Warner Music and MQA - Questions & Concerns

[crenca]

Also, I wonder what's in it for a competitor to come up with an open source product that does everything MQA can do? I can't imagine a team of lawyers and digital savants working with the labels for free, only to release the product as open source. If it was a paid-for thing, then we may be back to exactly where we are now.

 

Well, think of DSP - what is in it (EQ/room correction is not an IP protected tech as far as I am aware). Take Devialet's highly integrated offerings, or the new micromega's or DEQX. The answer is sales of course. Another example: Why would Andrew Jones take his considerable skills and experience and build ridiculously low priced speakers that (quite literally) compete with much more pricey options? Sales.

 

This is where the ideal (or is it a myth?) of IP & "open source" meets the reality. Turns out the IP protected fill_in_the_blank is no guarantee to $profit$ and success, and it turns out that open source is not the death knell to $profit$. This is of course obvious - and why I don't get the "well of course MQA is one grand end-to-end IP protected format consumer restricting revolution, how else could you accomplish what MQA does?" argument. In fact, most grand too-big-to-fail ideas actually fail, and many nimble, incremental, consumer friendly ideas do quite well. As you say, "MQA is such a large undertaking" - think about it, that should be a giant red flag. Is a large monolith moonshot really what our music needs? Probably not - even if it were not DRM/format restrictive/anti-consumer which it is...

[The Computer Audiophile]

Well, think of DSP - what is in it (EQ/room correction is not an IP protected tech as far as I am aware). Take Devialet's highly integrated offerings, or the new micromega's or DEQX. The answer is sales of course. Another example: Why would Andrew Jones take his considerable skills and experience and build ridiculously low priced speakers that (quite literally) compete with much more pricey options? Sales.

 

This is where the ideal (or is it a myth?) of IP & "open source" meets the reality. Turns out the IP protected fill_in_the_blank is no guarantee to $profit$ and success, and it turns out that open source is not the death knell to $profit$. This is of course obvious - and why I don't get the "well of course MQA is one grand end-to-end IP protected format consumer restricting revolution, how else could you accomplish what MQA does?" argument. In fact, most grand too-big-to-fail ideas actually fail, and many nimble, incremental, consumer friendly ideas do quite well. As you say, "MQA is such a large undertaking" - think about it, that should be a giant red flag. Is a large monolith moonshot really what our music needs? Probably not - even if it were not DRM/format restrictive/anti-consumer which it is...

I respectfully disagree with much of what you said, but do have a question. If MQA isn't what our music needs, what does our music need?

 

P.S. Try getting Dirac to give you its DSP for free :~)

[crenca]

Hi Dennis - I know I never said MQA wouldn't help certain recordings and MQA never said it either.

 

Not sure what you mean by your authenticated comments. When the mastering engineer creates the file, it has the green or blue light illumination with it, so the file will light that light on the DAC. Any man in the middle doing anything to the file will destroy this feature.

 

For someone who has very little knowledge of MQA you sure seem to have the entire world of MQA nailed. Your comment about the more you learn the more ... Can you explain some stuff that you've learned that made it seem like MQA was just marketing and DRM? I'm curious.

 

I took away that he was saying that MQA is promising something it can not in fact deliver - which is to say it is promising a kind of "best practice" in the recording/mix/mastering/distribution which is in fact all over the place practice/quality wise. In other words, MQA will end up just being a kind of meaningless rubber stamp and that the best practices (i.e the not tech part of MQA) can and will be abused/used. I currently only know one guy who does music recording/engineering/mixing. Most of it is for commercial's because this pays the bills, but a bit of it is for love of music. I am simply flabbergasted at the amount of post processing/changes he does in the course of his work. MQA would just be another checkbox to him...

[witchdoctor]

I respectfully disagree with much of what you said, but do have a question. If MQA isn't what our music needs, what does our music need?

 

What does music need?

 

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

 

it is becoming more and more of a commodity. Respect the artists, the studios, the distribution channels, and the consumers. Disrespect even one of these links in the value chain and you get a drop in quality.

