MQA is Vaporware

[WAM]

You may be right, I got the email yesterday.

[shtf]

On 4/16/2019 at 12:09 PM, crenca said:

 

He's just trolling you.  He does not care about the truth though he might very well know what it is. He is promoting MQA. It's why I say we are "post technical".  The confidence men in audio never have been about truth, only $promoting$ things.

 

Steven Stone cannot not be trolling for MQA.  For Steven himself said that MQA is sonically beneficial only from the sweet spot if and only if the listener does not move his head. 

 

So you're gonna' have to pick on another more reasonable MQA troll.

 

I'm sure Steven will come around later to thank me for defending him.

 

 

[Sonicularity]

I see a market for head stabilizers.  

[mansr]

4 hours ago, Sonicularity said:

I see a market for head stabilizers.  

[John Dyson]

On 4/16/2019 at 3:16 PM, Ishmael Slapowitz said:

Wow.7digital is actually a really good FLAC download store. It would be a shame.

 

It also is further proof that even LOSSLESS Redbook music in a non physical format is dying a death. To the mass of consumers Mp3 IS lossless.

 

 

geesh, I have been putting together a beautiful demo for the ABBACHAT group, and tried to encode it into mp3 format (lame, in insane 320k mode, with all of the checks enabled, and carefully limited bandwidth to avoid any kind of possible artifacts.)  Mp3 sounds kind of bad (actually fairly bad, definitely not great.)  The material that I can produce is SIGNIFICANTLY better than mp3 (with 40yr old ABBA), let alone the more recent studios that could totally blow it away.  (I did careful processing & mastering -- much better than any demo that I might have done here.)

Mp3 might be okay for cars or listening while running, but it is really not all that great IMO.  And I do NOT have 'golden ears' at all.

 

John

[sandyk]

9 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

And I do NOT have 'golden ears' at all.

 

 That's debatable, but there are certain times of the day when most people's hearing is not always as reliable as we would wish for. 

Another prominent member suggested that you show flashes of genius in your approach to correcting damaged material.

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

32 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

geesh, I have been putting together a beautiful demo for the ABBACHAT group, and tried to encode it into mp3 format (lame, in insane 320k mode, with all of the checks enabled, and carefully limited bandwidth to avoid any kind of possible artifacts.)  Mp3 sounds kind of bad (actually fairly bad, definitely not great.)  The material that I can produce is SIGNIFICANTLY better than mp3 (with 40yr old ABBA), let alone the more recent studios that could totally blow it away.  (I did careful processing & mastering -- much better than any demo that I might have done here.)

Mp3 might be okay for cars or listening while running, but it is really not all that great IMO.  And I do NOT have 'golden ears' at all.

 

John

 

 

Of course you are correct. But what i was saying is that to the masses of music consumers lossy encoding to them IS lossless...it is and all they know. Ask the average person what a WAV, FLAC, AIFF, or DSF files You might as well ask them about Relativity. Apple did a great job convincing tens of millions that lossy AAC or MP3 encoding was all they would ever need. I have friend who love music who have not listened to anything but a lossy stream for a decade. 😥

[Archimago]

1 hour ago, John Dyson said:

geesh, I have been putting together a beautiful demo for the ABBACHAT group, and tried to encode it into mp3 format (lame, in insane 320k mode, with all of the checks enabled, and carefully limited bandwidth to avoid any kind of possible artifacts.)  Mp3 sounds kind of bad (actually fairly bad, definitely not great.)  The material that I can produce is SIGNIFICANTLY better than mp3 (with 40yr old ABBA), let alone the more recent studios that could totally blow it away.  (I did careful processing & mastering -- much better than any demo that I might have done here.)

Mp3 might be okay for cars or listening while running, but it is really not all that great IMO.  And I do NOT have 'golden ears' at all.

 

John

 

@John Dyson, could you perhaps post even just a few minutes of what you've been putting together in FLAC and the LAME encoded 320kbps MP3. Would be great to have a listen for comparison.

 

Thanks...

[Paul R]

4 hours ago, John Dyson said:

geesh, I have been putting together a beautiful demo for the ABBACHAT group, and tried to encode it into mp3 format (lame, in insane 320k mode, with all of the checks enabled, and carefully limited bandwidth to avoid any kind of possible artifacts.)  Mp3 sounds kind of bad (actually fairly bad, definitely not great.)  The material that I can produce is SIGNIFICANTLY better than mp3 (with 40yr old ABBA), let alone the more recent studios that could totally blow it away.  (I did careful processing & mastering -- much better than any demo that I might have done here.)

