John Atkinson: Yes, MQA IS Elegant...

[wgscott]

18 minutes ago, mansr said:

He has two options, either provide a believable explanation for his actions, or stop acting like a shill. As long as he does neither, the suspicions will continue to mount.

 

I've stayed away from the MQA debate, and personally want nothing to do with the format.  I have gone so far as to intentionally not purchase products that have invested in it.

 

Having said all that, why should Atkinson not be able to advocate (or shill) for the format, if he believes in it?  The best way to counter the advocacy is by providing more information (as you have done).  

[mansr]

3 minutes ago, wgscott said:

Having said all that, why should Atkinson not be able to advocate (or shill) for the format, if he believes in it?

Of course he can do that. He just shouldn't act all offended when people start speculating over his motivations. If you act like a shill, you'll be regarded like a shill. It's that simple.

[firedog]

11 minutes ago, wgscott said:

 

I've stayed away from the MQA debate, and personally want nothing to do with the format.  I have gone so far as to intentionally not purchase products that have invested in it.

 

Having said all that, why should Atkinson not be able to advocate (or shill) for the format, if he believes in it?  The best way to counter the advocacy is by providing more information (as you have done).  

 

A shill means he's being paid to do it without revealing it, which would be very dishonest. That's not the same as advocacy. The assumption in his magazine is that we are getting the honest opinion of the writer. 

I don't see any reason to think he's a shill. I do think he (and some other writers) are exhibiting some kind of unreasonable enthusiasm for MQA. Seems to me more of a type of groupthink by the TAS, Stereophile, etc.  establishment, because they realize MQA success could indirectly  benefit them. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened in the last few decades. The audio press has tried to lead us astray more than once. 

 

[crenca]

3 minutes ago, wgscott said:

]ving said all that, why should Atkinson not be able to advocate (or shill) for the format, if he believes in it?  The best way to counter the advocacy is by providing more information (as you have done).  

 

True, but the subject is not how best to counter @John_Atkinsonadvocacy, but why he is advocating it in the first place.

 

The idea that he does not really $benefit$ (however indirect) is not really true.  He is in the business of editing an audiophile trade publication, and that trade publication has $interest$ in the whole of Audiophile consumer culture.  This consumer culture, and thus John's customers (his advertisers, not his readers) is in part supported by "the latest and greatest" marketing buzz.  MQA is (and thankfully, rapidly become a "was") part of the buzz/excitement/consumerist environment.  John's customers (his advertisers) expect John to "'shill" consistently and faithfully for whatever stirs up the market.

 

The conflict is that John's readers (who are not his customers) expect their interests, such as the truth of MQA technically/legally/as a market player, it's pros and cons vis-a-vis their interests, etc. to be at least considered if not actually supported by John.  John to his credit has occasionally thrown a bone to the consumer (e.g. when he rightly framed MQA as similar to Net Neutrality) but consumers rightly see that these considerations are too few and far inbetween to actually count as a serious consideration of his readers.

 

John is a shill for the industry and this "excitement with the latest and greatest" because at the end of the day his first, second, and third consideration is with his customers and not his readers.  That said, readers really should not expect anything different and should simply stop reading these trade publications that are by definition "shills" for their customers interests...I know I have 

[Rt66indierock]

3 hours ago, John_Atkinson said:

 

This accusation has been made before on this website. For the record, I do not benefit personally in any way whatsoever if MQA succeeds nor do I suffer in any way if it fails.

 

I am disappointed that Chris Connaker allows such false accusations to be posted to this site.

 

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

 

John,

 

wdw has accused me of strutting around this site like I own it so I will. Were you targeted by MQA Ltd as a key opinion maker? Undoubtedly you were among the people referred to in the MQA Ltd.’s 2015 Strategic Report “Given the widespread acceptance by key decision makers in the music industry and journalists.” So you were part of MQA’s corporate game plan.

 

But did you receive any money or other compensation from MQA highly doubtful. Part of modern day marketing is to use the press to get your message out. As best I can tell all MQA did was say here is our story and this is why it is compelling to your readers.