[crenca]

I respectfully disagree with much of what you said, but do have a question. If MQA isn't what our music needs, what does our music need?

 

P.S. Try getting Dirac to give you its DSP for free :~)

 

Ah, but that is simply a rhetorical point If someone comes to me and says "what NASA needs is to put a man on Mars by 2025" and I look at the Fed budget and actual planetary science, etc. and say "no, that is not what NASA needs" it is all too easy to reply "but then what does NASA need?". What if some politician says "I can keep you and your family safe from all crime and terrorism, you just have to let me read your thoughts" and I say "no thank you" the counter can not be "Well, how are YOU going to FIX crime!!?!".

 

It is obvious that once you put your music into a black box that real limitations occur (i.e. to innovation, etc.). Once you IP your fundamental formats, real consequences ensue. What would I do? At the very least, I would allow an incremental approach that does not lock us into an all-or-nothing scheme.

 

Also, once again it is a false dichotomy to say "free vs innovation". It's not "MQA or nothing". What MQA does will happen with or without MQA. Less restrictive and consumer friendly innovation will occur whatever happens to MQA. To say otherwise is to ignore the whole history of human endeavor...

[Dr. AIX]

Hi Guys - I literally just got off the phone with MQA. I asked all my questions and they addressed all my concerns. Much of the MQA opinion to date has really been colored by the speaker's glasses. There are those with rose colored glasses and those with dark dark dark glasses. The truth is somewhere in the middle.

 

With respect to the Warner catalog. The number Mark Waldrep is putting out (3500 albums) is false. If streaming services need many thousands, if not millions of titles to launch, why would MQA and Warner convert only 3500? They wouldn't. This brings me to the question of how are all these titles converted. I was concerned that it was a simple right-click > convert to MQA etc... We need to think about this form a label perspective. Some of their assets are very important to them and some are virtually unimportant. Miles Davis, Dave Brubeck and others of that ilk are critical and will be treated as such when the MQA master is created. Other titles, one that have never been listened to on Tidal for example, may be treated with a less hands on approach. This approach however isn't without its benefits. The MQA artificial intelligence is pretty cool. It can recognize equipment used in the production process, even though the label has long lost the information associated with a title. For example, it not only can recognize A to D converters, but serial numbers of those converters base on a signature (if present) and different generations of converters. So, the batch-type of processing isn't without its benefits. It isn't white glove, but it isn't an iTunes-like right-click > convert to MQA either.

 

I also talked to MQA briefly about the loudness wars and the fact that the MQA process isn't going to do much for dynamically "ruined" albums. They agreed that some albums were really squashed, but they also said their workings with the labels have really educated the labels and those involved. What I'm trying to say is this, MQA can't fix what has been squashed, but the company can educate and improve the future of album releases.

 

After this phone call I feel much better about MQA. I still have logical reservations like some others, but I don't think it's a trojan horse that's going to ruin all my enjoyment of this wonderful hobby while making MQA and record labels rich. If MQA can make my favorite music sound better, I'll be happy. Nobody else is going to make my favorite music sound better.

 

Chris, with all due respect. I went to the MQA suite at the RMAF event and spoke at length with Jeff Dean, the MQA representative and a person that I've been friends with for many years. I do not believe he would lie to me about the number. I asked him a few questions. Among them, "How many MQA albums are available now?" He answered 250. These are the ones that audiophiles might enjoy but are not mainstream. I then asked him about the conversion of the WB "catalog". I have read the announcements that the "entire WB catalog would be made available in MQA". I wanted to know if they would be converting every album in the WB archive (which is certainly in the hundreds of thousands) or only those that have already been identified as worthy and digitized by the WB mastering facility (the head of that studio is also a long time friend of mine). Jeff indicated the number was 3500, those titles that have already been digitized into high-res bit buckets from the best available analog master (not remastered) and made available to the WB licensed partners (HD Tracks, HiResAudio etc). This number makes sense to me. The people at WB have publicly acknowledged that they've processed (digitized) about 3500 albums over the past 9 years at events like CE Week and CES.

