Tidal sale is over, Apple was just conducting competitive research to see if they posed a threat to iTunes. It didn't so they had no reason to buy it.
Tidal hasn't done anything on MQA since then.
Stereophile ran an article online a month or so ago explaining that it was hibernating, but that Warner (or some other label) was busy converting their entire back-catalog to MQA.
I've listened to several MQA recordings and find them no better or worse than redbook. Claims of it improving anything in a recording are, as far as I am concerned snake oil and mysticism.
Best,
Erik
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Hi @bradf
I used a Mytek Brooklyn. Yes, MQA was properly identified when played. My sources came from 2l.no
In my case I comapred 96/24 to MQA and I honestly could hear no difference at all. Not a bad thing considering MQA is a lossy and complicated format to reconstruct. Still, it has no value for me at all.
The Brooklyn IS a very good DAC, and to my ears, plays Redbook much better than most DACs from even 5 years ago. MQA is currently disabled so I can play with other filters. There is an odd bit of interface troubles. If you enable MQA you can't change filters. :-)
Best,
Erik
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PS Audio said they were not at all impressed by it. Benchmark has a long blog post on the matter and just how convoluted the entire process really is.
Meh, the Brooklyn is a very good dac with or without MQA, but I was looking forward to finding yet another veil lifted... or some other ridiculous thing like that. Nothing.
Best,
Erik
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I’m sorry Tomcy, your mixing up a few things.
MQA does in fact require the use the apodizing filter. What MQA adds is decoding of the high resolution data as well as their claims to time domain fixes. MQA attempts to compress 384k data (in a lossy way) into a 48kHz signal.
Think of MQA more like FLAC vs. MP3 sort of kind of. :)
The best independent critique I know if how it works is at Benchmark media’s site.
In the case of the Brooklyn, when you have MQA detection and decoding enabled it will force you to use the apodizing filter. If you disable MQA you can pick from 3 different filter types.
Best,
Erik
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Well, I know the answer about sound quality already. :)
If I have to look for an "improvement" with a microscope and tweezers it's not worth it to me. :)
Remember Dolby A, B and C? That was worth paying money for. Differences were clear to anyone. MQA.... meh. I can't see myself on my deathbed going "OH, if only MQA had survived, my audio life would have been so much better."
Best,
Erik
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Hi @bradf
Why thank you kindly, good sir!
Hi @ohlala
Interesting. However, I’m afraid my experiences correlate exactly with Paul McGowan at PS Audio as well as most members of the SFAS who went to the local demo. Again, if we have to carefully look for "improvements" it’s not worth buying. If this were a Dolby B or dbx demo in the time of magnetic tape it would have been no contest. We would all be wowed. MQA? Meh, and double meh!
Just to add, since my system uses custom speakers and amps, I used AKG K712 headphones for critical listening with MQA sources. I compared native 24/96 to MQA. I didn’t care to evalutate an MQA file with/without MQA decoding, that comparison doesn’t mean anything to me.
Hi @tomcy6 What may not be clear is that the minimum phase filter IS selectable without MQA. Let me try to summarize the behavior (which jives with the text of the review):
- With MQA detection set OFF you have 3 filters to choose from, including minimum phase (MPH). The other two are conventional Fast Rolloff (FR) and Slow Rolloff (SR)
- With MQA detection set ON the Brooklyn forces the filter to be minimum phase, whether or not the input is MQA encoded.
There’s a little bit about that behavior in the body of the review, and I’m glad I read it because I was going nuts trying to get to the filter selection menu. :)
My only point is that the specific digital filter in the Brooklyn is independent of MQA. Personally my hierarchy (though speakers) is:
FR > MPH > SR
I find FR and MPH very close, with FR having more clearly delineated attacks. SR is just too funky to listen to. Maybe it’s because my tweeters go to 30kHz or 40kHz and I’m getting more effects in the audible range. Don’t know, but don’t like it, I can’t quite explain the weird discomfort.
In any event, I encourage everyone to trust your ears and buy only those things that are worth it for you. :)
Best,
Erik
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I take it back, I have a good analogy for the SR filters. The SR Filter on the Brooklyn is like wearing the wrong glasses. Everything sounds like it's in the wrong place and disconnected. That's just me though, make yourself happy!