 

Finally in my world if I see a product mentioned in say Forbes I assume someone is getting paid. I’ve seen too many price lists for press mentions to think otherwise. You argue this isn’t the case for high end audio but objectively Stereophile has done a better job marketing MQA than the firms MQA initially hired to launch MQA. In cases like this there will always be suspicions money is moving around. Too many people look at say Jason’s Esoteric N-01 network audio player review and count up the MQA mentions. You are going to have deal with it.

[mav52]

3 hours ago, christopher3393 said:

 

So, mav,....are you asking for bank statements? availbility of all communications regarding MQA? a special prosecutor?  

 

I need to ask my daughter since she is a Federal prosecutor for the DOJ , the truth would be nice instead of the kool aid response provided to them by the secret facebook club.   ?

[vl]

6 hours ago, John_Atkinson said:

 

This accusation has been made before on this website. For the record, I do not benefit personally in any way whatsoever if MQA succeeds nor do I suffer in any way if it fails.

 

I am disappointed that Chris Connaker allows such false accusations to be posted to this site.

 

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

 

Stereophile and JA in particular had my technical respect all these years in the contents published in the magazine.  The first time I had my doubts was the series of articles by Jim Austin on MQA.  His use of so called technical details in digital audio was certainly unique, to say it kindly.  To evaluate a digital audio system with an apparently non band limited impulse passing through filters and looking at their ringing is certainly not what digital audio is about.  Any competent audio engineer or audiophile knows that with the proper anti aliasing filter at the ADC stage, such ringing will not occur down stream.

 

The recent article by JA using various ADCs, DACs and SRC software further confuses the issue of what a good digital recording should be from a time and frequency domain stand points, by talking about filter ringing caused by improperly band limited signals entering the digital recording/reproduction chain.

 

JA can do use a favor by giving us an article on digital audio done well.

[mansr]

2 minutes ago, vl said:

Stereophile and JA in particular had my technical respect all these years in the contents published in the magazine.  The first time I had my doubts was the series of articles by Jim Austin on MQA.  His use of so called technical details in digital audio was certainly unique, to say it kindly.  To evaluate a digital audio system with an apparently non band limited impulse passing through filters and looking at their ringing is certainly not what digital audio is about.  Any competent audio engineer or audiophile knows that with the proper anti aliasing filter at the ADC stage, such ringing will not occur down stream.

 

The recent article by JA using various ADCs, DACs and SRC software further confuses the issue of what a good digital recording should be from a time and frequency domain stand points, by talking about filter ringing caused by improperly band limited signals entering the digital recording/reproduction chain.

It's not just that the "technical" explanations put forth by Stereophile, TAS, and others are dubious. They are all simply parroting what Bob Stuart tells them without for a moment stopping to think whether it even makes sense, let alone is true. Why is Stuart given page after page in issue after issue to promote his scheme? Why are no other points of view allowed even half as much exposure? They could have interviewed people like, in no particular order, Charles Hansen, Andreas Koch, Mike Moffat, or Rob Watts for a proper technical critique. On the production side, we have Mark Waldrep, Brian Lucey, and others. Jim Collinson could have discussed it from the perspective of a record label. Why have none of these people been given as much as a footnote? The continued and unquestioning deferral to Bob Stuart really does make it look like someone has been given an incentive to keep the reporting strictly one-sided. It's either that, or they've set a new record for collective gullibility.

[Brinkman Ship]

With all the criticism of TAS and Stereophile for their technical coverage of MQA, what gets somewhat lost is their

SUBJECTIVE praise of MQA, without deviation. Harley, Stone, JVS, Atkinson, Austin,  Lasgana, Fremer, and now shamefully Dudley (who did I leave out?) have offered nothing less than ridiculous opinions of MQA sonically that virtually no real world listeners have experienced.  That is the area I find truly as galling as not not giving an equal voice to industry heavy hitters who do not agree with them.

[Jud]

8 hours ago, John_Atkinson said:

 

This accusation has been made before on this website. For the record, I do not benefit personally in any way whatsoever if MQA succeeds nor do I suffer in any way if it fails.

 

I am disappointed that Chris Connaker allows such false accusations to be posted to this site.

 

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile

 

8 hours ago, mansr said:

Then why do you seem to be so deeply committed to promoting it at every opportunity, no matter how ridiculous it makes you look?

