MQA is Vaporware

[John_Atkinson]

14 hours ago, JoeWhip said:

 

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Posted 14 hours ago

15 hours ago, JoeWhip said:

They claim that it is because why waste their time but it is more likely because that manufacturer will no longer send in stuff to review or buy ads.

I do not know who "they" are but it ain't me.  - Kal Rubinson

Agreed Kal but I have heard this from JA and Steve Gutenberg just to name two.

 

If by "JA" you mean me, I have never said or written that Stereophile doesn't publish negative reviews "because manufacturers will no longer send in stuff to review or buy ads." Please don't put words in my mouth. See my comments on the relationship between the magazine and advertisers at https://www.stereophile.com/content/500-issues

 

John Atkinson

Technical Editor, Stereophile

 

[JoeWhip]

John, with all due respect, did you read what I wrote? I commented on why you said your magazine did not publish negative reviews, in short it is because there are so many products out that that are good and you didn’t want to waste time with the bad stuff. It was my supposition that the real reason was because of blowback from the manufacturer. I did not say you said that so I did not put those words in your mouth, I said that it is more likely because…… Please read what I wrote.

[John_Atkinson]

1 hour ago, JoeWhip said:

John, with all due respect, did you read what I wrote? I commented on why you said your magazine did not publish negative reviews, in short it is because there are so many products out that that are good and you didn’t want to waste time with the bad stuff. I

 

Yes, I did read what you wrote, JoeWhip. This statement is not what you originally wrote in the messages to which I was responding..

 

You first said that "This is the natural end result of the mindset to never publish negative reviews. They claim that it is because why waste their time but it is more likely because that manufacturer will no longer send in stuff to review or buy ads."

 

You then said in response to Kal Rubinson that you "have heard this from JA . . ."

 

I was pointing out that you did not "hear this from JA" and that this was a misstatement on your part.

 

John Atkinson

Technical Editor, Stereophile

[JoeWhip]

So you have never said that you did not want to publish negative reviews because it was a waste of time and would rather stick with equipment that were worthy of positive reviews?

[Kal Rubinson]

2 minutes ago, JoeWhip said:

So you have never said that you did not want to publish negative reviews because it was a waste of time and would rather stick with equipment that were worthy of positive reviews?

I can attest to the contrary.  While JA was editor, he consistently encouraged negative commentary, when deserved.

[KeenObserver]

Now that the truth about MQA has been exposed, it seems that the emphasis has gone from "It's good for the music consumer" to "It's good for the studios, screw the music consumer".

[JoeWhip]

11 minutes ago, Kal Rubinson said:

I can attest to the contrary.  While JA was editor, he consistently encouraged negative commentary, when deserved.

Ok, i guess I was wrong about JA as I will take your word for it Kal as to the negative review policy in Stereophile. I apologize for being mistaken about that at least as far as JA is concerned.

[John_Atkinson]

2 minutes ago, JoeWhip said:

Ok, i guess I was wrong about JA as I will take your word for it Kal as to the negative review policy in Stereophile. I apologize for being mistaken about that at least as far as JA is concerned.

 

Thank you.

 

John Atkinson

Technical Editor, Stereophile

[cab33]

6 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Now that the truth about MQA has been exposed, it seems that the emphasis has gone from "It's good for the music consumer" to "It's good for the studios, screw the music consumer".

 

True

[Allan F]

7 hours ago, KeenObserver said:

Now that the truth about MQA has been exposed, it seems that the emphasis has gone from "It's good for the music consumer" to "It's good for the studios, screw the music consumer".

 

While the emphasis may have changed, "It's good for the studios, screw the music consumer", has always been the prime justification for MQA. That's why a number of equipment manufacturers have refused to include MQA capability in their products, while others have done so reluctantly for marketing considerations only.

[The Computer Audiophile]

This is interesting. I wish the xxxxxs I put in the following quote were place holders for mQa. It would be a refreshing statement from JA2. Alas, they aren’t. 
 

 

“it would be a travesty if the xxxxx version were the only version of this classic track easily available. That, to me, is the key point about xxxxxx and xxxxxxx: It's cool as far as it goes, but the original version must stay in circulation, in pristine form.”

 

 

https://www.stereophile.com/content/respect-music-apple-dolby-atmos

[lucretius]

My eyes are burning. Was that last link necessary?

[JoeWhip]

All I can say is wow Chris!

[Samuel T Cogley]

1 hour ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

This is interesting. I wish the xxxxxs I put in the following quote were place holders for mQa. It would be a refreshing statement from JA2. Alas, they aren’t. 
 

 

“it would be a travesty if the xxxxx version were the only version of this classic track easily available. That, to me, is the key point about xxxxxx and xxxxxxx: It's cool as far as it goes, but the original version must stay in circulation, in pristine form.”

