MQA is Vaporware

[Taz777]

1 hour ago, crenca said:

 

I did not play the video, but the still image showing "MQA" and "352kHz" is interesting because MQA does not actually sample that high (topping out at 96kHz), it rather upsamples to it...

 

Would the same or similar effect be achieved by using a DAC or software to upsample a 96kHz source?

[mansr]

13 minutes ago, Taz777 said:

Would the same or similar effect be achieved by using a DAC or software to upsample a 96kHz source?

An MQA "renderer" is a piece of software that upsamples to some arbitrary rate, often lower than the displayed figure, using exceptionally poor filters.

[Taz777]

14 minutes ago, mansr said:

An MQA "renderer" is a piece of software that upsamples to some arbitrary rate, often lower than the displayed figure, using exceptionally poor filters.

 

So if you had a non-MQA Hi-Res file at 96kHz and an MQA file at 96kHz, would the non-MQA end up sounding 'better' if a DAC upsampled it versus the MQA file being sent to an MQA DAC and 'unfolded' to a higher bit-rate? Not sure I'm using the right terminology here but I hope you can understand my question.

[crenca]

50 minutes ago, Taz777 said:

 

Would the same or similar effect be achieved by using a DAC or software to upsample a 96kHz source?

 

The short answer is yes.  That said, the way that MQA does this (with their choice of filters, etc.) is considered by many (most really) to be inferior to the upsampling that an end user can do in software such as HQPlayer.

 

21 minutes ago, Taz777 said:

 

So if you had a non-MQA Hi-Res file at 96kHz and an MQA file at 96kHz, would the non-MQA end up sounding 'better' if a DAC upsampled it versus the MQA file being sent to an MQA DAC and 'unfolded' to a higher bit-rate? Not sure I'm using the right terminology here but I hope you can understand my question.

 

Again, the short is is "yes" or "probably", but there are variables that an end user would have to understand.  

[AMR/iFi audio]

2 hours ago, crenca said:

 

I did not play the video, but the still image showing "MQA" and "352kHz" is interesting because MQA does not actually sample that high (topping out at 96kHz), it rather upsamples to it...

 

It actually does, please feel free to check Crossing (Remastered) by David Elias. It's all in the vid 😉

 

 

[crenca]

24 minutes ago, AMR/iFi audio said:

 

It actually does, please feel free to check Crossing (Remastered) by David Elias. It's all in the vid 😉

 

 

 

Respectfully, it does not. This is documented here at AS in this very thread and elsewhere.   If the video claims any MQA is an actual 352khz sampled file, then it is an example of creative re-redefining of words and marketing speak, just like the image...

[Rt66indierock]

31 minutes ago, AMR/iFi audio said:

 

It actually does, please feel free to check Crossing (Remastered) by David Elias. It's all in the vid 😉

 

 

 

From David's site.

 

"Download the source DSD64 master as MQA encoded at the DXD bit rate 24/352.8kHz.

Songs are MQA encoded as FLAC at 16/44.1. They can be played with sonic improvements on any CD or media player. Hi-res tracks will also be unfolded to their full resolution using an MQA compatible USB DAC."

[crenca]

1 minute ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

From David's site.

 

"Download the source DSD64 master as MQA encoded at the DXD bit rate 24/352.8kHz.

Songs are MQA encoded as FLAC at 16/44.1. They can be played with sonic improvements on any CD or media player. Hi-res tracks will also be unfolded to their full resolution using an MQA compatible USB DAC."

 

I count 4 errors (or intentional re-redefinition of words) in those 4 sentences just reading it once through...

[Rt66indierock]

7 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

I count 4 errors (or intentional re-redefinition of words) in those 4 sentences just reading it once through...

 

All I read was the original files were one bit rate, DSD 64 converted to 24/352.8 DXD then processed as MQA files as 16/44.1 FLAC.

 

Doesn't seem like an elegant process to me.

[crenca]

 

Here are the errors and/or creative use of words I see:

 

1)  "Download the source DSD64 master as MQA encoded at the DXD bit rate 24/352.8kHz."

 

MQA only encodes to 96 - everything after is but mere upsampling

 

2) "Songs are MQA encoded as FLAC at 16/44.1."

 

No, 24/48 (which contains the lossy compressed 48-96).  At least normally - perhaps this particular album was 64DSD > 352.8 DXD, which was then downsampled to 16/44 before MQA encoding - strange but definitely possible.

 

3) "They can be played with sonic improvements on any CD or media player."

 

Only in MQA marketing speak is an MQA encoded file played back via a 'legacy system/DAC' a sonic improvement.  

 

4)  "Hi-res tracks will also be unfolded to their full resolution using an MQA compatible USB DAC."

 

Which "full resolution" (always via lossy compression)?  Certainly not a 352.8 DXD file (see #1).

