MQA is Vaporware

[botrytis]

2 minutes ago, John_Atkinson said:

 

As explained in the essay of mine that I linked to, it is what readers, who vote with the wallets, want.

 

John Atkinson

Technical Editor, Stereophile

 

 

I do vote with my wallet. All the time.

[botrytis]

31 minutes ago, John_Atkinson said:

 

As explained in the essay of mine that I linked to, it is what readers, who vote with the wallets, want.

 

John Atkinson

Technical Editor, Stereophile

 

 

 

I want to say, I appreciate your testing of equipment. Why isn't that done with everything in audio? I am just wondering.....

[botrytis]

I am sometimes a 16 lb sledgehammer, when I react. It is hard to be subtle when you can't see peoples mannerisms or body language. I think Chris is trying to be open and pretty lenient on how things go on this forum. That I really appreciate and say thanks!

 

Back to the OT.

[botrytis]

20 minutes ago, Arken said:

Sure that's not condescending at all.  

 

No it is just blunt and there is a difference.

[botrytis]

27 minutes ago, Doug Schneider said:

 

I would say who said this, but I didn't ask his permission, so I won't name him out loud. But when I told a top digital designer I couldn't get any technical details from the company to truly prove their claims, he replied with, "That right there should tell you what you need to know."

 

This whole deblurring thing, if true, could've been so easily proved. Get an ADC that's the supposed culprit. Record something that's "blurry." Then "unblur" it. Prove to everyone you can. Case closed. But no........... instead, let some audio writers tell the world it can and have them dig their heels further and further into the ground when asked.

 

I come from a technical background in IT -- any time someone came with some claim, the first thing you did was ask them to prove it. If they were real, they did.

 

Doug Schneider

SoundStage!

 

This is one of the big issues. MQA hasn't proven anything about it. All they say, you know *WINK WINK* and that is it. It causes me to pause.

[botrytis]

4 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

Thing is Doug, even those who assert that Gibbs effect is significant (such as @John_Atkinson) can not prove its significance outside of even outside of MQA.  @esldudeposted some impressive looking graphs just upstream, but to get them he admitted he had to concoct an "illegal" signal to get them.  What is the real effect of Gibbs to real transient behavior of real music?  Nobody seems to know or to have devised a test  - if someone does please post it or a link here!

 

What Atkinson, Bob S, and others have is a philosophy that does not seem to rise above a mere (idiosyncratic)- audiophile assertion.  They then have devised a certain philosophy that "fixes" this problem, but of course this philosophy introduces other problems and trade offs.  Rather than being honest about this in a pro/con matrix, they announce Copernicus level "birth of new worlds".

 

In other words, it's all a smokescreen for what they are really doing...

 

 

[botrytis]

1 minute ago, marce said:

Finally a supertweeter that can do my  64/2048 true audiophile recordings justice...

Sorry for OT😐

 

Is that the new rodent repellent system?

[botrytis]

I do not share the optimism of @Archimago @Doug Schneider and/or @Jud . It seems too many companies are making super high end, with out making more affordable products. Also, it seems the 'snake oil' is still being sold as ways to make your system sound better (cables, etc.). 

 

As much information that is educational out there, such as this thread, there is also just as much or more disinformation.

[botrytis]

I do agree but that is the issue. The amount of disinformation is reaching bad proportions.

[botrytis]

3 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I disagree. The hobby is about whatever consumers want it to be about. Some want only high fidelity and will suffer through 100 degree F rooms because their amps run so hot and they look like breadboard electronics while others only care about the bling. Most of us are in the middle. 

 

I don't want anyone else to decide for me what is available and what the definition of this hobby is. 

 

I agree with this. BUT, I think certain ideas in audio are 'facts' not contrivances and should be treated as such, not as inconvenient ideas that can be ignored. It seems MQA tried to push that and did not succeed. 

 

I think we need to hold the audio press to standards and not just pushing the latest bling. Audiophiles have been lax in this - well not on this forum but in many places, yes. 

[botrytis]

Just now, crenca said:

 

That's the real root of the problem.  In succinct way you just said "I am a radical subjectivist - no one can dare tell me what the truth of high fidelity is".

 

Here is the deal though, the Real World is the real world, and your little subjective corner of it is only a tiny itty bitty piece of it.  The truth is universal and dare I say it, "catholic".  You can deny it, ignore it, run from it, pay lots of money to overcome it or shelter yourself from it, but it does not change what it is.

 

Negatively, you will always be a victim (or promotor) of the con man - you enable the con man with this blase denial of the truth (of high fidelity). 

 

Positively, your attitude does not matter.  Falsehood does not matter, because the truth and the real can only be denied for so long.  So there is hope for Achi's and Doug - but they have to be realists about where "the hobby" really is at.

 

 

Catholic means universal   So, you are saying it is universal, universal? Jes asking.....

[botrytis]

13 minutes ago, firedog said:

There is tons of low priced near state of the art equipment on the market: Topping, Emotiva, TEAC, Audioengine and many others. The cost increase after this stuff is very steep to get you small improvements in SQ. Only in speakers is there a huge step up in SQ and that is mostly in very low bass and room filling ability - which many people don't need or really want; and many don't have the room for the big speakers that do this. 
 

There is also a lot of expensive, but not super high end stuff, say $1000-$3000 that is even closer to state of the art, and may actually be as good or better than some of the super high end stuff. You can get some seriously good "all in one" type of devices today at the upper end of this range. Probably in unsighted listening a lot of us couldn't pick it out vs more expensive stuff. 
 