 

 

https://www.stereophile.com/content/respect-music-apple-dolby-atmos

 

Could the same be said for recent remixes of classic (not classical) recordings?  When DVD-A and multichannel SACD were at their peak, you could usually find a stereo mixdown of the multichannel content for those who wanted the original stereo, but with the added benefit of the new capture pass that was made of the session masters.

 

But in spite of all that effort, those stereo mixdowns always sounded so different from the original stereo masters that they were like completely new songs.  Very much like when a band can't get a good streaming deal on their original recordings and go into the studio to re-record the songs and pass them off on streaming services as those original recordings.  Def Leppard infamously did just that to just horrendous results.

 

So yes, let's keep the original, unadulterated recordings.  And please CLEARLY differentiate remixes of original session masters for the purposes of an "audiophile" release.  In my opinion, those recordings should have the word "remixed" put directly in the title, not a footnote as HDTracks often does.

 

For sure some will disagree with this decidedly intolerant take.

 

 

 

[OldHardwareTech]

58 minutes ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

 

Could the same be said for recent remixes of classic (not classical) recordings?  When DVD-A and multichannel SACD were at their peak, you could usually find a stereo mixdown of the multichannel content for those who wanted the original stereo, but with the added benefit of the new capture pass that was made of the session masters.

 

But in spite of all that effort, those stereo mixdowns always sounded so different from the original stereo masters that they were like completely new songs.  Very much like when a band can't get a good streaming deal on their original recordings and go into the studio to re-record the songs and pass them off on streaming services as those original recordings.  Def Leppard infamously did just that to just horrendous results.

 

So yes, let's keep the original, unadulterated recordings.  And please CLEARLY differentiate remixes of original session masters for the purposes of an "audiophile" release.  In my opinion, those recordings should have the word "remixed" put directly in the title, not a footnote as HDTracks often does.

 

For sure some will disagree with this decidedly intolerant take.

 

 

 

I agree wholeheartedly! I was looking for a streaming version of Dobie Gray's Drift Away. The first version I clicked on brought my wife running (or some semblance of, we're old) into the room "What the hell is that!!", I couldn't stand it for more than 30 seconds.  Interestingly the re-release that sounds closest to the original is the ATMOS version even though I don't have ATMOS, needless to say the original is still the "right" one.   Unfortunately it isn't limited to just Dobie and Def Leppard.

[Rt66indierock]

3 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

This is interesting. I wish the xxxxxs I put in the following quote were place holders for mQa. It would be a refreshing statement from JA2. Alas, they aren’t. 
 

 

“it would be a travesty if the xxxxx version were the only version of this classic track easily available. That, to me, is the key point about xxxxxx and xxxxxxx: It's cool as far as it goes, but the original version must stay in circulation, in pristine form.”

 

 

https://www.stereophile.com/content/respect-music-apple-dolby-atmos

 

Priceless thanks

[FredericV]

Once again, our well known influencer keeps spamming old "unscientific" HB videos, in an attempt to educate his audience:

 

He probably has a list of canned articles he keeps spamming.

In his failed attempt of debunking GoldenSound, HB has admitted he can only guess, and this video example is a simulated example of time smear and more proof of the same.

HB can only guess how mQa tries to correct this, as mQa has never provided before- and after files or has explained the process:

 

Still waiting for scientific proof ...
 

[Iving]

12 hours ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

And please CLEARLY differentiate remixes of original session masters for the purposes of an "audiophile" release.  In my opinion, those recordings should have the word "remixed" put directly in the title, not a footnote as HDTracks often does.

 

For sure some will disagree with this decidedly intolerant take.

 

Completely on beam - completely reasonable - and not intolerant at all.

 

I'd go further. To fail to declare a modification to [perversion of] the original recording/master (and its nature) should be a criminal offence. Who needs to be misled like that. In the UK we have statutes that prohibit misdescription. (Their purpose mainly to contest the guileful kind, of course).

[Iving]

On 8/17/2021 at 7:58 AM, Iving said:

Copyright holders are the real targets ... protection of the moral rights of composers, artists and performers is about as upstream as you can get ... perhaps that's where the argument should begin.

 

On 8/17/2021 at 5:34 PM, Iving said:

6. Ownership weight can be created upstream - vested in composers, artists and performers. I am not the only person on the planet saying that this ought to and could be achieved.

7. Just to the extent that this happens is the capacity for agents downstream to manipulate the retail market diminished.

 

[Archimago]

21 hours ago, FredericV said:

Once again, our well known influencer keeps spamming old "unscientific" HB videos, in an attempt to educate his audience:

 

He probably has a list of canned articles he keeps spamming.

