MQA is Vaporware

[The Computer Audiophile]

@ECL What is this extra fidelity of which you speak? 

[The Computer Audiophile]

There’s no need for long analogies about burgers and fries. Sticking to audio will work much better. 
 

If I understand you correctly, you want to compare MQA to PCM, but from the original source before it has been turned into either? 
 

I’m confused because this makes no sense and is likely not what you’re trying to say. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

15 hours ago, ECL said:

NW - A placeholder for "new wave" digital paradigm, different from CW and making strongly questioned claims about being closer to OG than CW.

NW does not exist because there are no A to D converters in use in the real world that encode to MQA as the original file storage format. 
 

MQA files today are made by converting the real files made by the engineers, by a cloud conversion tool. Virtually nobody signs off on the MQA version of a file. It’s all cloud converted batch processing. 
 

Original PCM files are all signed off on by the engineers working on the album. Once you change this, it’s no longer as good as the original that was signed off on. It can’t be. The original was made to sound exactly like it sounds, whether accurate to anything or not, the sound is what they wanted. Any further processing after the fact is not what the artist intended. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

4 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

Nobody goes through this much to pile crap this high that does not have a vested interest in the matter.

That’s true I’m almost every case. 
 

Anonymous comments can be good and bad. If talking about objective data that’s reproducible by anyone, anonymity is totally fine. Making stuff up and calling us Nazis by an anonymous poster isn’t fine. He is either bad AI or appears to have a vested interest.
 

His use of anonymizing VPNs doesn’t help his case. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, jamesg11 said:

Question - is MQS, as used by Blue Note in their 75th Anniv release of Wayne Shorter albums, the same as MQA? Or …?

MQS is an Astell&Kern thing. Very different from MQA. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

7 minutes ago, sphinxsix said:

And yet hi-res derived from the same analogue or hi-res master sounds better.

Said someone who clearly hasn't listened to all the terribly compressed high resolution versions. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

24 minutes ago, Currawong said:

I have heard much the same thing, and more. It looks like.... this thread is vapourware. 

 

What are we going to complain about after this? 😂

MQAir, or make that SCL6 🙂

[The Computer Audiophile]

On a flight home from San Francisco, after taking some time off for my daughter’s spring break, and before Axpona and Munich. 
 

Anything going on lately 😳

[The Computer Audiophile]

On 5/22/2021 at 4:28 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

mQa’s only out is to sell the IP to Dolby, and have Dolby back door it into everything because Dolby can move the needle with most companies unlike mQa. I hope it never happens though. 

I still think this is the only logical way out for mQa. However, that logic is really weak because Dolby is hitting a home run with Atmos for music right now. Atmos goes from two channel stereo to 16 channel immersive. It’s all encompassing. 
 

I wish I knew more about Dolby’s purchase of MLP back in the day. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

11 minutes ago, yamamoto2002 said:

Are MQA encoded music files able to be decoded properly when official MQA decoder is disappeared? I heard it is protected by DRM and there is no legal way to decode properly by the third party even after all related patents are expired

The decoder is proprietary and unavailable outside of licensed products. The upsampling can be done after the decoding. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

20 hours ago, bambadoo said:

LOL!!!

 

 

The eternal optimist. Next time I have a bad day, I should call Peter V. He could spin any tragedy into a can't lose, opportunity not to be missed. I have to give him credit. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

11 minutes ago, firedog said:

if they are professionals, did they continue to deny anything was amiss and promote the falsehoods long after they were exposed?

 

I've been thinking about this one. Perhaps it has something to do with who exposed the falsehoods. How can one hammer against online forums and forum members, then credit them for anything, especially something that could've been seen long ago? That's a rhetorical question obviously.

[The Computer Audiophile]

4 minutes ago, Archimago said:

for the record, both Andrew and myself are doctors

There you go Arch, ruining another mQa narrative that you were a competitor in the industry 🤣

[The Computer Audiophile]

looks like one company didn’t get the memo. 
 

 

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

3 hours ago, Jud said:

 

The lifeblood of the magazines is being able to obtain equipment to review. I don't think it's any more complicated than not wanting to stop receiving hardware from manufacturers who licensed MQA for their products.

 

There is a little bit of this with respect to MQA, more of it with respect to product access in general, but I don't see this as a driving force in the MQA discussion. Overall, I've easily received more communications from manufcturers because of my honesty about MQA, than I would've if I'd jumped on the bandwagon with both feet and held the line. Honesty is respected by good manufacturers and good people. As long as reviews are fair, most manufacturers can handle it and will get over negativity. They may disagree with assessments and degrees of fairness though. Like all business, it isn't back and white and there are many other factors at play for everyone involved.

 

If I could purchase every piece of gear reviewed on AS and we could survive on community member subscriptions, I'd do it in a hearbeat though. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

19 minutes ago, Archimago said:

The nice thing about headphones is that there are no room effects so the measurements can be seen as more directly relatable to sound quality.

 

But, measuring headphones is a soup sandwhich right now. Most of the guys doing it can't agree on the right procedure or equipment :~)

[The Computer Audiophile]

12 minutes ago, Archimago said:

Even if one spent $$$$$ on test equipment, I don't think results will ever translate to universal approval nor (more importantly) the sound recommendations directly applicable to everyone aiming to enjoy music. That's why IMO, work by @JoshM recently using his EARS and SBAF curve is good enough to give us a sense of relative sound signatures (and why I also have my EARS for testing and not particularly keen to spend money to upgrade). The rest is up to us to try listening for ourselves ;-).

Totally agree.

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 hours ago, garrardguy60 said:

However, If we want to discuss, say, USB isolation devices, or cables -- i.e., the stuff that used to be fodder for the discontinued objectivist forum here on AS -- well, this is not the forum for that. That's a business decision Chris made; I understand it and accepted it. 

Every topic is fair game here. It just needs to be done in the appropriate place. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 hour ago, Currawong said:

given how much Universal and Warner were willing to put into it

Is anyone certain that the major labels put anything into it? All the encoding is batched in the cloud. Without any leverage, I assumed mQa did it all for free and gave shares of the company to boot. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

20 hours ago, Rt66indierock said:

Dead certain, look at the restated 2016 and 2017 Statement of Cash Flows. They document the services contributed by the labels in exchange for their stock.

Doesn’t that mean mQa paid the labels?

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

You can acquire stock by contributing cash, property, or services for stock.

My point is that the labels don’t have much into mQa. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

I consider $9.4 million to be significant. And the auditor BDO signed off on it.

No money changed hands. They created a big number in services. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

2 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

Jud what do think the basis of say Warner Music's MQA stock is? Mark up the invoice and report that as income is what you are suggesting. Otherwise the debits and credits don't match. 

A way over-simplication of a public company’s accounting practices and creativity to get the books to look as favorable as possible. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

The point I’m trying to make is that the labels have a “rounding error” of “money” spent on mqa, in the big picture. Their marketing budgets are much higher in a single year. Back in the good ole days, some of the executive expense accounts were higher. 

[The Computer Audiophile]

49 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

And the point I’m making is the services contributed are significant to MQA Ltd. They make up about 20% of the General and Administrative Expenses of the company from inception to 12/21/21.

 

If it’s a rounding error why was a Warner Music employee still pushing MQA two years ago? See Mark Waldrep’s  April 15, 2021 post on RealHD Audio.

Yes, significant to mQa but not to the major labels. The labels pushed it because they were part of the grift.