Generally, none of the above has the expensive looks of the super high end - and that is a lot of the reason the super high end costs so much. That is important to some people with deep pockets. As a result, sometimes high prices have little to do with SQ and a lot to do with cosmetics. 

The audio press tends to write mostly about the expensive and very expensive, so distorts the picture. The reviews are based on sighted listening, so almost always favor the more expensive, even if it measures very poorly.
 

The people at sites like this are extreme hobbyists and have at least reasonable incomes (or are willing to spend disproportionate amounts of disposable income on audio) and often spend thousands for that last few percent of performance (I include myself here). There is an unfortunate tendency to subtly or even explicitly put down moderately priced systems (say $1000-$4000) as inadequate when they certainly are not.

So we tend not to hear that much about such systems. 

 

I have not spent much money on my system, really. Bought a used Audio Research SP-16 pre-amp, and the current amps being used are Kenwood L-07M's (which were quite advanced for the latter 70's - these were totally rebuilt by a friend for the price of a bottle of scotch). I bought my TEAC DAC as NOS and at a great price. The biggest cost was my Wharfedale speakers.

 

If you go to AudioKarma, there are people who are in the other extreme, for the most part. They are either DIY'ers or just like the cheapest audio they can get their hands on. Many do end up rebuilding amps, etc. Some just are dumpster divers and that is all they like. But, there you get the snooty opposite, people saying that you spend too much on audio is silly. I really want a middle ground.

 

I agree, looking a bling is fun hence why I have been going to AXPONA since it moved to Chicago.

[botrytis]

2 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

 

Wow, you're really off the deep end with this one. You put words in my mouth that are so wrong, I'm laughing. 

 

I like all information, subjective and objective, and I like to decide what I believe. I've listened to both radical obj and sub people in this industry and neither have gotten me to a happy place for my listening. 

 

You seem to want to protect people from themselves and determine why people should like a hobby and define a hobby with strict black and white rules. I want no part of that and I bet most people don't either. 

 

I hope you drive a Toyota Corolla. Any other car would be a waste of money because cars are only for transportation. There can be no other purpose for a vehicle. 😁

 

You really want to make this hobby about what you think it should be about and that's it. That's like the Minister of Information you so despise from the old guard. 

 

 

 

 

 

They are willing participants who enjoy what they are doing. I don't want to protect people from themselves.

 

 

 

 

Well, the point is, MQA is built on a lie, a BIG LIE. If people enjoy it, that doesn't bother me at all. I just want them to understand the baggage that the enjoyment of MQA comes with. It is not the baggage I want to deal with.

[botrytis]

22 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Holy $#i+! You've gone to the dark side. Tube equipment should be banned from audio shows because it is sold as being better than solid state. Oh the humanity!

 

😁

 

I will lend you my Nelson Pass DIY amps - a whole 6 WPC big. Although they could probably heat your listening room all by themselves

[botrytis]

37 minutes ago, Tintinabulum said:

Oh yes it does...

You really should get out more...

 

No I don't care. What I do care about is the truth that MQA IS NOT HIGH RES, it is pseudo high res. Anything else is a lie. If people want to pay more for it, fine, but I am not buying it. 

[botrytis]

5 minutes ago, John Dyson said:

 When all is said and done, the esoterica doesn't fix the horrible mastering, even with digital media.

 

But it sure looks purty

[botrytis]

35 minutes ago, Jud said:

I think maybe you can. I’ve got a couple of pretty ironclad Cisco commercial grade switches in my system, $20 each, and know who clued me in? A couple of “radical subjectivists.” Good ideas come from lots of places. (So do bad ones of course, so education is key.)

 

Are these the same Cisco routers that have flawed chips inside that can't be patched? Or are they the ones that were open to attack and were patched 1 yr after the fault was identified? Cisco doesn't have a great rep on those.

[botrytis]

I am not so sure. I think they started to believe what they were writing and didn't think about anything else. Of course they were right. They are audio writing professionals. They know when something is a scam. I think that is all that happened. I think they are embarrassed now and trying to save face is all.

[botrytis]

13 minutes ago, esldude said:

Question for  @John_Atkinson and @Jim Austin, do you feel like you were mislead by what MQA promised/claimed early on vs what it actually is?

 

I don't think they will admit anything. I think they will obfuscate and deflect, like they have been doing. They think they know what is best in this situation.They don't realize the cat is out of the bag.

 

This is how anti-vaxxers react and why they really never admit they were wrong (very few do really).

[botrytis]

5 minutes ago, AudioDoctor said:

 

 

 

Bunch of comedians we have here... 😉

 

 

Comedian wanna-be's

[botrytis]

42 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

Just think in a few hours I will wade into a zone of incivility, RMAF. 

 

My my personal favorite is always I’m an analog man.

 

If you listen to speakers or headphones - that is analog

 

I get what you are saying, though.

[botrytis]

34 minutes ago, firedog said:

http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/hi-res-democratization/

 

Robert Harley continues his fanatic (and yes, the word fits) promotion of MQA. Note how he makes this corporate centric format somehow democratic, continues the lie that it has all those smaller file sizes needed for streaming, and calls it "true" hi-res. 

 

I responded....

[botrytis]

5 minutes ago, KeenObserver said:

 

How long do you think that will stay up?

 

A short time - we shall see.

[botrytis]

26 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

Let's see if they leave your comment up.

 

I don't expect them to. Then I will comment about how they do not want any discussion so how can democratization work, if you act like a DICTATOR. 

 

He didn't even use the term, 'DEMOCRATIZATION' properly. That is the real sad part.

[botrytis]

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