In his failed attempt of debunking GoldenSound, HB has admitted he can only guess, and this video example is a simulated example of time smear and more proof of the same.

HB can only guess how mQa tries to correct this, as mQa has never provided before- and after files or has explained the process:

 

Still waiting for scientific proof ...
 

 

Yeah, lots of claims and hand-waving by HB in his videos. He has a way of comparing devices he reviews based on price as if sound quality and cost are that closely correlated!

 

I'm always struck by how he describes his "reference setups" with graphics instead of just a picture of his room. Hard to take an audio hardware reviewer of his vintage who apparently hears jitter, time smearing, aliasing from poor filters, and of course the superiority 🤮 of mQa but is afraid to be transparent enough to show us the nature of the evaluation space.

[John Dyson]

1 hour ago, Archimago said:

 

Yeah, lots of claims and hand-waving by HB in his videos. He has a way of comparing devices he reviews based on price as if sound quality and cost are that closely correlated!

 

I'm always struck by how he describes his "reference setups" with graphics instead of just a picture of his room. Hard to take an audio hardware reviewer of his vintage who apparently hears jitter, time smearing, aliasing from poor filters, and of course the superiority 🤮 of mQa but is afraid to be transparent enough to show us the nature of the evaluation space.

The 'time smearing' started happening back in the 1980s with the commonly used processing technique began back then.   Whenever doing a lot of multi-band variable gain at multiple levels and the band splitting filters are minimum phase, there WILL be lots of time smearing.   I know, I know -- I am not shilling my project, but it HAS made great inroads, and has special techniques that remove left-over smearing that result from modulation of the signal and incomplete synchronous demodulation (dynamic gain control IS modulation and fast dynamic gain control is *almost* impossible to remove modulation.)   Whatever flaws the project previously (and still) had/has, it could remove most of the effects of modulation distortion.

 

Until the ubiquitous kind of smearing is removed or mitigated, there will never be a clean audio signal. 

MQA and it's kind of processing just makes it worse.

 

Anyone advocating that MQA removes the time smearing is totally whackko.   If MQA (as a signal obfuscation method) is used INSTEAD of the current ubiquitous scheme, then there might be fewer complaints, but the proprietary aspect of MQA is still disqualifying in my view.

 

[Archimago]

5 hours ago, John Dyson said:

The 'time smearing' started happening back in the 1980s with the commonly used processing technique began back then.   Whenever doing a lot of multi-band variable gain at multiple levels and the band splitting filters are minimum phase, there WILL be lots of time smearing.   I know, I know -- I am not shilling my project, but it HAS made great inroads, and has special techniques that remove left-over smearing that result from modulation of the signal and incomplete synchronous demodulation (dynamic gain control IS modulation and fast dynamic gain control is *almost* impossible to remove modulation.)   Whatever flaws the project previously (and still) had/has, it could remove most of the effects of modulation distortion.

 

Until the ubiquitous kind of smearing is removed or mitigated, there will never be a clean audio signal. 

MQA and it's kind of processing just makes it worse.

 

Anyone advocating that MQA removes the time smearing is totally whackko.   If MQA (as a signal obfuscation method) is used INSTEAD of the current ubiquitous scheme, then there might be fewer complaints, but the proprietary aspect of MQA is still disqualifying in my view.

 

No worries John, I get you with the time smearing when it comes to the music processing used in the studio and what you're doing with your project.

 

The problem with HB is that he's simplistically talking about time smearing inferred just by looking at impulse responses and in turn how that is supposed to be fixed by mQa; nothing truly more sophisticated like say the work you're doing or something like excessphase correction for speaker/room DSP.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Interesting. New TAS email and look how the Luxman CD player is described. When one has very limited space and the mQa part of a product is actually troubling, I guess it’s best to make sure mQa is mentioned in that premium space. 
 

 

[firedog]

19 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Interesting. New TAS email and look how the Luxman CD player is described. When one has very limited space and the mQa part of a product is actually troubling, I guess it’s best to make sure mQa is mentioned in that premium space. 
 

 

 

I can actually understand why they'd include it. It's an unusal feature that makes it noteworthy. Especially if you are marketing a "multi-format" player.

[ARQuint]

39 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Interesting. New TAS email and look how the Luxman CD player is described. When one has very limited space and the mQa part of a product is actually troubling, I guess it’s best to make sure mQa is mentioned in that premium space. 
 

 

 

 

This is one of those "eye of the beholder" things, Chris. Paul Seydor devoted 2400 words to his less-than-enthusiastic assessment of MQA SQ. It's a central subject of the review and it's appropriate to note that it is. To me, the capsule highlights an aspect of the product that the reviewer found "troubling". To you, it's just part of an etched-in-stone narrative that TAS is invariably supportive of MQA. Which we are not. 

 

Andy Quint

 

 

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