MQA is Vaporware

[Currawong]

12 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Understood.

 

Why is there content above 20 kHz in your file? Your unnamed microphone likely has a maximum frequency of 20 kHz. 

All that above 50 kHz is sigma/delta noise from the ADC.

[Fx Studio]

24 minutes ago, MikeyFresh said:

Actually?

 

All businesses' actions are guided to one extent or another by economics, no one is in business to break even. That said, being less than straightforward about your product will always trigger the BS meter of skepticism, because great products with efficacy can easily withstand scrutiny, and should be able to easily stand on their own two legs without outlandish marketing claims, and the deployment of attack the messenger tactics on any critics.

 

No that would have been non-viable product. You sound like GUTB with these arbitrary "$20k++ or you won't hear it" pronouncements. What about $15k, will I hear at least some of the magic?

 

No one knows what the hell that means. What exactly is MQA level 1-2, and how would that differ from (presumably) level 3 or 4?

 

Ostensibly with the vaporware plugin and ADC, or are we strictly talking about some sort of brand new digital recording, further details of which are bound by NDA (because that sounds sorta cool and plausible... to you).

 

That would be tough to do with vaporware.

 

Wild fantasy conjecture based on absolutely nothing but your own subjective observation. Tell us, how do you make that claim? Have you been able to listen in the past with "no effective resistance from the air" and thus you are able to discern what that sounds like on a comparative basis?

 

Great, how many EDM night club DJs will be employing this system and where can I go to hear it, or is it a unicorn? Will this system work at an outdoor festival, or is that just too much air to overcome?

 

Thanks for that very informed opinion.

 

That must be the reason they've never been able to counter or rebut any scrutiny or criticism, brilliant summation there.

 

 

 

I have always invited people to hire out similar equipment and perform their own tests - the results will be the same.

To hear the time smearing correction effect easily it takes a powerful system and fast PA ribbons.

 

I am trying to describe what that sounds like for someone who hasn't heard it - but here is an example:

Alcons sound LR28 line array system outdoor live test at 300 feet distance:

 

 

 

[MikeyFresh]

5 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

I have always invited people to hire out similar equipment and perform their own tests - the results will be the same.

Always as in for many years now, but this is the very first we are hearing from you on the subject of MQA?

 

6 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

To hear the time smearing correction effect easily it takes a powerful system and fast PA ribbons.

I asked you a very specific question about that and you have conveniently tried not to answer it. Once again: Have you been able to listen in the past with "no effective resistance from the air" and thus you are able to discern what that sounds like on a comparative basis?

 

8 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

I am trying to describe what that sounds like for someone who hasn't heard it - but here is an example:

Alcons sound LR28 line array system outdoor live test at 300 feet distance:

I'm not following, your example is from 2014, and uses the call to authority/good name of Alcons Audio, who seem to have exactly no affiliation with MQA. Search MQA on their site, what do you find?

 

My previous reply to you posed various questions, none of which you've answered. Good evening.

[Currawong]

I know what "time smearing" is. It's very audible when you switch filters on some DACs, as the position of the instruments on a good stereo recording shifts. The MQA short filters, and ones like it (iFi) bring all the instruments forward, even ones that should be behind the speakers. Our brain requires that the arrival of sounds to our ears be correct to be able to accurately locate the origin and distance of sounds. 

 

The only DACs I've heard which reconstruct this correctly are from Chord. The whole idea that MQA's system corrected the timing errors is not possible given how MQA works. It's a flat out lie from them. But then, almost everything they claimed has been proven to be false. 

[Fx Studio]

17 minutes ago, MikeyFresh said:

Always as in for many years now, but this is the very first we are hearing from you on the subject of MQA?

 

I asked you a very specific question about that and you have conveniently tried not to answer it. Once again: Have you been able to listen in the past with "no effective resistance from the air" and thus you are able to discern what that sounds like on a comparative basis?

 

I'm not following, your example is from 2014, and uses the call to authority/good name of Alcons Audio, who seem to have exactly no affiliation with MQA. Search MQA on their site, what do you find?

 

My previous reply to you posed various questions, none of which you've answered. Good evening.

 

Nope, I have been talking about it since I discovered it back more than 2 years ago and started asking about it. Its all documented on Golden Sound and Amir's YT channel in the comments section.