 

So I'm not sure who told you a different number, but I'm 100% certain of the information that I received from the MQA representative. I also know the person who worked on the software plug-in for MQA. He and I spoke about the current situation with the tools. They are in beta among limited number of mastering facilities. To believe that tens or even hundreds of thousands of WB recordings are available in MQA at this time seems unrealistic.

 

I would love to believe that MQA solves a meaningful problem in high-end audio. I've heard it on multiple tracks on multiple occasions. It sounds great — but so did the original analog masters! I had hoped that MQA would process a number of my files in the format as Bob Stuart promised me back at the CES 2014 show. I sent them 12 files shortly thereafter and am still waiting to get them back and do my own comparison. I'm personally not convinced that the overblown praise spewed by the major publications and a variety websites is deserved.

 

Music recorded with high fidelity in mind and released on vinyl LP, CDs, high-res physical media, file download, or streams can sound amazing without MQA. I know my own recordings eclipse the fidelity of just about everything I've ever heard. The unfortunate reality is that most music recorded and released by the major labels isn't recorded with fidelity in mind. Their sonic targets are bound up with the commercial realities of the music industry.

[esldude]

I respectfully disagree with much of what you said, but do have a question. If MQA isn't what our music needs, what does our music need?

 

P.S. Try getting Dirac to give you its DSP for free :~)

 

There are free alternatives. Having used a couple and Dirac, Dirac is a pretty good bargain. Not being forced on anyone however.

[hvbias]

What I'm wondering about is if Warner plans to sell MQA files as downloads or if it's strictly for streaming (Tidal)?

[esldude]

I took away that he was saying that MQA is promising something it can not in fact deliver - which is to say it is promising a kind of "best practice" in the recording/mix/mastering/distribution which is in fact all over the place practice/quality wise. In other words, MQA will end up just being a kind of meaningless rubber stamp and that the best practices (i.e the not tech part of MQA) can and will be abused/used. I currently only know one guy who does music recording/engineering/mixing. Most of it is for commercial's because this pays the bills, but a bit of it is for love of music. I am simply flabbergasted at the amount of post processing/changes he does in the course of his work. MQA would just be another checkbox to him...

This is close enough to what I had in mind no need to reply further.

 

Funny about the logo. I picture the box for an AVR or Blu-ray where they almost run out of room on the box for logos. MQA just one more to stick on the box somewhere.

 

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Computer Audiophile mobile app

[Miska]

Not sure what you mean by your authenticated comments. When the mastering engineer creates the file, it has the green or blue light illumination with it, so the file will light that light on the DAC. Any man in the middle doing anything to the file will destroy this feature.

 

I can bet the encoder doesn't know who is sitting behind the keyboard doing the encoding...

 

But the "authentication" feature with the fancy lights is really more about "DRM active" light.

 

I already have MQA content that is clearly upsampled from 44.1k to 96k.

 

MQA was invented years ago and was ready to encode music years ago.

 

Hmmh, based on their complaints it doesn't really sound like that. They only recently got the things together.

 

Also, I wonder what's in it for a competitor to come up with an open source product that does everything MQA can do? I can't imagine a team of lawyers and digital savants working with the labels for free, only to release the product as open source.

 

Yeah, it kind of doesn't make sense because it wouldn't work for DRM and there is no other reason to do it the way they do. But if you want the two-streams-in-one there is similar open standard already AAC ALS/SLS. And from closed side there's DTS MA/HD. Everything else works with standard FLAC (but of course then you cannot sell people new DACs and charge for decoder license).

[The Computer Audiophile]

I can bet the encoder doesn't know who is sitting behind the keyboard doing the encoding...

 

But the "authentication" feature with the fancy lights is really more about "DRM active" light.

 

I already have MQA content that is clearly upsampled from 44.1k to 96k.

