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MQA The Truth lies Somewhere in the Middle


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My goal is to stay out of the deeply technical weeds. I will touch on some of the stuff such as 18 bits, file sizes, etc... but will mostly look at this from a consumer perspective. Consumers are the audience at the show and the reason for the industry. I will talk to them and provide information they can use. 

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I'm putting everything together today and tomorrow (possibly Fri. & Sat. after the show as well). 

 

Without opening a huge can of worms, I'll ask the question - What do you think consumers should know?

 

Based on previous seminars I've given, there will be a few people who already know this stuff, but most will have only read bits and pieces of what the old guard has told them.

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4 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I'm putting everything together today and tomorrow (possibly Fri. & Sat. after the show as well). 

 

Without opening a huge can of worms, I'll ask the question - What do you think consumers should know?

 

Based on previous seminars I've given, there will be a few people who already know this stuff, but most will have only read bits and pieces of what the old guard has told them.

 

I'll have some fun financial facts. Basically the people who invested money in MQA Ltd aren't the kind of folks to care about sound quality.

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This is Audiophiledom, which is a largely (though this is slowly changing) factual free zone.  Another way to think of it is a hobby/culture where factual truth is in short supply, so the audiophile is left judging the man, subjectively.  This is mostly done in a kind of "balancing" or weighing exactly as Chris is putting it - putting all "opinions" (remember, there are no real facts, or too few) on a continuum.  Since this continuum is not a factual based one but a subjective one, it is quite naturally an emotional one. So on one end you have "hate", and on the other you have "love" - both irrational or "extreme" even in a subjective context.  So the middle becomes the only place anyone would want to be.

 

"What do you think consumers should know?"

 

I would say they need to be led away from the status quo subjective, emotional paradigm/continuum and shown the facts of MQA, which are many.  Don't worry about the emotion from the consumers OR the old guard trade publication cabal OR the industry itself.   You won't reach some or perhaps even most, but you will have done something sorely needed...

 

Hey MQA, if it is not all $voodoo$, show us the math!

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1 minute ago, lucretius said:

False equivalence.

 

 

The dialectic itself (i.e. the terms) is false.  If it were true (and it is the prevailing view from the "old guard", etc.), then the middle is where I and most everybody else who is not full of "hate" or extreme enthusiasm would want to be...

Hey MQA, if it is not all $voodoo$, show us the math!

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2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I'm putting everything together today and tomorrow (possibly Fri. & Sat. after the show as well). 

 

Without opening a huge can of worms, I'll ask the question - What do you think consumers should know?

 

Based on previous seminars I've given, there will be a few people who already know this stuff, but most will have only read bits and pieces of what the old guard has told them.

 

I think @mansr‘s information on how many filters there are (a limited number, thus not quite one-size-fits-all, but certainly not custom) and the response of each (won’t cut ringing, allow aliasing and imaging) are important for a baseline.

 

I also think the range of subjective listening impressions from CA members who’ve heard MQA might be important as another perspective vs. that of the subjective reviewers from the magazines.  (And BTW, my subjective impression that I like MQA a little less than non-MQA was formed before @mansr did his work.)

 

A question I hope someone with technical expertise can answer: MQA uses very short filters, presumably to limit the length of ringing.  But does a short filter have to be “reapplied” more often?  In other words, would a 7-tap filter have to be applied a thousand times as often as a 7000-tap filter?  If so, how can tap length limit ringing?

 

Thanks.

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

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4 hours ago, Archimago said:

But what are the desires of the Industry and at what point does advertising become so false that consumers have to literally dissociate their faith from traditional sources of (dis)information?

 

Excellent question, imo.

 

My own consumer question is: what important statements about MQA by Bob Stuart are most misleading, and what would be a more transparent and moderate way of making these statements in plain english as much as possible.

 

One thought I've had is to begin with a basic article like Crutchfield's ( https://www.crutchfield.com/learn/mqa-high-res-audio-breakthrough.html) and respond to it with more accurate claims and explanations.

 

One of the larger questions, like Archimago's, may be easier to address in time ( "the owl of minerva (wisdom) only takes flight at dusk")

Hopefully it will be fortuitous that this is the last session scheduled  ?, but my impression is that this could get ugly during Q+A, given the tensions that I think still exist.

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MQA is like a sandwich.  The baloney is somewhere in the middle.  MQA is the mystery meat of high res.

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14 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Without opening a huge can of worms, I'll ask the question - What do you think consumers should know?

 

They should know, without going into details, that there is a large amount of scientifically-founded critique on MQA's technology and on its alleged usefulness. And this critique comes from, not lab-coats, but people who actually care about sound, about music, about the industry.

 

They should be asked if they really want (to pay for) a locked-in format based on such a technology.

 

But you really don't want to go into technicalities, because that will go in no time down the rabbit hole, losing 99% of the audience in the process. It doesn't matter if it is 18 bits or not. It does not matter if it is lossy, lossless, or 'subjectively lossless'.

 

 

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5 hours ago, mansr said:

With a FIR filter, of which the MQA filters are examples, the output signal y[n] for an input x[n] is defined as

    y[n] = b0 * x[n] + b1 * x[n-1] + ... + bk * x[n-k]

where the constants b0 ... bk are the impulse response of the filter. Regardless of the filter length it is "applied" (though that's not a term anyone uses) once per sample.

 

So whether you are using a filter with 7 taps or 7000, if it rings it is going to be ringing as long as samples are running through it.

 

(I’m not focusing on ringing out of a particular concern for it, but because that is what MQA says it wants to ameliorate - as far as I can tell from their non-standard terminology, “blurring.”)

One never knows, do one? - Fats Waller

The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. - Einstein

Computer, Audirvana -> optical Ethernet to Fitlet3 -> Fibbr Alpha Optical USB -> iFi NEO iDSD DAC -> Apollon Audio 1ET400A Mini (Purifi based) -> Vandersteen 3A Signature.

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27 minutes ago, Archimago said:

Wow, had to do a double take this AM. Looks like subjective folks including Hans Beekhuyzen is now claiming that "often the linear phase version sounds the best - at least to my ears" (7:47):

 

 

Hmmm, minimum phase Meridian / MQA / Ayre / Pono filters on the way out? Is he about to jump on the Chord linear phase 1M tap filter bandwagon?

 

As the world turns ?.

 

 

 

Hans Beekhuyzen??  As the subjectivist turns, or as the "what am I trying to sell you today" turns ? 

Hey MQA, if it is not all $voodoo$, show us the math!

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34 minutes ago, Jud said:

So whether you are using a filter with 7 taps or 7000, if it rings it is going to be ringing as long as samples are running through it.

 

(I’m not focusing on ringing out of a particular concern for it, but because that is what MQA says it wants to ameliorate - as far as I can tell from their non-standard terminology, “blurring.”)

A particular input sample can only affect the output for the duration of filter (that's why it's called Finite Impulse Response). So-called ringing occurs only around step-like events in the input. A short filter thus limits the duration of "ringing" instances more than a longer one does.

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16 minutes ago, lucretius said:

 

Hans Beekhuyzen, John Darko, Srajan Ebaen  --  good examples demonstrating the hard of hearing can find employment.

Yes..although I am not sure about Srajan Ebaen. I found him to be incredibly rude and smug, but his sonic description have been rather accurate. Has he written about MQA?

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