Is the DAC not the only way to decode the MQA?

[granosalis]

I was just searching over internet and I have discovered that PS Audio use (MQA Certified) conversdigital module in their Bridge II.
If I'm not wrong, this is the way PS Audio use to decode MQA. Not in the DAC itself but in the renderer.
Does this open new possibilities to decode MQA without changing the DAC? 
Could they be available in the future a sort of MQA-enabled Renderer that unfold and decode the MQA file and pass it to the DAC?

 

Regards,

[mansr]

29 minutes ago, granosalis said:

Could they be available in the future a sort of MQA-enabled Renderer that unfold and decode the MQA file and pass it to the DAC?

There is no technical obstacle to this. The insistence on doing it in-DAC appears to be only to drive licensing fees and to make capturing the decoded stream harder (DRM).

[Doak]

?????

TMK there are several MQA enabled renderers currently on the market.

For example:

http://support.aurender.com/mqa.html

[Speed Racer]

4 minutes ago, Doak said:

?????

TMK there are several MQA enabled renderers currently on the market.

For example:

http://support.aurender.com/mqa.html

 

There has to be a DAC present such as in the A10.

[Doak]

13 hours ago, Speed Racer said:

 

There has to be a DAC present such as in the A10.

Now THAT I did not know.

Just reread MQA info on Aurender site and now "get it," I think. Looks like everything besides the A10 is "MQA Ready", to borrow from ROON terminology. This means that these renderers will pass the MQA encoded bitstream to an MQA enabled DAC.

Thanks for the clarification.

 

[firedog]

On 12/11/2017 at 11:56 AM, granosalis said:

I was just searching over internet and I have discovered that PS Audio use (MQA Certified) conversdigital module in their Bridge II.
If I'm not wrong, this is the way PS Audio use to decode MQA. Not in the DAC itself but in the renderer.
Does this open new possibilities to decode MQA without changing the DAC? 
Could they be available in the future a sort of MQA-enabled Renderer that unfold and decode the MQA file and pass it to the DAC?

 

Regards,

But the Bridge is "in the DAC", it isn't a standalone device. PSA had to do it this way as their FPGA DACs and MQA don't work together otherwise - they'd have to "mess up" their whole programming for D/A conversion otherwise. 

[wklie]

On 12/11/2017 at 5:56 PM, granosalis said:

Could they be available in the future a sort of MQA-enabled Renderer that unfold and decode the MQA file and pass it to the DAC?

 

For the sake of this discussion, there are MQA Full Decoding (to analog output only), MQA Core Decoding (to digital output) and MQA Rendering.

 

 

MQA Full Decoding to analog output - Lumin S1 / A1 / T1 / D2 / D1

MQA Core Decoding to digital output at 88.2kHz or 96kHz - Lumin S1 / A1 / T1 / D2 / D1 and especially U1 (support AES / USB / BNC / RCA coaxial / toslink output to external DAC), Tidal desktop app, Audirvana, Amarra

 

[oldzorki]

Auralic claims proprietary MQA decoding, and Tidal masters arrive from Aries Femto to my DAC as 88, 2 or 96 kHz or sometimes even 192. I dunno if anyone compared results with "official" MQA decoding.