MQA is Vaporware

[Paul R]

35 minutes ago, new_media said:

 

This article basically says that hi-res audio actually does offer a higher quality sonic experience, you just need the right system and room to appreciate it, so the title is very misleading.

 

I don't understand why Apple gets all the credit/blame for music being portable. I was listening to music on a Sony cassette Walkman with Sony earbuds in 1986; probably worse sound quality than the iPod.

 

I find it amusing that Apple is always made out to be the bad guy, running a closed garden, while the rest of the world knows better and uses open source goodies. Even if there is a little tiny bit of truth in that. 😁

 

So, without Apple, portable music would still be defined as cassettes, perhaps CDs. It would be portable because people would lug then around in backpacks or such. Instead, pretty much everyone has access to almost any music they want to listen to, anytime, anywhere, and on pretty much any device. Thank Apple and their flood of imitators that followed. The freeware / open source software was created more to imitate Apple than to lead the way forward. Not always the case of course, and Apple did create their own supported versions of some existing music formats, including FLAC. Support was important in those days!

 

Perhaps a non audio example would make the point clearer. In -oh - 1998, UFO enthusiasts claimed that if as few as 100,000 people  had cameras with them all the time, the “UFO Mystery” would be quickly resolved.  Fast forward to today, where millions of people have cameras and video recorders and almost instant ways  share those recordings on them all the time. Any proof positive that there are non-terrestrial aliens in our sky’s?  Nope. So the mystery may be resolved, but not at all the way they expected. 

 

While smartphones existed before the iPhone, with cameras, does anyone really believe that they would be as utterly ubiquitous today without Apple?  Same with MP3 players before the iPod with AAC and ALAC and AIFF. Apple has been an incredibly powerful force for progress over the past 40 years or so. Unfortunately for us, the driving force always was Steve Jobs, and he is gone. So, I am greatly afraid, is that driven innovation that literally changed the world. Several times over. 

 

God help us if innovation is left to Meridian and Tidal and Kanye. If Jobs were still driving Apple (or a Pixar, etc.) MQA would already have been buried.

 

Just my $0.02. 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

50 minutes ago, new_media said:

 

This article basically says that hi-res audio actually does offer a higher quality sonic experience, you just need the right system and room to appreciate it, so the title is very misleading.

 

I don't understand why Apple gets all the credit/blame for music being portable. I was listening to music on a Sony cassette Walkman with Sony earbuds in 1986; probably worse sound quality than the iPod.

[new_media]

I had this one...

 

 

 

It would "collapse" so that it would fit into a standard-sized cassette carrier. I think it probably lasted for 15 years.

[Hugo9000]

Some revealing stats here:

 

Blu-ray films with Dolby TrueHD=1532 (the only Blu-ray audio format that uses MLP, and optional by the Blu-ray standards)

DTS HD Master Audio=8188 (DTS HD Master Audio was the DTS "counterpart"/direct competitor to Dolby TrueHD, and quickly overtook Dolby's format that used MLP)

 

Total of all lossless audio Blu-ray releases (includes the above two formats plus others)=11037

 

This is from performing filtered searches of releases catalogued by blu-raystats.com.  There are many more discs with lossy formats, as well as more advanced and increased channel numbers of lossless audio.

 

http://www.blu-raystats.com/Stats/Stats.php

 

We all know that DVD-Audio (which is the only 'DVD' format that used MLP, it is not included in standard DVD) was a tiny niche, far smaller than SACD even.  SACDs are actually still being produced, mostly by a few smaller classical labels like BIS.  DVD-Audio is quite dead.  The only other product besides DVD-A that required anything that had MLP was Toshiba's failed HD DVD format.  It used Dolby TrueHD.  Dolby TrueHD lingered on as an optional audio format on Blu-ray discs, but see the stats above, other lossless schemes have far greater numbers.  This is why Meridian was so desperate to achieve success with MQA.  MLP was never as big as they made it out to be, and has been effectively dead for quite some time.

 

Things might have been very different for Meridian if Sony had not decided to go all in with Blu-ray to put the nail in Toshiba's HD DVD coffin.  HD DVD had less capacity than Blu-ray, so it needed more compression for audio and video.  Toshiba already had a relationship with Meridian, having used MLP in the niche DVD-Audio spinoff, so it was natural for them to find a use for it with HD DVD.  Sony, on the other hand, presumably expected more from SACD.  They pushed Blu-ray using their gaming platform, the PlayStation 3, and quit funding their own SACD projects (the Living Stereo SACD project) in order to throw that money behind Blu-ray.  I followed the format wars between SACD and DVD-Audio and then between Blu-ray and HD DVD as they were waged.  Most of the public were happy with CDs and MP3/iTunes downloads and with DVDs and didn't pay any attention to the format wars.