 

In more technical terms - Alcons PA ribbons produce what known as an all-natural cylindrical (Isophasic) wavefront) the sound is everywhere as can be heard in the LR24 test I posted above. That's the big difference that allows the MQA time smearing correction to be easily heard. 

 

[MikeyFresh]

23 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

That's the big difference that allows the MQA time smearing correction to be easily heard. 

Bullshit, and yet another call to authority using the Alcons Audio good name to somehow equate that systems' performance (in 2014) with that of MQA's supposed ability to eliminate time smear.

[MikeyFresh]

39 minutes ago, Currawong said:

The MQA short filters, and ones like it (iFi) bring all the instruments forward, even ones that should be behind the speakers.

Likely all that @Fx Studio is describing as revelatory in listening to this on a PA.

[Currawong]

29 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

 

Nope, I have been talking about it since I discovered it back more than 2 years ago and started asking about it. Its all documented on Golden Sound and Amir's YT channel in the comments section.

 

In more technical terms - Alcons PA ribbons produce what known as an all-natural cylindrical (Isophasic) wavefront) the sound is everywhere as can be heard in the LR24 test I posted above. That's the big difference that allows the MQA time smearing correction to be easily heard. 

 

I certainly believe that you're hearing a difference, but you're wrong about it being from "time smearing correction". We know now for a fact that MQA does, if anything the opposite.

[bogi]

2 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

you need a minimum $20K++ sound system to really hear the benefits

 

That's your claim only, not proven by any objective fact.

 

2 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

why do people want to pay all that extra cost for something that basically can't be heard

 

Because of propaganda fooling.

 

2 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

All that said, it still doesn't mean that the time smearing correction doesn't work or doesn't exist - it does and it does work very well for this type of system.

You can't prove a non existing thing by any objective mean. You are telling us that it exists based on your very subjective personal experience you got with specific audio devices. You simply like MQA ingredience in an audio meal if it was prepared by a very specific kitchen.

 

2 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

this is really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY

 

No. That's another your unproven claim. MQA was basically meant to gain money from ordinary music consumers, as well as audio software and device producers and therefore its propaganda was targeted to everybody who is listening to music. MQA was supported by music labels because of it's 'crown jewel' protection scheme. To continue to be financially supported by labels MQA needed mass success. Telling that MQA was "really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY" is therefore a nonsense. MQA infiltrated itself easier into device market but it failed to reach any significant success in audio content production and mastering area. MQA flooded Tidal by mass devaluation of already produced audio content. Tidal is targeted to mass public - not audiophiles.

[Fx Studio]

29 minutes ago, bogi said:

 

That's your claim only, not proven by any objective fact.

 

 

Because of propaganda fooling.

 

You can't prove a non existing thing by any objective mean. You are telling us that it exists based on your very subjective personal experience you got with specific audio devices. You simply like MQA ingredience in an audio meal if it was prepared by a very specific kitchen.

 

 

No. That's another your unproven claim. MQA was basically meant to gain money from ordinary music consumers, as well as audio software and device producers and therefore its propaganda was targeted to everybody who is listening to music. MQA was supported by music labels because of it's 'crown jewel' protection scheme. To continue to be financially supported by labels MQA needed mass success. Telling that MQA was "really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY" is therefore a nonsense. MQA infiltrated itself easier into device market but it failed to reach any significant success in audio content production and mastering area. MQA flooded Tidal by mass devaluation of already produced audio content. Tidal is targeted to mass public - not audiophiles.

You should go back and read my original posts I never said you needed a $20K sound system its taken out of context - I said: 

IF MQA had said that then they wouldn't have sold MQA to there customers in the first place.

 

The other comment is taken out of context as well. 

 

But the truth is it needs a hell of a sound system to be able to hear the benefits.

[Fx Studio]

1 hour ago, Currawong said:

I certainly believe that you're hearing a difference, but you're wrong about it being from "time smearing correction". We know now for a fact that MQA does, if anything the opposite.

Again, I will say instead of talking endlessly GO AND DO YOUR OWN TESTING - THEN YOU WILL KNOW that the time smearing correction does work very well.  I am going to leave it there.....