 

 

 

Hmmh, based on their complaints it doesn't really sound like that. They only recently got the things together.

 

 

 

Yeah, it kind of doesn't make sense because it wouldn't work for DRM and there is no other reason to do it the way they do. But if you want the two-streams-in-one there is similar open standard already AAC ALS/SLS. And from closed side there's DTS MA/HD. Everything else works with standard FLAC.

If MQA is DRM, and MQA takes off, HQPlayer is done for. Thus your comments?

 

Not sure why it would matter if software knew who was behind the keyboard.

 

Please state reasons for "knowing" thus is drm.

[Miska]

If MQA is DRM, and MQA takes off, HQPlayer is done for. Thus your comments?

 

No, I even added a filter to clean up MQA material when playing to a DAC without MQA decoder. And HQPlayer 3.14 now indicates MQA encoded tracks as such too and automatically applies some fix-ups (when DSP is used).

 

But in general, anybody doing digital cross-overs or digital room correction will heavily dislike MQA's approach.

 

For me personally, there's lot of RedBook, DSD and HiRes material to be played.

 

I do HQPlayer because it's my passion and I need it myself. I don't do it for living, so I don't have any particular dependency on it's success. In fact, my company's original goal was to compete with AudioPrecision on measurement gear and I still intend to do that... And I can also always go back to passive sonar signal analysis too...

 

Not sure why it would matter if software knew who was behind the keyboard.

 

Point is that there is no proof that the content going to MQA encoding is coming from mastering engineer and not from someone else in the recording company. But there are so many bad masterings coming out from "mastering engineers" that I don't see any particular value in this anyway.

 

 

P.S. For the past 12 years, I've made my living doing open source software.

[james45974]

I can't help but agree with those who feel that MQA is simply a money grab. Many pieces point to a software only solution being not only possible but likely already being used "in house". Why the need for special hardware?

[esldude]

My guess is they don't have it fleshed out. As someone who does amateur recording now and again, will gear be licensed to do your own MQA encoded recordings? Will they offer a plug in for popular DAW's that will let you specify your recording device and the plug in does the de-blurring? Will I have to send files to someone at MQA for the deblurring, and if so I think that will cost something? Or will this be only an option to have MQA licensed for the big record/content companies?

[Miska]

My guess is they don't have it fleshed out. As someone who does amateur recording now and again, will gear be licensed to do your own MQA encoded recordings? Will they offer a plug in for popular DAW's that will let you specify your recording device and the plug in does the de-blurring? Will I have to send files to someone at MQA for the deblurring, and if so I think that will cost something? Or will this be only an option to have MQA for the big record/content companies?

 

That was explained on their web page, although they've been removing stuff from there.

 

Based on their earlier page content (with the reservation about my memory):

- Yes, you get (buy) a DAW plugin and you can listen yourself through, but cannot create distributable encoding

- There are supposed to be also MQA-enabled ADCs, although I don't know how output from such supposed to be edited

- Yes, you need to buy encoding service from "encoding house" who will encode/encrypt your material for you - you send it for encoding and get encoded version back and pay for this service

- You can also buy encoding/encryption machine for $20k

 

 

See the FAQ sections here:

http://www.mqa.co.uk/professional/for-content-producers

[esldude]

That was explained on their web page, although they've been removing stuff from there.

 

Based on their earlier page content (with the reservation about my memory):

- Yes, you get (buy) a DAW plugin and you can listen yourself through, but cannot create distributable encoding

- There are supposed to be also MQA-enabled ADCs, although I don't know how output from such supposed to be edited

- Yes, you need to buy encoding service from "encoding house" who will encode/encrypt your material for you - you send it for encoding and get encoded version back and pay for this service

- You can also buy encoding/encryption machine for $20k

 

 

See the FAQ sections here:

MQA | Engineers

 

Thanks for the info Miska. Close to what I expected. I somehow missed that when I searched a few weeks back. As you say they keep moving stuff around.