 

Meridian's nemesis in their schemes has been Sony, and twice now.  First in that SACD was more successful than DVD-Audio, and although neither format replaced CD as intended, Sony's format was used for more new music, more back-catalogue, and also lingers on with slow releases by current classical/audiophile labels.  Second, by killing HD DVD, the second chance at life for MLP.  If MQA ever had any real shot at success, I wouldn't be surprised to see it countered by something from Sony.  lol

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

MLP was  just another failed Meridian idea destined for the scrap heap since day one. Like all other Meridian technologies. Stuart was utterly bereft of the ability to read the market. He was an anti visionary.  

 

Stuart was able to continue on after failure after failure due to friendly bail outs and operate under the charade of a "successful" business. Sounds like someone we know, huh? MQA is just bits of pieces from several obsolete ideas pieced together in one last ditch attempt. And there were a number of useful pseudo "authority" figures who played along until they were publicly exposed as either incompetent or shills. 

[Abtr]

On 6/28/2019 at 3:31 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

So is it official that choice has now been taken away from us as consumers? The company (MQA Ltd) that said it was all about choice and giving consumers the option, then said they it had no control over how its technology is used, just put a dagger in the hearts of many of its defenders. I think pretty much all the MQA fans who defended it for years here always said there was no evidence that our choice to stream pure PCM will be removed. Well, I just tried to play the non-MQA version of  The Black Keys new album Let's Rock and if using Roon there is no way to stream a non-MQA version from TIdal. I even went into the Tidal app, changed my settings to HiFi (not Master) and favorited the album as a hail mary to see if I could get the pure PCM version and it was a no-go. 

 

Thankfully Qobuz still offers pure PCM. 

 

 

Apparently The Black Keys found another ME. Their previous ME, our friend Brian Lucey, was an outspoken critic of MQA.

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, Abtr said:

 

Apparently The Black Keys found another ME. Their previous ME, our friend Brian Lucey, was an outspoken critic of MQA.

I’d be amazed if the Keys had anything to do with the decision and if the even know what MQA is. 

[mansr]

1 hour ago, Abtr said:

Apparently The Black Keys found another ME. Their previous ME, our friend Brian Lucey, was an outspoken critic of MQA.

Brian said some albums he mastered had been MQA'd without his knowledge or approval. That could well be the case with this one.

[firedog]

On 6/28/2019 at 5:22 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

Sadly no.

 

RIP Pure PCM through Roon via Tidal. 

And again, my decision to leave Tidal for Qobuz turns out to have been a good one. Even though Qobuz is about 40% more expensive for me, I don't regret it. 

[Ishmael Slapowitz]

Very very interesting side bar in the brand new issue of Rolling Stone:

 

"Better-Than CD Quality":

 

Quotes-

 

"Streaming services were once non starters in the audiophile world because of their compressed, compromised sound."

 

Qobuz is mentioned as the premier CD and high resolution service, Here is where it gets interesting Tidal is mentioned as 

streaming CD quality "or better". No mention of MQA what so ever.  There is mention of Amazon going high rez, which Amazon is quoted as saying is "speculative". Finally Neil Young is given a shout out by a Qobuz managing director as being at the forefront of high rez.

[firedog]

5 hours ago, Ishmael Slapowitz said:

Very very interesting side bar in the brand new issue of Rolling Stone:

 

"Better-Than CD Quality":

 

Quotes-

 

"Streaming services were once non starters in the audiophile world because of their compressed, compromised sound."

 

Qobuz is mentioned as the premier CD and high resolution service, Here is where it gets interesting Tidal is mentioned as 

streaming CD quality "or better". No mention of MQA what so ever.  There is mention of Amazon going high rez, which Amazon is quoted as saying is "speculative". Finally Neil Young is given a shout out by a Qobuz managing director as being at the forefront of high rez.

I'd guess they don't specifically mention MQA b/c they know that almost no one in the readership will know what it is. In the audiophile bubble it is a topic; outside the bubble it's a big zero. 

[Currawong]

On 6/29/2019 at 3:31 AM, The Computer Audiophile said:

Looks like the Tidal app streams the CD quality pure PCM when HiFi is selected, but only via the Tidal app. I captured some of one track if anyone wants to examine..

 

HiFi-passthrough.flac 3.7 MB · 1 download

 

Master-Decoded-by-Tidal-app.flac 3.97 MB · 0 downloads

 

Master-passthrough.flac 3.75 MB · 1 download

 

 

 

I've had weird issues with Roon search lately. I have typed in tracks or albums which are in my library, but don't show up in search, or only show the TIDAL versions (if "Only show my library" is off) so it could be a bug. 