 

This theatrical disappointment that Chris "allows" such discussion (you've been on the site long enough to know that Chris has a very light hand when moderating), and the ad hominem response (I don't care if John is the next MQA CEO,; the technical criticisms you have provided are to my mind far more informative and effective) do neither of you credit.

[Rt66indierock]

8 minutes ago, Jud said:

 

 

This theatrical disappointment that Chris "allows" such discussion (you've been on the site long enough to know that Chris has a very light hand when moderating), and the ad hominem response (I don't care if John is the next MQA CEO,; the technical criticisms you have provided are to my mind far more informative and effective) do neither of you credit.

 

Can I remind you the battle against MQA had an interesting turn in June of 2017 at the Los Angeles Audio Show when Bob Stuart was called a liar after his seminar?

 

 

[wdw]

to all the comments above and to JA's awful and horrible hurt, the resounding question is more likely better elaborated than I but why is Stereophile and, of course, that other audio universe, Absolute Sound, opening so much print space within each article to endlessly mention, advocate, perhaps shill, for an audio technology that almost no one in the world has heard about but,  more importantly, to their major audience who have, we have hardly have any interest in it.

This whole episode has exposed the free-equipment no charge unethical writing of these reviewers.   Always made a point of listening to and then buying most of the musical recommends from J. V.  Serinus  until you read that most of that stuff he has is just given to him.  I have to work hard, well hardish as an overly and  horrible privileged white hetero male can be, just haven't yet self identified as non binary, ;-), to even think of whatever stereo products I may buy but these darlings just get this stuff dropped out of sky and freely admit it. Our bearded buddy at Audiostream is simply shameless in this regard..

So you dance with who brung ya!

 

[firedog]

2 hours ago, wdw said:

Always made a point of listening to and then buying most of the musical recommends from J. V.  Serinus  until you read that most of that stuff he has is just given to him.  I

I like his record reviews and have bought recordings on his recommendations. Have stopped given his equipment reviews much thought because: a)  he seems to never have heard an MQA recording that isn't the most fantastic thing in the history of audio, and b) because in a recent review of Bricasti he amps he connected them up in a way not approved by the manufacturer and then complained that they didn't sound like they should in the review. 

[Brinkman Ship]

22 minutes ago, firedog said:

I like his record reviews and have bought recordings on his recommendations. Have stopped given his equipment reviews much thought because: a)  he seems to never have heard an MQA recording that isn't the most fantastic thing in the history of audio, and b) because in a recent review of Bricasti he amps he connected them up in a way not approved by the manufacturer and then complained that they didn't sound like they should in the review. 

JvS is an utter charlatan as a reviewer. Just read his Jadis mono block debacle. He would not have a clue how to properly set up a system with a gun to his head...clearly he can’t hear his way iut of a paper bag either.

[Sal1950]

12 hours ago, Brinkman Ship said:

With all the criticism of TAS and Stereophile for their technical coverage of MQA, what gets somewhat lost is their

SUBJECTIVE praise of MQA, without deviation. Harley, Stone, JVS, Atkinson, Austin,  Lasgana, Fremer, and now shamefully Dudley (who did I leave out?) have offered nothing less than ridiculous opinions of MQA sonically that virtually no real world listeners have experienced.  That is the area I find truly as galling as not not giving an equal voice to industry heavy hitters who do not agree with them.

That's because their coverage on the sound of MQA has nothing to do with honest listening evaluations and everything to do with $ and improving the commercial take for everyone who's stands to gain from it's wide acceptance in the industry.

But of course that has in general been true for a large portion of the things that have been written about High End audio over the last couple decades at those two magazines. We could start with a discussion on the REAL sound of vinyl vs digital and the reasons for the "vinyl resurgence:" if you like.  Naw, let's not bother. 

[psjug]

On 9/3/2018 at 4:17 PM, mansr said:

For a solution to be elegant, there must first be a problem.

That really sums it up.  MQA  says the problem is temporal smearing, but they don't do the obvious and show examples of DAC output where ringing can be seen in properly recorded music (Archimago shows examples where ringing can be seen - in recordings with clipped peaks).  If they are talking about a different issue they don't explain what it is.  They want to claim that they are on to a whole new era of signal processing and have given this a name: post-Shannon.  And then MQA's solution to temporal smearing applies leaky filtering with phase shift, so that it actually introduces smearing.  It's not elegant. It's Orwellian.  Really sad or hilarious, depending on whether MQA succeeds or not.

