MQA Users & Discussion Thread

[bhobba]

On 09/07/2023 at 1:42 PM, pretender said:

Too bad, I think MQA format is a great sounding digital format, better than PCM and DSD to my ears and I will miss it if it goes away.

 

So did I, but it was far from unanimous.

 

The problem IMHO was the publicity BS around it.   What they were doing is conceptually simple, but they both implemented it incorrectly and told a lot of BS about it like it was lossless (it most definitely was not), better than the original etc, etc - I remember the marketing; revolting IMHO.   I will do another post on what I think they should have done.

 

Tidal seems to be slowly converting over to direct 96k or 192k.

 

Thanks

Bill

Edited September 10, 2023 by bhobba

[Addicted to music]

On 9/9/2023 at 9:27 PM, bhobba said:

 

So did I, but it was far from unanimous.

 

The problem IMHO was the publicity BS around it.   What they were doing is conceptually simple, but they both implemented it incorrectly and told a lot of BS about it like it was lossless (it most definitely was not), better than the original etc, etc - I remember the marketing; revolting IMHO.   I will do another post on what I think they should have done.

 

Tidal seems to be slowly converting over to direct 96k or 192k.

 

Thanks

Bill

don’t forget that predatory marketing to gain a market share in the recording chain was just wishful thinking,  no one is going to subscribe to this especially for general masses that don’t give a Schitt because it provided little to zero benefit.

Edited September 10, 2023 by Addicted to music

[davewantsmoore]

On 9/9/2023 at 9:27 PM, bhobba said:

it most definitely was not

Close enough though.

[bhobba]

2 hours ago, davewantsmoore said:

Close enough though.

 

All I can say is I liked it.   But that slow roll-off filter above about 24k is not lossless, and measurements showed significant post-ringing, which I never understood for a supposedly shallow filter - maybe it was their reconstruction filter.

 

IMHO, the Ayre filter would have been better:

https://www.ayre.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Ayre_MP_White_Paper.pdf

 

Just put that at 48khz and transmit as 196k sampled flac to prevent even the small amount of aliasing the filter introduces.   If the aliasing is below the noise floor, 96k is probably OK, but I suspect it is recording-dependent.   Then there is the bit-freezing trick.   You locate where the noise floor of the recording is, add a couple of bits just to be sure, and then set the bits below that to zero.   FLAC very efficiently encodes zero bits.  I read doing that produced better-quality files smaller than MQA. 

 

Thanks

Bill

Edited September 11, 2023 by bhobba

[Volunteer]

29 minutes ago, bhobba said:

 

All I can say is I liked it.   But that slow roll-off filter above about 24k is not lossless, and measurements showed significant post-ringing, which I never understood for a supposedly shallow filter.

 

IMHO, the Ayre filter would have been better:

https://www.ayre.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Ayre_MP_White_Paper.pdf

 

Thanks

Bill

 

I didn't like the format personally, however, the best playback I heard of MQA was from an Auralic Vega 2.1 which isn't an mqa compliant device.

 

Apparently, Auralic apply in-house filters to the format that, in my humble opinion, made it sound better than any other player/DAC I've heard, mqa compliant or otherwise.

 

 

[davewantsmoore]

49 minutes ago, bhobba said:

filter above about 24k is not lossless, and measurements showed significant post-ringing, which I never understood for a supposedly shallow filter - maybe it was their reconstruction filter.

But does any of that really matter?   (nobody ever made a convincing case that it does .... and in theory you would expect it not to ..... so <shrug>)

Don't get me wrong, I'm not real fan of MQA... but I think most people are barking up the wrong tree(s) as to what is good, or bad, about it.

 

On 9/7/2023 at 1:47 PM, rantan said:

I just hope something equally loathsome doesn't come along to try and gain proprietary control of music playback.

Somebody, at some point, is going to give the content owners what they desire .... which is effective control over how their works are used.

[bhobba]

1 hour ago, davewantsmoore said:

But does any of that really matter?  

 

No.    It is pretty much inaudible.  As I said, what I hated was the marketing lies and BS.   Even though I liked it; good riddance.  There are other ways of getting the benefits of MQA using just normal FLAC.

 

Modern DAC chips do at least 8X oversampling, pushing any images of, say, 196k material way outside the audible band.   All you need to worry about is frequencies that high, causing problems with amps, etc.   A designer I know solved the problem elegantly.   He used a standard chip, but his output was simply the highest quality Sowter audio transformer they make, which is flat to 70kz but drops off steeply after that.   He didn't worry about what was done inside the chip.

 

Thanks

Bill

Edited September 11, 2023 by bhobba

[bhobba]

A while ago, a paper was published with much of the technical detail of MQA, which wasn't easy to find previously:
https://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=20456

 

It is an updated version of a previous one with more detail.

The reason I posted it is that MQA stated (I think in Stereophile) that well over 99% of the material, when they chop off and dither the noisy bottom bits, there is nothing above 48khz left, so it is just a normal band-limited signal - but band-limited using a sneaky method.   No sneaky origami, etc.; use normal FLAC with bit-freezing, and you have MQA without the BS - just an unusual way of band-limiting 96k that supposedly reduced time smear.   For the very few cases where some musical detail is chopped off, you go to 192k Flac.   Sure, the material above 24khz is slightly lowered - but that is way above audibility. 