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@tomcy6 No worries. The truth is MQA is a very ambitious encoding format and it's easy to misread how parts of it fit together. I went a long time thinking it was lossless, until Benchmark set me straight.
Best,
Erik
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@ejr1953
You bring up a very good point. MQA isn't just competing against high resolution data files, it's competing against the latest crop of DAC's. Over the past 5 years or so the performance of DACs with Redbook has markedly improved while the performance at super-high res has remained more or less constant.
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Hi @ptss
HDCD is the perfect analogy. HDCD is a pretty complicated format as well. Microsoft bought HDCD but then did nothing at all with it. It's a shame because I would love to have a software scanner to go through all my FLAC files, and decode any HDCD content.
MQA is not involved in DRM either. There is no playback, copy or encryption restrictions on the files or the decoding. Just like HDCD however, you must have compatible hardware. MQA IS attempting to be an authoritative standard so when your MQA light goes up you know you downloaded the file without additional alteration/compression done by the download service.
HDCD was a recording engineer's toolbox. It was up to the engineering team to decide which features, and when and how much they would take advantage of. This is a little different from MQA as everything is done by the hardware vendors. The recording engineers don't really have any control over MQA besides turning it on or not.
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@ejr1953 If PS Audio wanted to I'm pretty sure they could implement it purely as a software solution for you as could Chord.
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One thing that I should point out to anyone comparing MQA, is that to do it right re-mastering is required. Meaning you have to work your way back to the original multi-track digital files before you can produce a 2 channel MQA product. Becnhmark Media has a lot more on this.
In any event, when I have heard significant differences what I heard seemed due to this re-mastering and the choices taken at that time. If you've ever heard good re-masters you know what I'm talking about.
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@emailists
Well, read Benchmark's blog on the matter. To them it IS a seriously flawed system. Their points are accurate too, but I'm not sure about audibility.
Personally I was really excited about the "digital origami" idea, when I thought it was lossless.
The good news is that if this is a good idea, then undoubtedly some one will produce an open-source version of the same idea without the flaws or licensing requirements. Personally I would love to have my music collection take 1/4th it's current size if it could be done without any loss of quality.
Best,
Erik
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@ejr1953 That's pretty much how I understand it, based on MQA and Benchmark data.
How Warner Bros. will do this I have no idea. I know MQA provides a "generic" AD de-blur setting in case the original converter data is not available, but as I understand it, once the tracks are mixed together there's now way to de-blur that.
To avoid confusion, there are also de-blurring, or compensating steps at the DAC end too. It's easy to confuse them together. :)
Best,
Erik
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Hi @ptss You asked a question I did not fully answer.
How is MQA superior (significantly) to HDCD
At least on spec, HDCD compresses dynamic range, in addition to providing other frequency dependent tools. That is, the equivalent of more bits in a CD. MQA attempts to pack a 384k/24 signal into 48k/24 and improve the overall fidelity by carefully matched de-blurring filters on the AD and DA process. So it's benefits are to file/stream size as well as fidelity. However, this is all specmanship. Sadly I have heard no improvement in MQA recordings, and don't have an HDCD capable player either so I am unable to render a subjective comparison. It kind of bugs me that there isn't an HDCD software decoder for me to use. :) Best, Erik |
Hi ejr,
Yes, this was a big problem when DSD first came out. The DSD versions were noticeably different in energy across the audible frequency spectrum. It can also happen in reverse. As Bob Carver advertised, a lot of early CD's were heavily compressed, not just in dynamic range but also stereo separation compared to LPs. A lot of the "bad sound" of digital could be directly attributed to really bad mastering engineering and practices.
We also tend to hear any difference as improvement. Much like haircuts. :)
So the idea is to compensate for the original A/D step. This is done by measuring the blurring of the AD converter itself, and then applying a compensating algorithm to the Digital multi-track masters. As far as i know, the process for going from analog to digital is to first convert each track individually to digital. So whether or not we start from analog or digital doesn't really affect the process.
Only after multi-track masters are fully digitized can re-mastering begin.
Of course, some recordings are far simpler. A lot of great 1950-1960 orchestral recordings were multi-track, but by multi we mean 3.
Best,
Erik
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