MQA is Vaporware

[botrytis]

4 hours ago, Currawong said:

That track is mostly digital, and and the vocals are very heavily processed. There's nothing remotely "natural" about anything on it. You don't seem to understand that the result of genuinely time corrections are audible primarily on recordings of acoustic instruments in a single space, where you get the genuine soundstage of the event -- correct depth and width, as you'd actually hear it if you had been present. In a well set-up system, the speakers disappear and the instruments appear in their actual space as they were. There's nothing to correct with the kind of music you are listening to, if it's all like what you just mentioned, as it's all electronically generated, aside from the voice.

 

He should try John Williams - The Baroque Guitar. In MQA the strings sound like nylon strings not metal ones, and it is louder. There is a smearing which obviously is due to the filtering, etc. on MQA.  And this is a supposed high res MQA versus a FLAC CD rip.

 

Do a blind test, not sighted. That way you bias can't be triggered by the little blue light.

[MarkHH]

7 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

He should try John Williams - The Baroque Guitar. In MQA the strings sound like nylon strings not metal ones, and it is louder. There is a smearing which obviously is due to the filtering, etc. on MQA.  And this is a supposed high res MQA versus a FLAC CD rip.

 

Do a blind test, not sighted. That way you bias can't be triggered by the little blue light.

Nevertheless the vocals in the MQA version of this instrumental piece of music have an impressive 3D effect and are not hiding behind the speakers as in the FLAC version but are all over the room!

[botrytis]

Just now, MarkHH said:

Nevertheless the vocals in the MQA version of this instrumental piece of music have an impressive 3D effect and are not hiding behind the speakers as in the FLAC version but are all over the room!

 

The vocals are so processed as to be useless to compare. Also, were they from the same master? Different masters give different results.

 

You like MQA - I get it, but it is a tech that was 20 years too late. As soon as FLAC came out MQA was dead in the water as was any lossy compression.

[MarkHH]

Just now, botrytis said:

 

The vocals are so processed as to be useless to compare. Also, were they from the same master? Different masters give different results.

 

You like MQA - I get it, but it is a tech that was 20 years too late. As soon as FLAC came out MQA was dead in the water as was any lossy compression.

No, I do not like MQA at all ... my reply was meant to be a joke ... "the vocals of this instrumental piece of music" 🤪

[botrytis]

Well, next time use *sarcasm* - I have friends who telle MQA is the future daily. Just sick of the cult of MQA.

 

Sorry, still getting back to the proper time zone after travel back from France where I met @DuckToller  Yes, that is a Puddles Pity Party shirt - awaiting the TGV to go to Paris from Auray (beautiful little town).

 

 

[MarkHH]

1 minute ago, botrytis said:

Well, next time use *sarcasm* - I have friends who telle MQA is the future daily. Just sick of the cult of MQA.

 

Sorry, still getting back to the proper time zone after travel back from France where I met @DuckToller 

 

My bad & my apologies - next time I will use *sarcasm* ...

Have a good & safe trip home!

[botrytis]

4 minutes ago, MarkHH said:

My bad & my apologies - next time I will use *sarcasm* ...

Have a good & safe trip home!

 

Just recovering from the trip back. Old bodies take longer to recover.

[Fx Studio]

57 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

He should try John Williams - The Baroque Guitar. In MQA the strings sound like nylon strings not metal ones, and it is louder. There is a smearing which obviously is due to the filtering, etc. on MQA.  And this is a supposed high res MQA versus a FLAC CD rip.

 

Do a blind test, not sighted. That way you bias can't be triggered by the little blue light.

 

John Williams – The Baroque Album (1988) - As I have made quite clear before MQA works badly on those old tracks made up to a Level 1 or 2 those are just rubbish and shouldn't be listen to. At best the software that's used to create them is only taking a guess at the ADC's that were originally used. Only a post 2020 MQA Studio Master Track is worth listening to.

[The Computer Audiophile]

3 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

 

John Williams – The Baroque Album (1988) - As I have made quite clear before MQA works badly on those old tracks made up to a Level 1 or 2 those are just rubbish and shouldn't be listen to. At best the software that's used to create them is only taking a guess at the ADC's that were originally used. Only a post 2020 MQA Studio Master Track is worth listening to.

