

They did it before and will do it again if necessary, offering a product you can look inside of, know what it's doing and modify it to your heart content. I suspiciously look at MQA as the answer to a problem that doesn't really exist. A simple $ driven market attack.

Keep fighting the good fight Mike48

[Paul R]

Do you feel the same way about DTS, AC3, etc ...?

 

i hope it succeeds because I want more choices in the marketplace. Even if I don't use MQA I still want fellow music lovers to have the choice. If it succeeds, I don't think it will limit other choices, but one never knows.

 

I worry more it will be another DIVX, and admit to some worry that it is an attempt to lock in the market. Imactually see. It as a result of Soolos complete loss of market share and income once products like iTunes, JRMC, and others made everything a $15,000 Solos system did available for the cost of a modest PC and $50 or so.

 

The deciding factor - to me - is whether or not there really is any new ground breaking technology involved here, or if it is just very clever packaging.

 

Note - my investment in audio equipment pales in comparision to my investment in music - everything from 78's to DSD. I have decided my archive copies will be in whatever their native format is, or the highest quality ripped format Imcan reasonably achieve, but most often played back either as very high res PCM or as DSD. I do not want to rebuy all that music as MQA, even if I could see my way clear financially to do so. I am even less interested in supporting Tidal in any way, shape, or form.

[woodnote]

Regardless of SQ, I will oppose however possible allowing Meridian to put a stranglehold on the digital music delivery market.

Which codec currently dominates HDA delivery, FLAC. A open source product from the cooperative minds of hackers the world over.

They did it before and will do it again if necessary, offering a product you can look inside of, know what it's doing and modify it to your heart content. I suspiciously look at MQA as the answer to a problem that doesn't really exist. A simple $ driven market attack.

 

Emphasis is mine... But you have just articulated the crux of what has been bugging me so much since all of the discussion (i.e., hype) about MQA started. Everything that I have read, whether from big audiophile sites singing its praises, or even from Bob Stuart himself, has been threaded with this insinuation that all of our "legacy" systems and bit/sample rate-focused audio formats are full of myriad problems that we never knew we had, but for which suddenly a solution has been developed! And it can be ours for several mildly uncomfortable payments of a few hundred, or thousand, dollars.

 

Ever since the discussion moved away from the benefit of having smaller files for easier streaming of HRA (which I also agree would have been much more valuable in a world before cheap terabyte hard drives and easy streaming of endless HD video with surround sound to every TV and phone... but I digress), the language about MQA has been not so much about subjectively good-sounding audio that sounds different from current formats and can add a novel method of encoding/archiving to the current repertoire; rather, it has been about "better" sounding audio and about encoders that will "fix" problems that current music is seemingly rife with, from frailties throughout the entirety of the recording-to-listening chain. I'm not going to argue that the DAC in my smartphone couldn't stand a little improving, but my BS-o-meter starts to ding when I hear that MQA is a "chameleon" with the ability to adapt itself to what sounds like any and every scenario so that the studio master/my phone/my home stereo will now be "better".

 

What Chris described in his initial review of MQA's impact on SQ was much more even-keeled than the majority of the writing I've read on the forthcoming music revolution, I have really had it with this notion that somewhere, someday, someone will present all of us with the be-all, end-all "best" audio, and that as we move toward that, everything new or different is in fact "better". I realize that superlatives are much more effective for marketing, though, and so I will not hold out too much hope. In any case, me and my "legacy" stereo system will be fine - since I actually did set it up to sound the best to me and don't need any uppity encoding formats telling me that they know better.

[Sal1950]

Emphasis is mine... But you have just articulated the crux of what has been bugging me so much since all of the discussion (i.e., hype) about MQA started. Everything that I have read, whether from big audiophile sites singing its praises, or even from Bob Stuart himself, has been threaded with this insinuation that all of our "legacy" systems and bit/sample rate-focused audio formats are full of myriad problems that we never knew we had, but for which suddenly a solution has been developed! And it can be ours for several mildly uncomfortable payments of a few hundred, or thousand, dollars.

 

Ever since the discussion moved away from the benefit of having smaller files for easier streaming of HRA (which I also agree would have been much more valuable in a world before cheap terabyte hard drives and easy streaming of endless HD video with surround sound to every TV and phone... but I digress), the language about MQA has been not so much about subjectively good-sounding audio that sounds different from current formats and can add a novel method of encoding/archiving to the current repertoire; rather, it has been about "better" sounding audio and about encoders that will "fix" problems that current music is seemingly rife with, from frailties throughout the entirety of the recording-to-listening chain. I'm not going to argue that the DAC in my smartphone couldn't stand a little improving, but my BS-o-meter starts to ding when I hear that MQA is a "chameleon" with the ability to adapt itself to what sounds like any and every scenario so that the studio master/my phone/my home stereo will now be "better".

 

What Chris described in his initial review of MQA's impact on SQ was much more even-keeled than the majority of the writing I've read on the forthcoming music revolution, I have really had it with this notion that somewhere, someday, someone will present all of us with the be-all, end-all "best" audio, and that as we move toward that, everything new or different is in fact "better". I realize that superlatives are much more effective for marketing, though, and so I will not hold out too much hope. In any case, me and my "legacy" stereo system will be fine - since I actually did set it up to sound the best to me and don't need any uppity encoding formats telling me that they know better.

LOL

A most excellent post woodnote. I fear the $marketing powers will run over any opposition to this leveraged takeover of digital audio distribution but let us not go down quietly. LOL

I for one will NOT be trading in my DAC, pre MQA music files, or paying for MQA encoded streaming, No Thanks Meridian, High End Audio does not need a corporate dictator.

[Tintinabulum]

I though MQA basically unwound characteristics of the recording ADC and added a bit of extra information. Sounds good to me. I'll keep an open mind.

[[email protected]]

Tidal MQA works, but only through ROON...

 

I tried the new Masters using the Windows desktop, but could not get my Meridian Explorer2 to light up. So I tagged the new MQA albums in Tidal, switched to Roon, resynced to Tidal. Now I get the three LEDs to light up on the DAC, and play MQA.

 

Listening for a while before commenting on SQ improvements.

[jtwrace]

Tidal MQA works, but only through ROON...

 

I tried the new Masters using the Windows desktop, but could not get my Meridian Explorer2 to light up. So I tagged the new MQA albums in Tidal, switched to Roon, resynced to Tidal. Now I get the three LEDs to light up on the DAC, and play MQA.

 

Listening for a while before commenting on SQ improvements.

 

I can't find it through Roon.

[[email protected]]

I can't find it through Roon.

 

I had to tag (i.e hit the like star) on the new Master albums in Tidal. Then I switched over to Roon and played the "New" albums.

 

Listening to Van Morrison's Moondance. LEDS are Blue/White/White. Nice SQ.

 

Some MQA albums only light up Blue/White.

[jtwrace]

I had to tag (i.e hit the like star) on the new Master albums in Tidal. Then I switched over to Roon and played the "New" albums.

 

Listening to Van Morrison's Moondance. LEDS are Blue/White/White. Nice SQ.

 

Some MQA albums only light up Blue/White.

 

That's just it, I can't find anything through TIDAL using Roon.

[[email protected]]

That's just it, I can't find anything through TIDAL using Roon.

 

Have you added Tidal to the Services in Roon? See Settings>Services.