[mansr]

1 minute ago, psjug said:

MQA  says the problem is temporal smearing, but they don't do the obvious and show examples of DAC output where ringing can be seen in properly recorded music (Archimago shows examples where ringing can be seen - in recordings with clipped peaks).

So-called ringing is not smearing. That's the first mistake.

[Le Concombre Masqué]

So, after the MQA campaign, which audiophile magazines, paper or online, can we read ?

[mansr]

5 minutes ago, Le Concombre Masqué said:

So, after the MQA campaign, which audiophile magazines, paper or online, can we read ?

Soundstage Hi-Fi and Hi-Fi News & Record Review are to my knowledge the only ones where the editors have been critical of MQA. Positive Feedback published one piece by Andreas Koch, but as they usually fall for any kind of snake oil with great enthusiasm, I would only read it for entertainment.

[Rt66indierock]

1 hour ago, Le Concombre Masqué said:

So, after the MQA campaign, which audiophile magazines, paper or online, can we read ?

 

I'd keep reading Stereophile and The Absolute Sound but from the perspective of what are they trying sell me? How are they managing information to keep you less informed. And a personal favorite find technical errors in their articles and reviews.

[tmtomh]

TAS in particular, and Stereophile to a degree, always (or at least for a long time) have been defined subjective, impressionistic listening tests. This means that they will tend not to say that new or interesting-sounding technologies, upgrades, or innovations don't make any sonic difference. The reason is simple: If you feel that MQA doesn't improve the sound, is that because MQA isn't all it's cracked up to be, or because your hearing and listening skills (or your reference rig) are not developed and discerning enough to detect the differences? If someone else, especially at a peer/rival publication, claims to hear a difference after you've just published a piece saying you couldn't hear a difference, you risk demoting your reputation.

 

I am not saying that reviewers consciously think in these terms - in fact, I would guess they don't. Instead, I would guess they feel that they go into this stuff with an open mind, and consistently are "struck" or "surprised" to find that they do in fact hear differences.

 

IMHO - and I stress this is just my opinion - they underestimate the power of confirmation bias (which doesn't have to manifest itself as a conscious "I need to hear a difference here to burnish my golden-ears rep" feeling), and they overestimate the reliability of human auditory memory when it comes to fine details over extended listening periods in a non-A/B (or non-A/B/X) situation.

 

My point here is that their cheerleading for MQA is not necessarily that much of an outlier from their usual approach to tech claims made by manufacturers and equipment designers. The overall attitude required to compare power cords, and to compare 96kHz vs 192kHz sample rates, is very similar.

[Rt66indierock]

11 minutes ago, tmtomh said:

TAS in particular, and Stereophile to a degree, always (or at least for a long time) have been defined subjective, impressionistic listening tests. This means that they will tend not to say that new or interesting-sounding technologies, upgrades, or innovations don't make any sonic difference. The reason is simple: If you feel that MQA doesn't improve the sound, is that because MQA isn't all it's cracked up to be, or because your hearing and listening skills (or your reference rig) are not developed and discerning enough to detect the differences? If someone else, especially at a peer/rival publication, claims to hear a difference after you've just published a piece saying you couldn't hear a difference, you risk demoting your reputation.

 

I am not saying that reviewers consciously think in these terms - in fact, I would guess they don't. Instead, I would guess they feel that they go into this stuff with an open mind, and consistently are "struck" or "surprised" to find that they do in fact hear differences.

 

IMHO - and I stress this is just my opinion - they underestimate the power of confirmation bias (which doesn't have to manifest itself as a conscious "I need to hear a difference here to burnish my golden-ears rep" feeling), and they overestimate the reliability of human auditory memory when it comes to fine details over extended listening periods in a non-A/B (or non-A/B/X) situation.

 

My point here is that their cheerleading for MQA is not necessarily that much of an outlier from their usual approach to tech claims made by manufacturers and equipment designers. The overall attitude required to compare power cords, and to compare 96kHz vs 192kHz sample rates, is very similar.

 

In other words or in this case a picture.