Mp3 might be okay for cars or listening while running, but it is really not all that great IMO.  And I do NOT have 'golden ears' at all.

 

John

 

To me, MP3 anf 320bps sounds very close to CD quality. Sometimes there is just something not quite right about it, but it is usually at least listenable.  What SRC did you use to convert it with? I have grown quite fond of iZotope RX7. (Which my spelling checker insists on changing to isotope.)

[John Dyson]

5 hours ago, Paul R said:

 

To me, MP3 anf 320bps sounds very close to CD quality. Sometimes there is just something not quite right about it, but it is usually at least listenable.  What SRC did you use to convert it with? I have grown quite fond of iZotope RX7. (Which my spelling checker insists on changing to isotope.)

I used my own cobbled together research engineering type stuff.  I very very seldomly use stuff like Audacity, even though it is sometimes convienient for certain things.   My DolbyA decoder is as advanced as ever produced -- does do amazing things to correct the distortions, even some from encoding.  Software that was a 2wk project (for the audio processing portions -- usually it is GUI that takes the time) just cannot compare with carefully crafted material.  The DolbyA compatible decoder isn't just a single band fake (or a sloppy multiband) like some other decoders available for purchase.  This decoder is SUPER sophisticated and does mostly match as closely as various versions of DolbyA HW match (which is specifically not too difficult a goal.)  Except for improved distortion characteristics, the DHNRDS DA decoder mostly sounds like a DolbyA.

 

(My bragging results from a multi-year project, but my ego is just barely big enough to avoid Napolean complex type things.  After a fairly competent engineer sucessfully develops a difficult project like this, he/she deserves a bit of self congratulation. 🙂)  Even if the decoder is bad (which all feedback that I have received says that it is very good), I would self congratulate because I tried very hard.

 

The mp3 encoder that I compared the results with 'lame', which I have heard is one of the better encoders.  mp3 using that encoder left a lot to be desired even at 320k.  * I do have to admit that sometimes the DHNRDS decoder has produced especially difficult material to mp3 encode because of suboptimal quality -- and erroneously producing difficult-to-encode audio.  I don't think that this instance is such a case -- but at least I am trying to fully inform about possible mistakes.

 

I will try to post some comparisons today or tomorrow.  I found another quality optimization in the DolbyA decoder (also busy doing the security mechanisms -- my project partner tells me that the decoder (DHNRDS project) will be stolen otherwise.)  For only 10dB,10dB,10dB and 15dB processing for each band, there are LOTS of mistakes that the hardware, software and basic design can make...  This has been both a fun and frustrating project.

 

I will do EVERYTHING that I can to put together a clean demo today.  When I upload the results to Dropbox, remember that the default mp3 decoder used when on Dropbox is insanely bad.  It would be unfair against mp3 to depend on the Dropbox decoder.

 

John

[John Dyson]

On 4/19/2019 at 9:43 PM, Archimago said:

 

@John Dyson, could you perhaps post even just a few minutes of what you've been putting together in FLAC and the LAME encoded 320kbps MP3. Would be great to have a listen for comparison.

 

Thanks...

I am so sorry that this took so long to do.  I get distracted and forget things.  Lately, been writing some licensing software, and that is so far afield from what I know that I am becoming frustrated all of the time.

 

I put together some chopped (sorry, I might have forgotten to 'fade' them instead of chop them) demos of freshly and unEQed decoding results by the DolbyA compatible decoder.

 

First -- I did NO EQ or ANY KIND of compression of the decoding output.  This is RAW output, and I have just rebuilt the decoder correctly (I think...)  Been working on some very subtle performance improvements -- which often totally break the decoder for a while, but I think that it is put back together correctly.

 

There are also equivalent .mp3 results at 320k.  Listening carefully, you can tell that the output directly from a DolbyA encoded (then decoded) copy can be pretty darned high quality -- when compared to the original source material.

 

IF you do compare with equivalent commercial releases -- make sure to start with properly mastered releases -- a lot of releases are DolbyA encoded or badly EQed.  I usually try to use original vinyl for comparison.  The vinyl is not higher quality, but is a good basis of comparison for EQ.

 

ABBA is doubly problematical -- their music is consistently difficult to properly decode, but there are often flaws in the recordings also.  Another thing about ABBA -- I have 3 undecoded DolbyA copies of some ABBA songs, and each one sounds different.  I think that the SOS example that I uploaded is not mutiply encoded/decoded.  DolbyA starts getting ugly after multiple encode/decode cycles, so I have tried to find the best sources in my collection.