 

If they had done that, you would not need special decoders, watermarking the audio, this authentication stuff lighting up a stupid light and all the rubbish around it, i.e. no BS.   It might have succeeded then. 

Thanks
Bill

[LHC]

10 hours ago, bhobba said:

If they had done that, you would not need special decoders, watermarking the audio, this authentication stuff lighting up a stupid light and all the rubbish around it, i.e. no BS.   It might have succeeded then. 

 

You are correct that most of their BS was driven by marketing and businsse model. However the concept of authetication is a very useful idea. Discussion in othe forum threads have revealed an enduring problem with music content provenance in the music industry; a consensus authetication approach can solve this annoying problem. 

[davewantsmoore]

13 hours ago, bhobba said:

It might have succeeded then. 

But that would miss the point of what they are trying to ultimately achieve (all detailed, in patent speak, in their patents).

 

Audio content which:

• Plays back at a quality chosen by the rights holder - ie. depending on if, or how much, you have paid, the quality of the audio can adjust.... and this can happen even for audio files you have stored locally.
• Is a small size.   FLAC isn't that great at compressing files where > 20khz has "information" in it (even if that is just very quiet)... compared to MQA which can fit "DXD" into a 24/44 PCM sized container.
• It can play back on anything (16/44 PCM)
• Playback hardware can refuse to play certain content (or play it at a low quality)
• Consumers can know they have a certain version of an audio stream, and not "something else".

 

 

[davewantsmoore]

3 hours ago, LHC said:

authetication approach can solve this annoying problem. 

There are many technologies that are not yet fully adopted or utilised that can go a long way to solving this and other similar issues for content.

 

Essentially allowing for:

 

• Artists / content owners store their music in a (many) publicly accessible location(s).
• Consumers of content pay the content owners directly (micropayments) as the content is consumed.
• This doesn't preclude a "big music service" from creating an app, with a library of music.... consumers would just pay (micropayment) "music service" AND the content owner.
• Artists are always in control of their content, it's only stored where and how, they want to .... as opposed to being placed on the storage servers of "big music service X"
• You can verify that the content you are accessing is the legit content ... and not some imitation/scam.
• "Big music app" then don't need to "do deals" with the content owners .... they do deals with the consumer.    If Radiohead charge 5 thousandths of a cent per play ... then that's what I pay them, no matter if I access their music direct from any server where its located, or whether I listen to it via "Spotify App".    Spotify also charge me 1 thousandth of a cent per play when I'm listening via their music app/library.... they get paid for the service of providing a big shiny happy music app, which collates all the artist and genres, and news, and videos and whatever other things the music apps are doing these days.... they don't get paid for rent-seeking Radiohead... because I can go around Spotify, if I want to - the content is available for me to access any other way, by only paying Radiohead.

 

This may sound complex.... but it can all happen "automagically".

 

You simply put $20 in a bucket... and then go listen to some music.   Some hours later, you have $19.95 left in the bucket, which you can take back out when you want.

[Addicted to music]

5 hours ago, davewantsmoore said:

 

• Is a small size.   FLAC isn't that great at compressing files where > 20khz has "information" in it (even if that is just very quiet)... compared to MQA which can fit "DXD" into a 24/44 PCM sized container.

 

 

anything above 20khz is totally useless if you want to forensically iron out any operating contaminating oscillations that’s either happening in the recording studio or the equipment used.  And that’s been demonstrated here on this forum and other sites regardless how tiny it is especially when you go beyond 16/44.   Most “consumer grade electronics and even at “audiophile level” should have attenuated or started attenuated “band limited “  compensated so it won’t even respond to most freq outside 20khz and that has multiple advantages.   

Edited September 13, 2023 by Addicted to music

[stereo coffee]

On 07/04/2023 at 3:03 PM, metal beat said:

 

what did Microsoft do after they bought HDCD?

Shuffled the inventor into a minimalist role , ensuring no further development occurred.    https://referencerecordings.com/people/prof-keith-o-johnson/

[stereo coffee]

7 hours ago, Addicted to music said:

anything above 20khz is totally useless if you want to forensically iron out any operating contaminating oscillations that’s either happening in the recording studio or the equipment used.  And that’s been demonstrated here on this forum and other sites regardless how tiny it is especially when you go beyond 16/44.   Most “consumer grade electronics and even at “audiophile level” should have attenuated or started attenuated “band limited “  compensated so it won’t even respond to most freq outside 20khz and that has multiple advantages.   

We will have to agree to disagree.  The cause of having to limit is the sampling frequency  ,not what is possible by extending bandwidth .  The medium was proposed following the passing of Alec Reeves, and it was the anticipated length of a classical music piece that decided at the time to have maximum length of 74 minutes for CD. it was both this and the size of the medium that limited the frequency response, and directly related the sampling frequency chosen.