 

 

[bogi]

17 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

I never said you needed a $20K sound system

 

17 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

But the truth is it needs a hell of a sound system to be able to hear the benefits.

 

You brought those claims, although you formulated them as "IF MQA had said". It's from your head. Such a claims were never formulated by MQA representatives. Therefore they are your claims.

 

So not '$20 k sound system' but exactly 'a hell of a sound system' ? OK...

[Fx Studio]

54 minutes ago, bogi said:

 

 

You brought those claims, although you formulated them as "IF MQA had said". It's from your head. Such a claims were never formulated by MQA representatives. Therefore they are your claims.

 

So not '$20 k sound system' but exactly 'a hell of a sound system' ? OK...

Its hypothetical that should be obvious.

 

Yes correct, you need 'a hell of a sound system'  to hear the benefits of the MQA time smearing correction.

 

 

[bogi]

31 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

Its hypothetical that should be obvious.

 

OK, so I separated your claims and your hypothetical claims and re-posted my previous post:

 

Posted 38 minutes ago

5 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

you need a minimum $20K++ sound system to really hear the benefits

 

That's your claim only, your hypothetical claim, not proven by any objective fact.

 

5 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

why do people want to pay all that extra cost for something that basically can't be heard

 

Because of propaganda fooling.

 

5 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

All that said, it still doesn't mean that the time smearing correction doesn't work or doesn't exist - it does and it does work very well for this type of system.

You can't prove a non existing thing by any objective mean. You are telling us that it exists based on your very subjective personal experience you got with specific audio devices. You simply like MQA ingredience in an audio meal if it was prepared by a very specific kitchen.

 

5 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

this is really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY

 

No. That's another your unproven hypothetical claim. MQA was basically meant to gain money from ordinary music consumers, as well as audio software and device producers and therefore its propaganda was targeted to everybody who is listening to music. MQA was supported by music labels because of it's 'crown jewel' protection scheme. To continue to be financially supported by labels MQA needed mass success. Telling that MQA was "really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY" is therefore a nonsense. MQA infiltrated itself easier into device market but it failed to reach any significant success in audio content production and mastering area. MQA flooded Tidal by mass devaluation of already produced audio content. Tidal is targeted to mass public - not audiophiles.

[bogi]

17 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

Yes correct, you need 'a hell of a sound system'  to hear the benefits of the MQA time smearing correction.

 

That your claim is "very different" from your hypothetical claim. I stand corrected. 🤩

[Fx Studio]

40 minutes ago, bogi said:

 

That your claim is "very different" from your hypothetical claim. I stand corrected. 🤩

THIS IS WHAT I WROTE IN REPLY TO FIREDOG :

Those points were taken out of context - can you understand English?

 

"You make some very good points actually.

I think that MQA's actions have largely been guided by economics so they have been less than straight forward about things.

If they had come out and said you need a minimum $20K++ sound system to really hear the benefits of it then would any streaming company or DAC maker have picked up on it?

The MQA indicator should have had more bits available to it, so it could indicate an old track made up to an MQA (level 1-2) separately from a studio mastered MQA (I don't need it because you can tell the difference in a split second on my sound system) but it has undoubtedly created a heck of a lot of confusion. 

They could have been more transparent about how an studio MQA is achieved i.e. some basic information about the plugin - I don't expect to see a free download of it on there website but at least they could have officially clarify it.

 

And as I said before and as you've said here, why do people want to pay all that extra cost for something that basically can't be heard. I have a set of Adams A7X and have never heard that affect on them - they just don't have the power that the Alcons Pro Ribbons have whereby the sound is delivered as though there was no effective resistance from the air. 

 

All that said, it still doesn't mean that the time smearing correction doesn't work or doesn't exist - it does and it does work very well for this type of system. I think the MQA guys are a bunch of tech heads, who have at its core have a very good product, but who would never have found financing or got it out there in the first place had they straight forwardly said;  this is really only meant for Hi End audiophile users ONLY.

 

And that's why when its exposed they run around with their tail between there legs just ignoring it, because to address it - that's really the only answer they can honestly give. "

[bogi]

25 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

can you understand English?

 

Not an issue with understanding English.

 

Can you exactly specify the difference between (your thought) hypothetical 'a minimum $20K++ sound system' and a non hypothetical 'hell of a sound system' ?