 

One other thing -- it is INCREDIBLY tricky to distinguish between poor mastering and leaked DolbyA material.  I can often be tricked into thinking that something is leaked DolbyA, when it really isn't.  I use multiple criteria to demonstrate the high liklihoood -- including looking at the noise spectrum -- because DolbyA creates certain patterns and shapes in the spectograms.  Also, I am pretty good at detecting the HF compression when using DolbyA, but pop material is already compressed -- so it can be confusing to make the correct judgement call.  So, when I don't actually KNOW that I am providing properly decoded material, I have super high confidence that this started with leaked DolbyA material. (Legally leaked/properly purchased is what I mean.)

 

All said, there is almost the best possible copies of some of the material, and the mp3 version -- encoded with lame in 'insane' mode.  I will also be trying to compare these today (again), and others might be interested in trying to detect differences.  THESE ARE SHORTENED to try to be a good citizen, but to avoid any kind of long-term distribution of even the snippets, I'll be deleting these examples within about a wk or so.  These are shortened enough that the material is a tease and might motivate purchase of the music :-).

 

I am notoriously bad at swapping the L+R channels also -- note that in any comparisons with normal releases -- sometimes the DolbyA encoded versions have swapped channels, and I don't know why that sometimes seems to be true.

 

Here are the demos (this is all 1960's/1970's stuff, I think pretty good for the timeframe):

 

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ab9nhtqjforacd8/AABvt7IYgoob7VXxpN0ekK6ra?dl=0

 

 

John

[Samuel T Cogley]

Just listened to a bit of @John Dyson 's work and it's really good!  But I'm thinking that what started as a tangential comparison to MQA has blossomed into something that is getting way off topic for this thread.  Perhaps @The Computer Audiophile can surgically move those posts to a new thread?

[rando]

Whichever way this goes.  I appreciate you refreshing the link to examples of your Dolby A decoder.  Saw discussion elsewhere here too late to retrieve the files.

 

Stay strong brothers.    

[Rt66indierock]

1 hour ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

Just listened to a bit of @John Dyson 's work and it's really good!  But I'm thinking that what started as a tangential comparison to MQA has blossomed into something that is getting way off topic for this thread.  Perhaps @The Computer Audiophile can surgically move those posts to a new thread?

 

Actually not. Part of the purpose of this thread was to cover topics that impact recorded music more than the problems MQA claims to fix. I will give John a bit a latitude in this area.

[John Dyson]

1 hour ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

Actually not. Part of the purpose of this thread was to cover topics that impact recorded music more than the problems MQA claims to fix. I will give John a bit a latitude in this area.

Thanks -- there were probably three reasons for chatting about these decoding examples -- lossy compression  in ideal conditions, the mastering differences being MUCH more important than the last small amount of sample rate or bit depth, and trying to show the potential improvement available (using my decoder or perhaps some superior one that might yet be invented by someone who really IS an audio expert :-)).

After all of this -- still off topic, but an example of the h*ll that I am in -- the demos that I made were done by a version of the decoder with a bug remaining (just found the bug, and the decoder *IS* complicated - probably 10X more complicated than a typical compressor software package -- running in 20threads.)  I still think that the general quality is still well represented even with the bug.

 

We have a LONG WAY to go before some of the finer grained improvements are really needed -- this first and most important (and where we have least amount of control) is in the source material itself -- that is, the mastering part of the process.  The bit-rate (or with MQA, the bit-rot) is important, but not the biggest problem.

 

I'll probably end up updating the repository (it will be the same location) early tomorrow with the corrected material.  As it is, again -- the examples -- for looking at possible quality improvements, and comparing with what mp3 can do -- that is still valid.  (I could have probably kept the defect hidden -- but that is NOT in my nature -- I truly believe in transparency and attempting to be honest.)

 

I *think* that starting with the highest quality material possible -- mp3 (or opus) can handle any case where bit reduction is really needed nowadays.  Otherwise, we are VERY WELL COVERED with .flac and other lossless compression schemes.  The in-between data-reduction doesn't have a place anymore -- time has come and gone.

There is *ZERO* advantage of a lossy compression scheme that controls our freedom also.  All bases (for our needs) are already covered nowadays.

 

John

[asdf1000]

Is it possible it's MQA?

 

Even if not MQA, of the Big Four (Apple, Google, Spotify, Amazon) Amazon might be the first to offer CD quality or better? If so, the rest to follow?

