MQA is Vaporware

[fas42]

Personal attacks? ... I'm asking John why he is so certain "Many/most CDs, at least I know the early ones, were not in the form that a normal CD player and consumer playback chain could optimally play"? For it to be a personal opinion, that he doesn't like the subjective SQ of playback on his own audio system, is not good enough - he's stating that the whole industry has got it wrong, for years and years ... and no-one else has noticed.

 

Yes, it requires a high standard of playback integrity to replay many CDs correctly - if people don't want to go to the effort of improving the capability of their setups to achieve this, then it makes sense for them to acquire pre-digested versions of the source tracks, so that it "sounds better". But to then go the next step and claim that these original CDs are wrong, and must be 'fixed', is a step too far, IMO ... I might as well insist that every recording be put through the MQA mill, to make it better for posterity ... or perhaps an 8 track tape step, to "take off the rough edges", 😜.

 

Looking up that thread, it's clear that that the posters are disputing that it's genuine undecoded Dolby A - "I don't like it, therefore the mastering is wrong!! " is an easy get out of jail card .. I would like see samples of, say 2L material, being given genuine Dolby A encoding treatment, and posted - to see how terrible it sounds; or vice versa.

[fas42]

Also noting in that thread, that some tapes marked, "Dolby", in fact weren't - and that Dolby decoding messed up the sound big time, when they previewed the output ... meaning, they didn't decode for the release - and people were happy, 😁. So, it can work both ways, 🙂.

[sandyk]

Give it up Frank. You have painted yourself into a corner with no way out except to keep repeating the same tired old stuff.

 

 John was correct about this too : 

https://www.harmonycentral.com/forums/topic/109335-dolby-a-noise-reduction-cat-22-exciter/  See #2

 

[fas42]

Okay, Alex, I know you like to live in the world of, heros versus villains - but those who are more comfortable with the thought that the world is a touch more complicated than that, will turn to other matters ...

[KeenObserver]

Shall we get back to the topic at hand?

 

Has MQA Ltd secured the funding it needs to continue its quest to impose itself on the music business?

 

Is MQA still a threat to the music consumer?

[ShawnC]

3 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Shall we get back to the topic at hand?

 

Has MQA Ltd secured the funding it needs to continue its quest to impose itself on the music business?

 

Is MQA still a threat to the music consumer?

Maybe the group that just saved Aston Martin from going into bankruptcy will step in.  Although being it was an F1 racing group, they probably only care for the sound of  V10 engines running at maximum performance.

[Confused]

1 hour ago, ShawnC said:

Maybe the group that just saved Aston Martin from going into bankruptcy will step in.  Although being it was an F1 racing group, they probably only care for the sound of  V10 engines running at maximum performance.

They are turbo hybrid V6’s these days, although form an audiophile perspective the V10’s did sound better.

[Ralf11]

we need a Most Mellifluous Motor thread...

[Confused]

59 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

we need a Most Mellifluous Motor thread...

Mellifluous Quality Automobile.

[mcgillroy]

Move over Bob, here's how to do compression right: 48khz audio on a Commodore 64 - http://brokenbytes.blogspot.com/2018/03/a-48khz-digital-music-player-for.html

[John Dyson]

On 1/31/2020 at 11:08 PM, fas42 said:

Also noting in that thread, that some tapes marked, "Dolby", in fact weren't - and that Dolby decoding messed up the sound big time, when they previewed the output ... meaning, they didn't decode for the release - and people were happy, 😁. So, it can work both ways, 🙂.

In this way I can agree -- like most older CDs not being decoded can be tolerable (feral DolbyA), also undecoded DolbyB even barefoot , maybe with a tone control can sound tolerable.

However, neither is accurate to the recording as produced by the recording engineer/artist.

If something that is compressed by a fast compressor sounds good to you, that is 'feralA' material from old CDs, I will never argue with out about that.   You wouldn't believe how hard a DolbyA unit beats on the signal -- and almost every POP cd had that processing treatment, without decoding it.

 

The sad thing is that many/most of those old CDs were not clean images of the original recording.  People (apparently including you) have learned to tolerate this defect.  I never did learn to tolerate the defect, as I know how sound really sounds like when being recorded.   See, I have heard real performances and the resulting recordings.  (I did a few.), and have been very disappointed by the qualities of the CDs when I quit listening.  They were JUST NOT RIGHT.  When young, I was taught how to do high quality recordings (just a side effect of one of my little adventures).  Because of the disappointment of the perfect digital media not having properly mastered recordings back in the late 1980s, I got disgusted and walked away from a serious audiophile hobby.