Keep digging that hole. 

[MarkHH]

3 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

Only a post 2020 MQA Studio Master Track is worth listening to.

How come Robert Stuart from MQA never told us about that?

[Fx Studio]

6 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Keep digging that hole. 

I said the same thing for 2 years - and its in the first thing I said here!

 

But really it should be obvious that the software can't apply correction when the data it requires is unknown.

[The Computer Audiophile]

11 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

I said the same thing for 2 years - and its in the first thing I said here!

 

But really it should be obvious that the software can't apply correction when the data it requires is unknown.

You've been digging for two years? Don't you get tired of being the only person in the world on this high horse?

[Fx Studio]

17 minutes ago, MarkHH said:

How come Robert Stuart from MQA never told us about that?

Exactly - but if he had would the format have even got of the ground?

[MarkHH]

12 minutes ago, Fx Studio said:

Exactly - but if he had would the format have even got of the ground?

It's those half-truths and omissions why MQA never got of the ground, IMHO.
Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

[botrytis]

11 minutes ago, MarkHH said:

It's those half-truths and omissions why MQA never got of the ground, IMHO.
Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

 

With a protocol like this being patented, it was obvious they were trying to hide something. I mean MP3, Monkey Audio, FLAC, etc. didn't hide anything, why did MQA? That is the point to me. I understand what the algorithms do, MQA is just a black box because they didn't want you to see how it is warping the original music.

 

The patent is an eye opener because it extensively talks about DRM. This is what MQA was all about, CONTROL.

[MarkHH]

2 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

With a protocol like this being patented, it was obvious they were trying to hide something. I mean MP3, Monkey Audio, FLAC, etc. didn't hide anything, why did MQA? That is the point to me. I understand what the algorithms do, MQA is just a black box because they didn't want you to see how it is warping the original music.

 

The patent is an eye opener because it extensively talks about DRM. This is what MQA was all about, CONTROL.

Control is what they got. The administrator's control ...

[Archimago]

4 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

Exactly - but if he had would the format have even got of the ground?

 

Who knows if MQA would ever be able to get off the ground. But by 2020 I think it was clear that this thing was going nowhere.

 

Bob Stuart coming out and saying: "Hey folks, we've heard about the concerns... We've made some changes and let me introduce to you MQA 2.0!", then maybe show us some evidence that it's truly a hi-res product and some demonstration of how it "deblurred" anything would have helped.

 

Remember that Golden Sound's tests were in 2021. There's no evidence that any changes made in 2020 improved his results which were consistent with what we knew even before 2020.

[Allan F]

8 hours ago, Fx Studio said:

Exactly - but if he had would the format have even got of the ground?

The attributes of a true snake oil salesman.

[Shadorne]

3 hours ago, Archimago said:

 

Who knows if MQA would ever be able to get off the ground. But by 2020 I think it was clear that this thing was going nowhere.

 

Bob Stuart coming out and saying: "Hey folks, we've heard about the concerns... We've made some changes and let me introduce to you MQA 2.0!", then maybe show us some evidence that it's truly a hi-res product and some demonstration of how it "deblurred" anything would have helped.

 

Remember that Golden Sound's tests were in 2021. There's no evidence that any changes made in 2020 improved his results which were consistent with what we knew even before 2020.

I remember Computer Audiophile was one of the very first to question the dogma of MQA. Rocky Mountain Audiofest, if I recall. I watched the video with MQA executive crew sitting at the back shooting from the peanut gallery. Certainly CA was one of very few in the audio rag/social media fan club to ask critical questions - everyone else who depended on advertising revenues seemed to be cheering MQA on, as they do for most everything.

 

To this day I have deep respect for @The Computer Audiophile! All those years ago , it took Cojones and you Sir deserve ALL the credit, as you stood to lose the most and yet there you were playing hardball and asking tough questions!!!

[Spike Kasperak]

4 minutes ago, Allan F said:

The attributes of a true snake oil salesman.

Yes, time to pull the ripcord on this joker.