 

 

Agreed, not an elegant process at all - perhaps it is elegant marketing speak...

[mansr]

23 minutes ago, crenca said:

Agreed, not an elegant process at all - perhaps it is elegant marketing speak...

It's elegant cash flow in Bob Stuart's general direction.

[james45974]

4 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Is MQA dead yet?

This whole MQA thing has been become very uninteresting.  There is nothing but marketing puffery inflating minor steps as major advancements!  

[FredericV]

2 hours ago, AMR/iFi audio said:

 

It actually does, please feel free to check Crossing (Remastered) by David Elias. It's all in the vid 😉

 

 

352 Khz MQA is 17/88.2 at best (first unfold), upsampled to 24/352.8 Khz (renderer)

You can even strip 8 bits from the MQA stream sabotaging the first unfold, and the DAC will still fool you into believing this is 352.8 Khz

Sure sure MQA is very authentic to the DXD source it was encoded from:
 

[Rt66indierock]

26 minutes ago, mansr said:

It's elegant cash flow in Bob Stuart's general direction.

 

The question is is cash actually flowing to MQA Ltd?

[FredericV]

If MQA was a niche, this certainly is another new niche:

https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2019/01/08/sony-360-reality-audio/

 

and yes I have an 11.2 dedicated atmos room which is budget wise a fraction of my stereo room where we develop the 432 EVO products, and in several occasions I am amazed what immersive audio can do, compared to the best in class 2 channel systems.

My 11.2 room is mid-end Klipsch Icon-X and Icon - wood, two 15 inch subs in a custom push-pull diagonal setup to give a very flat response when measured with REW, NAD master amps and Anthem 11.2 atmos processor fed from a a HDI Dune media player. I am addicted to this room.

Immersive may just kill MQA

[Rt66indierock]

46 minutes ago, FredericV said:

If MQA was a niche, this certainly is another new niche:

https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2019/01/08/sony-360-reality-audio/

 

and yes I have an 11.2 dedicated atmos room which is budget wise a fraction of my stereo room where we develop the 432 EVO products, and in several occasions I am amazed what immersive audio can do, compared to the best in class 2 channel systems.

My 11.2 room is mid-end Klipsch Icon-X and Icon - wood, two 15 inch subs in a custom push-pull diagonal setup to give a very flat response when measured with REW, NAD master amps and Anthem 11.2 atmos processor fed from a a HDI Dune media player. I am addicted to this room.

Immersive may just kill MQA

 

I'm certainly OK with whatever kills off MQA.  You almost make me wish I had room for such a system.  

[FredericV]

25 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

I'm certainly OK with whatever kills off MQA.  You almost make me wish I had room for such a system.  

Even a small space can be converted into an 11.2 room

I have one spare bedroom which I converted into this little cinema:

 

 

What I changed since the above pic:

- 15 inch subs are now diagonal in a push -pull config, less boom but much more linear and clean

- added 4 height channels just below ceiling
- added atmos processor from Anthem instead of the NAD 7.1 master
- added a simple trends 2x 10 Watt amp for rear ceiling atmos speakers

and some day the 65 inch plasma is going to die , and I'm considering 2019 Samsung QLED or LG OLED, but QLED has no burn-in issues.

In the main room, the stereo system is at least 4x more expensive (around 60k euro), but I am often amazed what immersive can do .... and some of the DTS-X tracks even kill Atmos. DTS-X is underrated, but I actually prefer DTS Neural X over the Dolby upmixer.

So it's all relative, you don't need a very large room for killer home cinema, better have small room full of acoustic panels instead of a big room without room treatments ....

A mid-end immersive system can easily beat a cost is not object 2ch system. The ultimate AHA moment for me

The secret is that this room has not a lot of acoustical problems

So immersive may kill MQA. A lot of people already have a 5.1 system.

 

 

[Rt66indierock]

1 minute ago, FredericV said:

Even a small space can be converted into an 11.2 room

I have one spare bedroom which I converted into this little cinema:

 

 

What I changed since the above pic:

- 15 inch subs are now diagonal in a push -pull config, less boom but much more linear and clean

- added 4 height channels just below ceiling
- added atmos processor from Anthem instead of the NAD 7.1 master
- added a simple trends 2x 10 Watt amp for rear ceiling atmos speakers

and some day the 65 inch plasma is going to die , and I'm considering 2019 Samsuns QLED or OLED, but QLED has no burn-in issues.

In the main room, the stereo system is at least 4x more expensive, but I am often amazed what immersive can do .... and some of the DTS-X tracks even kill Atmos. DTS-X is underrated, but I actually prefer DTS Neural X over the Dolby upmixer.

