MQA is for chumps

I have a great, MQA-enabled Esoteric K-01XD SACD/CD player.

The MQA CDs that I own, from Hilary Hahn, Joni Mitchell (Blue), and Chick Corea (Return to Forever) are UHQCD-MQA 24 bit remasters and they sound better than the same CDs in SACD and Redbook CD formats. However, all of my UHQCD disks sound better on my system, so it is hard to determine what format is responsible.

MQA is already a marketing failure for someone like me, because there are very few MQA CDs or vinyl records for sale anywhere, even in Japan. This suggests that this highly-touted format is not all that it was cracked up to be, even following those ads of the woman crying when she hears the MQA format for the first time.

Hi

I agree with Blacktalon ...MQA was a short term solution for getting around  limited bandwidth and high end listening ...  basically a compression technology ... to give better quality at a given file size..   As storage and bandwidth become cheaper and more available MQA will not be a "must have" but a nice to have for some situations...  As more providers stream higher res files and homes getting higher bandwidth service , WIFI specs increase etc... file size will not be the gating factor in music streaming and quality....   but it will have its place in portable situations .. but then again in most portable / mobile situations is there a MAJOR need hi end streaming?  Yes ,  I am thinking about value engineering ( AKA " Good Enough" ) ( not a good characteristic in a Audiophile).

Good Hunting and listening.
Bill Sohne

I did a quick ear test, from Tidal to QB and cancelled Tidal and bought a year of Sublime QB.  I can tell you from my two ears and brain, I should have done this long ago.

JT

Mr. Chump here.  Bad MQA recordings sound bad.  Bad cd recordings sound bad.  Really good MQA recordings sound better than really good cd recordings.

If you prefer another format, it doesn’t change my assessment one bit.

I stream both Tidal and Qobuzz via a Cambridge CXNv2 to a Benchmark DAC 3b,  I would say Tidal is slightly better than straight Redbook although I am using a Sony XA5400 ES which Stereophile gave an A+ to.  I think that may be because they are using newer masters with better methods than the older CDs I have.  I would also say Qobuzz in general sounds better than Tidal in general and Qobuzz high rez is better yet although some sound a bit edged...  like an over-sharpened photo.  I find Tidal easier to use and seems to have more material when I look for a particular artist.  For the price of 2 CDs a month I'll keep them both.  FWIW, there are some internet radio stations out there broadcasting in 250 and 320 kbps that sound as good as Qobuzz hi rez.