[Shadders]

16 minutes ago, Rt66indierock said:

 

In other words or in this case a picture.

[mansr]

51 minutes ago, tmtomh said:

My point here is that their cheerleading for MQA is not necessarily that much of an outlier from their usual approach to tech claims made by manufacturers and equipment designers. The overall attitude required to compare power cords, and to compare 96kHz vs 192kHz sample rates, is very similar.

It is not the general nature of the promotion, but rather the frequency and fervour, that is unusual. From the "birth of a new world" to the 12-part (or whatever) series, each instalment featuring a page just for Bob Stuart, the MQA coverage is far higher over the top than the regular infomercials, and that's just Stereophile. In equipment reviews, they are not content with merely mentioning whether MQA is supported, they go out of their way to dramatically emphasise how spectacularly great it sounds. Add to this the stream of press representatives who have shown up here, made fools of themselves, and been banned. None of this is normal behaviour. Is it any surprise then, that some readers start questioning what might be driving it?

[John_Atkinson]

On 9/4/2018 at 2:52 PM, vl said:

The recent article by JA using various ADCs, DACs and SRC software further confuses the issue of what a good digital recording should be from a time and frequency domain stand points, by talking about filter ringing caused by improperly band limited signals entering the digital recording/reproduction chain.

 

It saddens me that so much of this thread has degenerated into personal attacks, from people who have not read what I have written or, if they have done so, have not understood it, as in the case of the post which I am responding. Too many posters have a greater confidence in their opinions than they do actual knowledge, driven by what appears to be antagonism toward those of us who earn our livings by what we publish and write.

 

When I was studying 45 years ago to get my post-graduate qualification as a high-school science teacher, I read a lot of the works of philosopher Karl Popper. I was recently reminded of something he wrote in "The Open Society and Its Enemies": "A healthy society means a competition for ideas . . . and critical thinking that considers the facts, not who is presenting them." (my italics)

 

So putting aside the fact it was I who wrote the article that triggered this thread, consider the facts:

 

The experimental evidence I presented is incontrovertible. That unless the user of an A/D converter is prepared to accept the possibility of some aliased image energy in order to use an antialiasing filter that preserves the time-domain behavior of the original analog signal, the resultant digital data will have sinc-function content at the Nyquist frequency accompanying every musical transient.

 

If the original data were captured at 2Fs and or 4FS rates, then the sample-rate converter used to prepare a CD master will introduce ringing at the new Nyquist frequency of 22.05kHz with every musical transient.

 

Decoding these correctly band-limited digital data with a conventional sinc-function reconstruction filter will replace this ringing with its own, again at Nyquist, with every transient. A slow-rolloff reconstruction filter will not ring but will preserve the Nyquist-frequency ringing in the original data.

 

If a specific type of slow-rolloff antialiasing filter in the A/D converter is combined with a reconstruction filter in the D/A converter that behaves in a similar manner, you will have an analog-digital-data storage/transmission-digital-analog chain that will have an impulse response and top-octave rolloff equivalent to that of a small distance of air. As I wrote in my article, this was the stated goal of both Bob Stuart and the late Charley Hansen; I see no disrespect to the latter in pointing that out, especially as I instanced Charley's antipathy to MQA in the article.

 

In the context of Popper's comment, what should be debated are the following questions:

 

Does the MQA analog-analog chain behave in the same manner as the Charley Hansen's "Listen" anti-aliasing filter in the Ayre QA-9 and his experimental reconstruction filter for the Ayre QX-5 Twenty? You will note that I used the word "if" in my article. Without access to an MQA-equipped A/D converter, that must be speculation on my part. (I have asked to try Mytek's MQA ADC, but I would have to sign a non-disclosure agreement that makes my using it moot.)

 

Is the compromise in the frequency domain associated with using time-domain-perfect converters acceptable with real musical signals? Or is the possibility of image energy being aliased into the audioband too great? I have heard arguments on both sides of this question. I suspect the answer is that it depends on the type of music.

 

Does ringing at 22.05kHz even matter when it comes to sound quality? Again, I have heard arguments on both sides of this question, from people I respect.

 

And that, I would hope, is my final word on this matter.

 

John Atkinson

Editor, Stereophile