[crenca]

That was explained on their web page, although they've been removing stuff from there.

 

Based on their earlier page content (with the reservation about my memory):

- Yes, you get (buy) a DAW plugin and you can listen yourself through, but cannot create distributable encoding

- There are supposed to be also MQA-enabled ADCs, although I don't know how output from such supposed to be edited

- Yes, you need to buy encoding service from "encoding house" who will encode/encrypt your material for you - you send it for encoding and get encoded version back and pay for this service

- You can also buy encoding/encryption machine for $20k

 

 

See the FAQ sections here:

MQA | Engineers

 

 

Interesting - think of all the "producers" who make (mostly electronic) music these days. Because of the PC/digital revolution, the changes to the industry have been significant in the sense that studios/labels (and some artists) have been disempowered and small guys with modest equipment and DAW's have been able to become part of the economy.

 

Now comes along MQA (if it becomes a significant market player) that moves the needle back in the direction of the larger studios/labels/big players. Big "solutions" (and MQA is a big-end-to-end solution) usually help the big boys and hurt the small guys, and help consolidate the market. People often don't like non-consolidated markets - lots of choices (many of them bad) and unpredictable change, but also lots of innovation. Consolidated markets have their advantages (think video - non-tech people can walk into Walmart and purchase a Blue-Ray and it just works).

 

I hate saying this (it makes me sound like a pseudo-marxist) but MQA truly benefits the few at the cost of the many...

[ElviaCaprice]

It's not going anywhere. Making too much of it, MQA. It's too late, big studios/labels have lost control of the market. Most people are happy with compressed garbage online. They aren't going to pay for MQA material. As far as audiophiles are concerned, at least this one, I already have all the lossless material I desire for the rest of my life and it doesn't include MQA.

[Don Hills]

... When the mastering engineer creates the file, it has the green or blue light illumination with it, so the file will light that light on the DAC. Any man in the middle doing anything to the file will destroy this feature. ...

 

... Point is that there is no proof that the content going to MQA encoding is coming from mastering engineer and not from someone else in the recording company. ...

 

Miska, you read my mind... :-)

[Ajax]

Hi Chris,

 

I became very interested in the potential for MQA and was contemplating purchasing a new compatible DAC and had the following email exchange with Benchmark Media in June this year:

 

-------------------------------------------------

Hi,

 

I am interested in incorporating the new MQA technology into my hifi system (s). I am a very happy owner of the Benchmark HDR DAC1 (into ADAM A7 active speakers in my office) and the Devialet 200 (into ATC SCM 19 passive speakers in my lounge room). I understand Tidal is soon to incorporate MQA and I am therefore interested in upgrading both systems.

 

My question is whether or not Benchmark have an official view on MQA and whether they intend incorporating the technology within future DACs. If so when would such a DAC become available?

 

------------------------------------------------

 

Hello Michael,

 

Thank you for considering us again for your D/A needs. We are cautiously watching the MQA development. Quite frankly, we see a number of issues that are concerns.

So, at the moment, we don’t anticipate adding MQA to our products. You might find the following of interest.

 

https://benchmarkmedia.com/blogs/application_notes/163302855-is-mqa-doa

 

SoundStage! Hi-Fi | SoundStageHiFi.com - Myriad Questions About MQA

 

Schiitting on MQA | DAR__KO

 

SoundStage! Global | SoundStageGlobal.com - BACCH-SP and MQA -- A Great Demo and a Not-So-Great Demo

 

Best regards,

 

Rory Rall

Sales Mgr.

Benchmark Media Systems, Inc.

 

---------------------------------------------------------------------

 

I very much want the MQA experiment to work but it seems Benchmark Media have more than just concerns about it. In particular I draw you attention to the first link taken from their own web site, wherein John Siau states:

 

"...... at the present time, I remain skeptical of the sonic advantages of MQA and even more skeptical of its commercial viability. There is no question that MQA degrades the quality of the audio for users who do not have an MQA decoder."