How can others except of you build 'a hell of a sound system'? Can anybody except of you reproduce the MQA time smearing correction benefit you claim to hear? How should others use your ears and brain to hear the MQA time smearing benefit which you state you hear? What is the objective method to distinguish if you hear a MQA time smearing correction or you actually like some kind of distortion? Can you show the time smearing benefit you hear on some objective measurement?

[Fx Studio]

4 minutes ago, bogi said:

 

Not an issue with understanding English.

 

Can you exactly specify the difference between (your thought) hypothetical 'a minimum $20K++ sound system' and a non hypothetical 'hell of a sound system' ?

How can others except of you build 'a hell of a sound system'? Can anybody except of you reproduce the MQA time smearing benefit you claim to hear? How should others use your ears and brain to hear the MQA time smearing benefit which you state you hear? What is the objective method to distinguish if you hear a MQA time smearing benefit or you actaually like some kind of distortion?

I already stated so many times - if you want to hear the MQA time smearing correction GO AND HIRE A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS that don't resample - and do your own tests its really not that difficult!

[bogi]

4 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

I already stated so many times - if you want to hear the MQA time smearing correction GO AND HIRE A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS that don't resample - and do your own tests its really not that difficult!

 

You state you can hear MQA time smearing correction on A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS. Anyone else can state anything else. It's nothing more than one of millions of subjective standings about sound. There is no way to distinguish which subjective standing is correct. Everybody has his own personal "truth" about "correct" sound. Personal listening experience is not so easily transferable to others like you probably think.

 

What you like can easily be some MQA specific distortion which has nothing to do with time smearing correction. Give some objective confirmation that a time smearing correction is happening on A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS.

[lamode]

23 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

 

evidence in the huge disparity* between recent post 2019-2021 recordings and old recordings made up to MQA level 1-2 would support that. 

 

* on a Hi end PA system

 

🤣

[The Computer Audiophile]

MQA, the gift that keeps giving. 

[Shadorne]

2 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

MQA, the gift that keeps giving. 

Time to close the MQA thread? It is dead and done - no amount of hand waving will change that. We were never told exactly what it does and it remains a black box to this day.

 

I want to discover/understand why computer based upsampling to DSD256 straight to a true 1 bit converter like in the T+A DAC 200 has better soundstage than any chip DAC based design I have ever tried. Nobody seems to know the answer yet. PC-based Redbook to high rate DSD  is so widely reported to improve soundstage that there must be a distortion mechanism in all DAC chips - is it the “equiripple” from low latency filters (cascaded 63, 31, 15 tap filters) in chip DACs that produces pre-echos in the time domain? Has anyone researched the reason for HQ player popularity? Some folks want to know - where is AES why is there no investigation by companies like Harman?

[JoeWhip]

Fx Studio is trying awfully hard here to extol the benefits of MQA. My spidey sense is tingling. Next thing he will tell us is that he can determine the surface temperature of the sun by pointing an infrared thermometer at it.

[bogi]

@Shadorne Ask in other suitable thread. I think you will get an answer.

[charlesphoto]

3 hours ago, bogi said:

 

You state you can hear MQA time smearing correction on A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS. Anyone else can state anything else. It's nothing more than one of millions of subjective standings about sound. There is no way to distinguish which subjective standing is correct. Everybody has his own personal "truth" about "correct" sound. Personal listening experience is not so easily transferable to others like you probably think.

 

What you like can easily be some MQA specific distortion which has nothing to do with time smearing correction. Give some objective confirmation that a time smearing correction is happening on A SET OF ALCONS PA RIBBON SPEAKERS + POWER AMPS.

Nailed it. I would consider myself an 'objectivist' (yes, I've heard sound differences in cables and digital replay/networking gear) but far too many people are like "I added x/y to my setup and now it sounds amazing!" or " There's no way x/y could do anything because the sound of my setup is already amazing!" Well, both statements can be simultaneously true and false if there's no baseline to compare to. And there's nothing wrong with thinking your setup is endgame - for you. I know mine is - for me - mostly because I don't/can't want to spend anymore money on it. And that's okay. But I won't go around making pronouncements about things because of hearing what I hear (only it's a shame Audio Physic speakers aren't better well know outside EU/Germany).