[The Computer Audiophile]

27 minutes ago, Shadorne said:

I remember Computer Audiophile was one of the very first to question the dogma of MQA. Rocky Mountain Audiofest, if I recall. I watched the video with MQA executive crew sitting at the back shooting from the peanut gallery. Certainly CA was one of very few in the audio rag/social media fan club to ask critical questions - everyone else who depended on advertising revenues seemed to be cheering MQA on, as they do for most everything.

 

To this day I have deep respect for @The Computer Audiophile! All those years ago , it took Cojones and you Sir deserve ALL the credit, as you stood to lose the most and yet there you were playing hardball and asking tough questions!!!

I had help from many people in this community, to provide me pros and cons of the technology and help me understand it much better than I could in my own. I owe them a huge thanks. 
 

I really wanted to love MQA. If it delivered on its promise, we all would’ve been so thrilled. 
 

The most surprising thing for me after I went through the RMAF experience, was how many manufacturers and engineers contacted me to say thanks. They had to walk the party line in public because their jobs depended on it.
 

In a way, my job depended on me being honest and saying what I thought to be right. Only dead fish swim with the current. I can’t follow the herd, especially if that herd is going over a cliff.
 

I will always have open comment sections and let anyone call me out for anything. I not only couldn’t sleep if I followed the mQa herd, but I would’ve never heard the end of it from this wonderful community. 
 

In the big picture, I was just the talking head at RMAF and online, repeating what you all educated me about here. For that I thank YOU!

[Fx Studio]

7 hours ago, Archimago said:

 

Who knows if MQA would ever be able to get off the ground. But by 2020 I think it was clear that this thing was going nowhere.

 

Bob Stuart coming out and saying: "Hey folks, we've heard about the concerns... We've made some changes and let me introduce to you MQA 2.0!", then maybe show us some evidence that it's truly a hi-res product and some demonstration of how it "deblurred" anything would have helped.

 

Remember that Golden Sound's tests were in 2021. There's no evidence that any changes made in 2020 improved his results which were consistent with what we knew even before 2020.

That makes sense because I noticed a big improvement to MQA EDM type music which is exclusively made on a DAW around that time of 2020-21. Which is why I have always talked about post 2020/ 21 as opposed to pre 2019 as the critical date. So its likely the DAW VST plugin was upgraded around that time. 

 

[Fx Studio]

11 hours ago, MarkHH said:

Control is what they got. The administrator's control ...

I don't think they are in control that was the problem. 

For the record companies to sign up to it they would have wanted and apparently got the ability to Encode MQA themselves.

 

MQA's marketing would have us believe that each track is handled by experts, possibly people with golden ears, perhaps musicians themselves with a deep understanding of music, and finally signed off by the artist themselves. In reality what probably happened was the music companies sent millions of there back collections to sub-contractors in India for encoding. Who's staff instead of giving each track the white glove treatment just hit the [..Generic ADC...] button each time and treated it like it was Bollywood.

 

That's why EDM music seems to be the only consistently good use of MQA because it doesn't involve human error.

There is no need to output the plugin file and send it to the publisher along with the master file for encoding which is required for other types of music - for example something that was mixed on a big mixing desk. With EDM/ house producer music like David Guetta/ Robin Schulz/ Nicky Romero etc... everything can be on the DAW.

[James lee]

There is no VST MQA plugin.

Prove me wrong.

[Fx Studio]

26 minutes ago, James lee said:

There is no VST MQA plugin.

Prove me wrong.

 

This was taken from there website in 2017, the info was under the "professional" section - which has since been removed from public access. So Yeh, another example of a lack of transparency.

 

Workflow: "A mastering studio that is equipped and certified to deliver MQA files auditions the files using a DAW emulator VST plugin. With the emulator, we can dial in the exact parameters we want the encoder to use. These settings are saved to a parameter file that is uploaded with the full-res files to MQA, where they are encoded and delivered back. One of the largest benefits of this technology is that all of the encoding is done by the MQA team, in conjunction with the mastering engineers and major labels that are trained in MQA technology."

http://www.mqa.co.uk/professional/