 

He then goes on to quote work done by Miska.

 

"The compatible portion of the MQA signal is equivalent to about 13 to 15 bits at a sample rate of 44.1 kHz or 48 kHz. The loss of resolution is due to down sampling, dither noise, and pseudo-random noise from the high-frequency compression channel which occupies the lower 8 to 11 bits. When fully decoded, the resolution of MQA is limited to 17 bits at 96 kHz. Miska has shown that an MQA file actually occupies more space than a lossless 96 kHz 18-bit PCM file! Why settle for 17 bits when you can have an 18-bit file in a smaller package? MQA may be promising a sonic benefit and file-size benefit that it cannot deliver!"

 

As an aside I was England in May this year and before this email exchange I had a small "bet" on MQA by purchasing the Meridian Explorer 2 DAC (I obtained a demo model for about US$200), which as you know can decode MQA. You gave the original Explorer DAC a very positive review some years ago and I can confirm, MQA or not, the upgraded version is an excellent DAC, especially for the money. So for those still wishing to experiment with MQA it's an inexpensive option.

 

All the best,

 

Ajax

[The Computer Audiophile]

A couple things.

@Miska I love and support open source software and know people can make a very good living with open source. I'm happy to hear you are doing well with it. I also don't believe I'll see all your hard work and IP in HQPlayer open sourced. Not a slight on you at all :~)

 

Its my guess that all the DAC chip manufacturers will support MQA in not too long.

 

Sure there's no guarantee that the mastering engineer is the one creating the MQA files. It certainly could a an Intern trained on a DAW. Maybe my glasses just aren't as dark as others' :~)

 

I always come back to this: If nobody else is going to make my music sound this good, I'll accept MQA. Maybe a white glove process could do the same thing with non-MQA flac, but I don't see it happening. How many terrible high res downloads have we all purchased? If MQA fixes this, great. If it doesn't, we all will move on and not spend a dime on it. If MQA takes over and it's the only thing we can purchase, we'll have to live with it, knowing our niche doesn't matter much anyway. In other words, our complaining falls on deaf ears.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Hi @Ajax - Interesting email exchange. I'm willing to bet Benchmark will support MQA because it's a good business decision. Meaning, consumers will pass them by for not checking the MQA box. Right or wrong, this is just how consumers operate. Currently many DAC manufacturers support ultra high DSD rates just to check the box. It's a simple business decision and has nothing to do with technology.

[Ajax]

Hi @Ajax - Interesting email exchange. I'm willing to bet Benchmark will support MQA because it's a good business decision. Meaning, consumers will pass them by for not checking the MQA box. Right or wrong, this is just how consumers operate. Currently many DAC manufacturers support ultra high DSD rates just to check the box. It's a simple business decision and has nothing to do with technology.

 

Hi Chris,

 

Yeah, totally understand.

 

Benchmark, a company I have no affiliation with but from whom I have received nothing but excellent products and service, actually added DSD to their DAC 2 line up, although John Siau was not supportive of the format. I know a lot of CA members were critical that he should produce a product he did not "believe in", however, that is not the way the real world works.

 

Having run a small business supplying building products to Architects who, with their ego and artistic hat firmly in place, did not want to be "told" that the design they were contemplating was difficult and expensive build, and that their maybe a better way. They would become very defensive if you challenged "their" design. This was particularly the case amongst the younger Architects and the less competent, as they didn't have the experience or knowledge to decipher between the bullshit salesman trying to shove a product down their throat and someone genuinely interested in assisting them to get a good result.

 

At the end of the day you build trust by giving an honest and competent opinion, which leads to repeat business, which leads to higher sales with higher margins. No magic wand.

 

Anyway, you can lead a horse to water .....