 

BTW, it has been a LONG HAUL to reverse engineer the feral-A filtering.  There is definitely a pattern in the EQ, and I have started documenting it.  I have publically posted a short example for one recording, and more general information is being given privately.  There is *no magic* in the feralA decoding, but is a bit tricky because parameters need to be chosen.  I have narrowed them down, and will be fully transparent, documenting the scheme.   I have passed VERY EARLY complete information to a few select people (only to avoid subjecting other people to partially mistaken noise.)   Already, found one error, but there will be a more complete PUBLIC paper (not formal, just a set of notes) in a few weeks.  If he is interested, I might give it to Richard (my recording recovery expert friend) to formalize and publish.

 

There is NO metaphysics in the feralA, it is a simple fact, and a recoverable defect.

 

John

[FredericV]

17/88.2 + upsampling to 352.8kHz with fake resolution indicator ...
Even if you blank 1/3 of the data in the MQA distribution file, the DAC will still do some fake unfold without actually recovering the first step to 17/88.2 of internal resolution, and still claim it's 352.8

 

The original DXD which is the real 24/352.8 from which the lossy crypto DRM version was created, still is the preferred version to my ears. I leave them with their illusion.

[FredericV]

I just saw this on FB. Please explain why they would do this. What's the point?

The source was MQA CD and the DAC is doing upsampling to 352.8 kHz and also applying a 25 kHz low pass filter which is amusing ...
 

Quote

Pro-Ject was making great sound with their new CD Transport and DAC at the Florida Audio Expo this weekend in Tampa. They were playing MQA CDs through the system featuring a pair of Sonus Fabers.

 

[Archimago]

Well... The "Vaporware" thread lives again :-).

 

Hmmm, they might have been playing with MQA CD as reported but could they have been streaming Tidal at the time this picture of the Pre Box RS2 was taken @FredericV? Presumably it's a 24/44.1 stream being sent to the DAC which was of course decoded to 24/88.2 then "rendered"/upsampled to 352.8.

 

Interesting about the 25kHz LPF as well as tube stage. That presumably adds a couple more layers of "post-processing"!

 

I thought MQA alone would have sounded perfect already - as artist intended and totally "deblurred" 😉. Somebody call up Bob Stuart and let him know about such travesty!

 

[MikeyFresh]

10 hours ago, FredericV said:

17/88.2 + upsampling to 352.8kHz with fake resolution indicator ...
Even if you blank 1/3 of the data in the MQA distribution file, the DAC will still do some fake unfold without actually recovering the first step to 17/88.2 of internal resolution, and still claim it's 352.8

 

The original DXD which is the real 24/352.8 from which the lossy crypto DRM version was created, still is the preferred version to my ears. I leave them with their illusion.

 

It would seem Mr. Wong needs to get out a bit more, maybe take a break from Facebook too. There is nothing exciting about a number on a display, especially when that number is both fake and meaningless.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Essential is shutting down. Remember the big MQA + Essential partnership. 
 

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/12/21134985/essential-phone-shutting-down-andy-rubin-startup

[JoeWhip]

Oops!

[mansr]

10 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Essential is shutting down. Remember the big MQA + Essential partnership. 
 

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/12/21134985/essential-phone-shutting-down-andy-rubin-startup

Is anyone surprised?

[JoeWhip]

Can’t say that I am.

[MikeyFresh]

27 minutes ago, mansr said:

Is anyone surprised?

 

Not at all, Essential has been dead in the water for a long time now.

 

Perhaps MQA themselves are surprised, they still tout the "partnership" on their website despite it never having produced much of anything. How many total units did Essential ever even ship?

[mansr]

22 minutes ago, MikeyFresh said:

Not at all, Essential has been dead in the water for a long time now.

Was it ever alive?

[MikeyFresh]

32 minutes ago, mansr said:

Was it ever alive?

 

I guess not, it would appear Essential had sold a total of 150,000 units since 2017.

Thats just not going to cut it going against the likes of Apple, Samsung, Moto, Oppo, OnePlus, and various others.

[Ralf11]

23 hours ago, MikeyFresh said:

Perhaps MQA themselves are surprised, they still tout the "partnership" on their website despite it never having produced much of anything. How many total units did Essential ever even ship?

 

 

Hey - gotta tout something!

[KeenObserver]

Is MQA dead yet?

 

I'd like to move on, but I don't feel I can if the threat of MQA still hangs over the heads of the music consumer.

 

Is there any way of determining if MQA Ltd secured further funding to stay in business?

 

Has MQA had a presence at any Hi-Fi events?

[The Computer Audiophile]

19 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

Is MQA dead yet?

 

I'd like to move on, but I don't feel I can if the threat of MQA still hangs over the heads of the music consumer.

 

Is there any way of determining if MQA Ltd secured further funding to stay in business?

 

Has MQA had a presence at any Hi-Fi events?

I think the key is to follow the people who work there on LinkedIn or some other platforms. When they bail, the ship has sailed.