[Shadders]

3 hours ago, Currawong said:

 

I've had weird issues with Roon search lately. I have typed in tracks or albums which are in my library, but don't show up in search, or only show the TIDAL versions (if "Only show my library" is off) so it could be a bug. 

Hi,

Farnell has the same issue - despite the transistor being in the system as i could locate it through narrowing the filter criteria, it could never return the device through a search. I noticed that when i completed a search, then "bing" was in the search URL that flashed up.

 

Maybe the target system has moved across to a Microsoft solution ?

 

Regards,

Shadders.

[Sal1950]

On 6/28/2019 at 3:25 PM, Paul R said:

The freeware / open source software was created more to imitate Apple than to lead the way forward

Whoa, Linus Torvalds should get a whiff of that post.  😖

[StreamHiRes]

My $1500 budget stereo will put most $20,000 stereos to shame because of my source, MQA. 

 

My $0.02 

[mansr]

And the award for most transparent shill of the week goes to...

[jabbr]

On 6/28/2019 at 3:25 PM, Paul R said:

I find it amusing that Apple is always made out to be the bad guy, running a closed garden, while the rest of the world knows better and uses open source goodies. Even if there is a little tiny bit of truth in that. 😁

 

So, without Apple, portable music would still be defined as cassettes, perhaps CDs. It would be portable because people would lug then around in backpacks or such. Instead, pretty much everyone has access to almost any music they want to listen to, anytime, anywhere, and on pretty much any device. Thank Apple and their flood of imitators that followed. The freeware / open source software was created more to imitate Apple than to lead the way forward. Not always the case of course, and Apple did create their own supported versions of some existing music formats, including FLAC. Support was important in those days!

 

Yes! MP3 isn’t a free (IP) format. By Apple you mean iTunes here. They created the music download business — they also demolished the closed/locked cell phone ecosystem for those of us who remember when the only apps you could get on your phone were available from AT&T or Verizon on Motorola. Yuck!

 

So now our cellphones run ARM and have Wi-Fi and cellular. I’m happy to cede a good measure of control to Apple in exchange for my phone not crashing at critical moments. 

 

But honestly! It plays music, makes calls, holds my calendar, is a browser, is a camera, operates my Sony camera, stores photos & movies. It also gives my maps, and tells me where to drive to in the morning!

 

Sony never had the vision to give us this. 

[jabbr]

1 hour ago, Sal1950 said:

Whoa, Linus Torvalds should get a whiff of that post.  😖

 

Linus hasn’t gotten so involved in applications. @Paul R is talking about iTunes ... it seems as though the world is moving away from iTunes to streaming services. Roon is the latest to tackle the music library browser business. They don’t have a Linux desktop library browser. I’d love to see a cutting edge open source Linux desktop music library manager app — where is it? (The DLNA / uPNP stuff just doesn’t cut it for me)

[new_media]

3 hours ago, StreamHiRes said:

My $1500 budget stereo will put most $20,000 stereos to shame because of my source, MQA. 

 

My $0.02 

 

Please tell me this is a parody account.

[StreamHiRes]

44 minutes ago, new_media said:

 

Please tell me this is a parody account.

Why is there so much hatred towards MQA? I along with the thousands who enjoy MQA can’t understand why so many dislike a music medium that efficiently brings Hi-Res to the masses. MQA can also introduce high quality music to the many that think Spotify is quality streaming. MQA is rapidly growing weather you want to accept it or not. Many popular hardware makers are embracing the technology and all others will just have sit back and watch their old stock get dusty because they refused to adopt the revolutionary technology. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, StreamHiRes said:

Why is there so much hatred towards MQA? I along with the thousands who enjoy MQA can’t understand why so many dislike a music medium that efficiently brings Hi-Res to the masses. MQA can also introduce high quality music to the many that think Spotify is quality streaming. MQA is rapidly growing weather you want to accept it or not. Many popular hardware makers are embracing the technology and all others will just have sit back and watch their old stock get dusty because they refused to adopt the revolutionary technology. 

Is this the cold open for Make Audio Great Again?

[Sal1950]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Is this the cold open for Make Audio Great Again?

Your putting the a great motto to a bad cause Chris 

[rickca]

Another Peter Veth clone?

[StreamHiRes]

1 minute ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Is this the cold open for Make Audio Great Again?

Could be. Music reproduction technology hasn’t changed in over three decades. The science of audio is continuously evolving. I understand change can be hard for many, but we should give MQA a chance. It’s changed my life for the better.

[StreamHiRes]

Chris seemed very enthusiastic about the future of music with  great streaming services like TIDAL, that happen to feature MQA, “bringing all kinds cool stuff” back in January 2015. 

 

 

Why the radical change of heart?