[witchdoctor]

Chris, with all due respect. I went to the MQA suite at the RMAF event and spoke at length with Jeff Dean, the MQA representative and a person that I've been friends with for many years. I do not believe he would lie to me about the number. I asked him a few questions. Among them, "How many MQA albums are available now?" He answered 250. These are the ones that audiophiles might enjoy but are not mainstream. I then asked him about the conversion of the WB "catalog". I have read the announcements that the "entire WB catalog would be made available in MQA". I wanted to know if they would be converting every album in the WB archive (which is certainly in the hundreds of thousands) or only those that have already been identified as worthy and digitized by the WB mastering facility (the head of that studio is also a long time friend of mine). Jeff indicated the number was 3500, those titles that have already been digitized into high-res bit buckets from the best available analog master (not remastered) and made available to the WB licensed partners (HD Tracks, HiResAudio etc). This number makes sense to me. The people at WB have publicly acknowledged that they've processed (digitized) about 3500 albums over the past 9 years at events like CE Week and CES.

 

So I'm not sure who told you a different number, but I'm 100% certain of the information that I received from the MQA representative. I also know the person who worked on the software plug-in for MQA. He and I spoke about the current situation with the tools. They are in beta among limited number of mastering facilities. To believe that tens or even hundreds of thousands of WB recordings are available in MQA at this time seems unrealistic.

 

I would love to believe that MQA solves a meaningful problem in high-end audio. I've heard it on multiple tracks on multiple occasions. It sounds great — but so did the original analog masters! I had hoped that MQA would process a number of my files in the format as Bob Stuart promised me back at the CES 2014 show. I sent them 12 files shortly thereafter and am still waiting to get them back and do my own comparison. I'm personally not convinced that the overblown praise spewed by the major publications and a variety websites is deserved.

 

Music recorded with high fidelity in mind and released on vinyl LP, CDs, high-res physical media, file download, or streams can sound amazing without MQA. I know my own recordings eclipse the fidelity of just about everything I've ever heard. The unfortunate reality is that most music recorded and released by the major labels isn't recorded with fidelity in mind. Their sonic targets are bound up with the commercial realities of the music industry.

 

Thanks so much for posting this. I have been grappling with the "hirez" solution and keep going back to live concert recordings via concertvault.com and qello.com as being head and shoulders above every other type recording whether redbook or hirez (I still have not compared to native dsd). When you said the reality is fidelity isn't a major prioroity I realized why I prefer the live "low rez" recordings. Most of the time the sound at a live venue is captured through the mixing board and ready to go, not bastardized and sampled a zillion ways before being compressed with some mixing software.

[Rt66indierock]

When I turned onto the toll road to Irvine California this June for Newport I told myself as of now the clock is ticking and we are keeping score. The score card after RMAF 2016 is as follows.

 

The price Warner Music Group wants to charge people who will sell digital MQA albums is more than twice the price for CD quality. This makes the price for MQA Tidal about $40 per month. Their words not mine.

 

Analog tapes are deteriorating and many albums don’t exist on tape that can be copied without extensive work. Slow expensive work. So while there is WMG’s complete or near enough to complete library converted the question of what was the quality of the sources. Based on the speed the library was converted it is fair to ask about sources they used.

 

Now we get to the authentication part. The MQA representative I talked to mentioned two words as he discussed this “family partnerships.” If WMG still needs to get permission from rights holders of music then they have some work ahead of them. A “family partnership” is an estate planning tool and getting agreement can be a time consuming process even if they are all clients of the same accounting firm. I know this very well. And anyone dealing with a record company has long history of unsatisfactory dealings with them so they have no incentive to agree anything without upfront payments or better royalty arrangements.

 

If MQA is has been around as long as Chris said in post #23 then I have to ask why didn’t the technology get off the ground before and why is now the time for it?

 

Finally I need to how a master file converted to MQA will get through the bewildering maze of middlemen when in Warner Music Groups June 30, 2016 financial statements they state in the notes as a business risk factor “the ability to develop a successful business model applicable to a digital environment.” The plain meaning of these words is they don’t have a business model yet.

 

Is the promised sound quality enough to offset the issues above? I won’t know until Sony and Universal license MQA and they all release my reference albums.