 

The medium, and its limitations arising  was chosen by what would be popular for consumers - rather than possibilities of  outright performance ability 

 

 

 

[metal beat]

1 hour ago, stereo coffee said:

Shuffled the inventor into a minimalist role , ensuring no further development occurred.    https://referencerecordings.com/people/prof-keith-o-johnson/

 

Keith is also the chief designer for Spectral Audio since the 70's.  Widely praised amplifiers. 

[Guest]

Just when I was about to unpin this thread and let it sink into the nether regions of the forums ...

 

Back from the dead.

 

Lenbrook Extends Leadership in Hi-Res Audio with MQA Acquisition

 

Quote

Lenbrook’s vision is of a thriving hi-fi industry where technologies that promote both consumer choice and the pursuit of the highest sound quality are deserving of investment and nurture. We view this acquisition as an opportunity to ensure the technologies developed by the scientists and engineers at MQA continue to serve the industry’s interests rather than be confined to any single brand or company.

 

Gordon Simmonds, Lenbrook Corp. CEO

 

[georgehifi]

And here we go again, https://www.stereophile.com/content/lenbrook-acquires-mqa

 

Cheers George

[John0001]

Audio zombies are real! Actually I don't mind the idea of its use as a bluetooth implementation to improve that side of things, but for PCM/High-rez? Yeah, nah.

[rantan]

So, it looks like the cancerous scourge has returned under new management. I guess we couldn't live the dream of consigning this travesty into the eternal fire of hell.

Somehow I knew it was too good to be true.

[Guest]

 

In all seriousness though, only the IP was acquired, and we know of many things MQA was working on, including the previously mentioned MQAir (SCL6). Bluesound was one of the first licensees of MQA, and obviously had strong connections. We may see new or different technologies implemented and none of the previous implementations of MQA. They've already lost TIDAL and it's highly unlikely they're going to come back.

 

I think MQA will be back, but not as we know it. That's my take.

 

We have someone from Lenbrook scheduled for a video interview at the upcoming Melbourne hi-fi show - so I'm looking forward to asking the direct questions in less than 4 weeks time.

[bhobba]

I have been doing some interesting experiments.

 

Most consider DXD the reference format.   I have one master recording, Carmen Gnomes Sings The Blues, in DXD - it sounds fantastic.   

 

However, it is over 3GB Flac.  What you want is to transmit that at MQA rates somehow.    To simulate what that would be, I converted it to 88.2/24 - it was 1GB.

 

Then I took the DXD Master and converted it to 16bits FLAC with triangular dither.   Surprise, surprise - it compressed to 1.19 GB.

 

Then I did a few comparisons.   You could hear the difference between the 88.2/24 bit and DXD at 24 bit without much effort (the 88.2 was slightly veiled).   But when I compared it to the 16-bit version, god it was hard to pick a difference.   I think there was one favouring the 24-bit, but I doubt I could pick it blind.

 

Importantly though, this particular recording was one of the first DXD recordings commercially available and designed to show off the format.  I also ran the file through a program called XIFEO.    You can't buy it anymore (the company went out of business) but the trial version is still downloadable and allows use on the first minute of your audio.   What it does is determine the highest frequency of actual audio vs. noise.   It runs a filter above that frequency so higher frequency noise is filtered out and not compressed (FLAC compresses noise badly).   It then looks at the noise floor of the Audio and bit freezes unnecessary bits.   On most HD recordings, it makes a big difference eg Riding with the King high definition is just upsampled 48k, and many other HD recordings could easily be resampled lower.   On that recording, it simply chops off two bits; it has musical content at 176400Hz.  Amazing.

 

Also, remember each frequency doubling adds one bit to the bit depth, so 16-bit DXD is effectively 19 bits, plus it was dithered.  

 

This little experiment convinced me there is no need for MQA and other shenanigans.   Transmit the DXD master at 16 bits dithered.  But before, run it through something like XIFEO to determine the optimal sample rate and bit depth.   It would also be great if someone would bring out another version of XIFEO that does it automatically.

 

Thanks

Bill

[GregWormald]

On 20/09/2023 at 11:53 AM, Marc said:

<snips>In all seriousness though, only the IP was acquired

This. 

To say that MQA was bought is not quite correct, its corpse was bought.

[Guest]

Lenbrook on the MQA acquisition:

 

 

[georgehifi]

14 minutes ago, Marc said:

Lenbrook on the MQA acquisition:

Cas Oostvogel (Product Manager at NAD Electronics): "We were one perhaps the first adapter of MQA when it came out."

 

Sounds to me like a desparate man trying to hang onto his job, NAD sunk quite a bit into MQA at first and is now with this, desperately trying to resurrect it to make up for the losses they had with it. 

 

RIP MQA

 

Cheers George

Edited December 11, 2023 by georgehifi

[Guest]

Not sure how you jumped to that conclusion from what you heard in that small part of the video.

 

He's the NAD Product Manager so I highly doubt the MQA or anything to do with it actually affects him at all from an employment perspective. When you speak to him, he's highly passionate about the talent they picked up from MQA that is now part of the Lenbook staff - more of the digital side of audio, than MQA technology itself.