 

https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/amazon-is-readying-a-hi-def-music-streaming-service/

[The Computer Audiophile]

17 minutes ago, Em2016 said:

Is it possible it's MQA?

 

Even if not MQA, of the Big Four (Apple, Google, Spotify, Amazon) Amazon might be the first to offer CD quality or better? If so, the rest to follow?

 

https://www.musicbusinessworldwide.com/amazon-is-readying-a-hi-def-music-streaming-service/

 

Amazon was the big fish the MQA team told me about over a year ago. Amazon loved the fact that MQA could illuminate a blue light because Amazon couldn't explain bit rate or sample rate to its customers. If it lit the light, that's all that mattered. 

 

However, from the article:

 

"It’s understood that Amazon has not partnered with MQA for its own HD tier."

 

[asdf1000]

20 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

However, from the article:

 

"It’s understood that Amazon has not partnered with MQA for its own HD tier."

 

Whoops, missed that line reading on my phone.

 

Positive move for the streaming world if this is true. Will be interesting to see what the Big Two (Spotify and Apple Music) do... their subscriber numbers continue to climb at a healthy rate with current sound quality options, so I'm not sure what rush they would be in.

 

Amazon and Google are probably looking for a big jolt in subscriber numbers though, to catch the Big Two.

[The Computer Audiophile]

I look at it like 3D, 4K, and soon 8K TV. Virtually nobody asked for it but companies are always looking for ways to make money nonetheless. If Amazon can differentiate itself with high res and possibly make money, it may happen even without demand. 

[sandyk]

17 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

it may happen even without demand. 

 

 And eventually create the demand, just as 4K TV is now doing, and also 4K from Foxtel for Sporting events ?

[The Computer Audiophile]

4 minutes ago, sandyk said:

 

 And eventually create the demand, just as 4K TV is now doing, and also 4K from Foxtel for Sporting events ?

I still haven’t met anyone who demands 4K for any real reason. It’s all marketing driven. If you sit a few inches from the TV, by all means go for 4K 😁

[firedog]

Too bad the article didn't mention Qobuz. Not a good outcome for them - they don't even rate a mention.

On the other hand, if Amazon starts streaming hi-res without MQA, that could be the beginning of the end for MQA. They will be relegated to minor league (Tidal) status in the streaming world, and will have direct competition in the hi res audiophile streaming world (Qobuz) that also doesn't support them.
Seems to me that would make MQA an irrelevant footnote in the streaming universe and belie all the claims about how it's compression scheme is necessary for hi-res streaming.
Might also make the record labels reconsider if MQA is something they want to continue to invest in - as both the  stock of the company and the format won't seem to have the same great growth potential as might have been hoped previously. 

[rickca]

12 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I still haven’t met anyone who demands 4K for any real reason.

I rent movies from RedBox, and they do offer a limited selection in 4K ultra HD.  It's definitely superior to Blu-Ray on my LG OLED TV/Panasonic DP-UB820.  But the rollout of movies in 4K seems way slower than the Blu-Ray rollout.  I don't find I have to sit uncomfortably close to appreciate the difference.  It also supports HDR formats including Dolby Vision.

 

 

 

[asdf1000]

27 minutes ago, firedog said:

Too bad the article didn't mention Qobuz. Not a good outcome for them - they don't even rate a mention.

 

Probably because they fall in 'others' along with numerous others. Tidal probably only gets a mention in the article because of the Jay-Z/Beyonce/popular artists connection but also falls in the same 'others' category.

 

There are some that believe we'll be left with just 4 in the end... Spotify, Apple, Google, Amazon...

 

[Archimago]

2 hours ago, rickca said:

I rent movies from RedBox, and they do offer a limited selection in 4K ultra HD.  It's definitely superior to Blu-Ray on my LG OLED TV/Panasonic DP-UB820.  But the rollout of movies in 4K seems way slower than the Blu-Ray rollout.  I don't find I have to sit uncomfortably close to appreciate the difference.  It also supports HDR formats including Dolby Vision.

 

RedBox could not stay afloat here in Canada. Other than smaller rental places, physical media is something collectors buy rather than rent anymore.

 

Agree, UHD-BluRay and 4K resolution in general is of benefit for larger screens or closer distance (75" screen, normal viewing distance looks great). Many movies still using 2K digital intermediates... In fact, word is that Avengers: Endgame despite the big budget is still a 2K DI. But it was always the HDR that IMO made the most difference.

 

As for MQA... Glad to hear Amazon is passing the codec by. Good move :-).