So it's all relative, you don't need a very large room for killer home cinema, better have small room full of acoustic panels instead of a big room without room treatments ....

A mid-end immersive system can easily beat a cost is not object 2ch system. The ultimate AHA moment for me

The secret is that this room has not a lot of acoustical problems

 

 

 

Since my life now has an other person it space is an issue and I've never had a dedicated room for audio even when I had room. There was never any chance to have a dedicated room even when I could. Two large standard poodles and children don't allow for such things.

[oneway23]

On 1/9/2019 at 4:25 PM, FredericV said:

If MQA was a niche, this certainly is another new niche:

https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2019/01/08/sony-360-reality-audio/

 

and yes I have an 11.2 dedicated atmos room which is budget wise a fraction of my stereo room where we develop the 432 EVO products, and in several occasions I am amazed what immersive audio can do, compared to the best in class 2 channel systems.

My 11.2 room is mid-end Klipsch Icon-X and Icon - wood, two 15 inch subs in a custom push-pull diagonal setup to give a very flat response when measured with REW, NAD master amps and Anthem 11.2 atmos processor fed from a a HDI Dune media player. I am addicted to this room.

Immersive may just kill MQA

 

I appreciate the info, Frederic, as I'd yet to hear about this.  Enough with the formats already.  Let's focus on better-sounding albums!

 

By the way, your room is obviously outrageously amazing, as if you needed my validation.

[mcgillroy]

Remember when MQA and the MQA-press argued that bandwidth and storage requirements for high-rez-audio-streaming would be cost-prohibitive and hence MQAs lossy-compression would be an economic necessity?

 

Well here is an interesting tidy-bit from a discussion about Netflix on the cost of video-streaming:

 

"The cost of actually delivering the video was so tiny it didn't matter. To put it another way, you could watch for the entire month continuously and it would make no difference to the bottom line.

The videos were fixed cost licenses, not per view, so it didn't matter who watched it or for how long. The actual cost of sending bits over the wire was trivial."

 

Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18951875

 

We don't know if audio is licensed on a per-listend basis or fixed cost. But we do know that storing and streaming audio requires almost two orders of magnitude less storage and bandwidth than video: uncompressed 24/96 audio requires ca. 576 kb per second storage vs. ca. 30 mb/s for 4k video - a 60-fold difference.

 

Streaming bandwidth requirements will depend on the video compression but Netflix recommends 25 mbit/s for 4k while Qobuz recommends 20 mbit/s "if you want to stream 24 bit/192 kHz files."

 

https://www.qobuz.com/ie-en/info/hi-fi/bancs-d-essai/will-my-internet-bandwidth-be179216

 

Uncompressed 24/192 audio would actually need less than 10mb/s so they are leaving a very healthy margin here.

 

So MQA could you please explain the economics of your codec again? Thx!

[FredericV]

On 1/20/2019 at 3:52 PM, mcgillroy said:

"The cost of actually delivering the video was so tiny it didn't matter. To put it another way, you could watch for the entire month continuously and it would make no difference to the bottom line

...

So MQA could you please explain the economics of your codec again? Thx!

They will come up with the excuse that mobile still has a limited data allowance ( like a few gigabyte up to ~ 20 gigabyte / month) and countries with slow internet like ADSL. In any case listening to redbook flac will easily consume > 1 gig for 3 albums, so you will reach a typical monthly mobile plan even without MQA easily. WIth MQA the flac size doubles as it can't compress the crypto DRM'ed part which is non-nyquist data and just does not fly with flac.

For slow ADSL it does not matter, even the slowest connections can do flac hi-res. Throw in an entropy  optimizer / noise blanker and you even need less bandwidth, e.g.

https://www.xivero.com/xifeo/
 

[SilvesterH]

Reading Archimago`s blog I stumbled upon this article:

 

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mqa-advances-and-more-encountered-ces

 

So MQA pundits are not giving up.

[firedog]

2 hours ago, SilvesterH said:

Reading Archimago`s blog I stumbled upon this article:

 

https://www.stereophile.com/content/mqa-advances-and-more-encountered-ces

 

So MQA pundits are not giving up.

The really sad part is that JVS (supposed proffessional) and another poster who paints himself as a professional expert both can't get their heads around the fact that their is no such thing as a DXD (or even 192khz) MQA file. Both continue to argue that MQA encodes at those high frequencies.

[mcgillroy]

Thx firedog - Stereophile is entering histrionic territory: "Qobuz is limited to 24/192 resolution."

 

Limited to 24/192 - lol! How much more of their reputation do they want to burn on the throne of MQA?

 

 

 

 

[KeenObserver]

Harley certainly made himself a laughing stock with his over the top gushing about MQA and Stereophile is following down the same path.

I'll be glad when MQA is dead and buried and we don't have to listen to the shills anymore.