MQA Users & Discussion Thread

[Guest Eggcup the Dafter]

9 hours ago, metal beat said:

 

Bob's had many trys at making digital sound like analog.   remember DVD-A?

 

the guy is more about $$ than sound.

 

Pass.

Actually he seems to have lost his and other people’ money to the time of over $100m US chasing this dream. I suspect that he’s now prisoner to his investors and the bulk processing into MQA is on now because with the automated process it’s a comparatively cheap step.. 

 

MQa’s developers will probably be set to work on producing demonstration recordings and trying to do the “from the mic” stage of the process, while the big investors who know how to fleece us get on wth the rest.

[Guest]

Quit Tidal just now, with reason: "Tidal pushing MQA".  Maybe more people should be explicit when quitting....

[NonPlayableCharacter]

26 minutes ago, Snoopy8 said:

Quit Tidal just now, with reason: "Tidal pushing MQA".  Maybe more people should be explicit when quitting....

Good work.

 

When I quit, I gave the reason "MQA is crap and I am not giving Dorsey any of my money" (it was the day that Square announced their buy-in).

 

Now don't forget to write to their customer services and request they delete all personal data. They will ask for identity confirmation to make you jump through a hoop or two, but do it anyway.

[LHC]

On 01/05/2021 at 8:50 AM, Eggcup the Dafter said:

Actually he seems to have lost his and other people’ money to the time of over $100m US chasing this dream. I suspect that he’s now prisoner to his investors and the bulk processing into MQA is on now because with the automated process it’s a comparatively cheap step.. 

 

MQa’s developers will probably be set to work on producing demonstration recordings and trying to do the “from the mic” stage of the process, while the big investors who know how to fleece us get on wth the rest.

You hit the nail on the head - this is the elephant in the room.

 

These appears to be the facts:

• MQA developers are indeed capable of producing great sounding recordings like the Adele demonstrating recording that Marc heard. "From the mic" stage is where the work needs to happen to produce fantastic masters (that have great dynamic range for a start). Authenticating those true masters would indeed be a great leap in audio quality. To be able to influence all music labels and studios to adapt this is the 'promised land' potential of MQA. The potential for improved audio performance here is real.
• No other streaming companies are interested in producing quality recordings, not Qobuz, not Amazon, not Apple, not Spotify. We saw that Qobuz offered a recent hi-res 24/48 track that has a poor DR score of 5. They are interested in selling people a lossless hi-res format; but less interested in the quality of the content within. So only Tidal/MQA has the potential to achieve this sonic improvement at the moment.
• The practical reality of scaling the above sonic improvement to large music catalogues and archives is probably prohibitive for a profitable business. They might be able to solve that in the future through automation, but at the moment it is not profitable. Just imagine if they could automate that 'white glove' process ...
• So now MQA have the three major labels onboard, the low hanging fruit is a mass dump of their catalogues onto a MQA format, without regard to improving the quality of recordings. It is a cheap step for short term profit, and people's criticism of them are valid.

If the dot points are correct then quitting Tidal/MQA is not necessarily going to make things better. Seeing MQA fail and go bust won't improve the quality of recordings as they are uniquely positioned to induce that paradigm shift. MQA is indeed our last hope.

[NonPlayableCharacter]

36 minutes ago, LHC said:

You hit the nail on the head - this is the elephant in the room.

 

These appears to be the facts:

• MQA developers are indeed capable of producing great sounding recordings like the Adele demonstrating recording that Marc heard. "From the mic" stage is where the work needs to happen to produce fantastic masters (that have great dynamic range for a start). Authenticating those true masters would indeed be a great leap in audio quality. To be able to influence all music labels and studios to adapt this is the 'promised land' potential of MQA. The potential for improved audio performance here is real.
• No other streaming companies are interested in producing quality recordings, not Qobuz, not Amazon, not Apple, not Spotify. We saw that Qobuz offered a recent hi-res 24/48 track that has a poor DR score of 5. They are interested in selling people a lossless hi-res format; but less interested in the quality of the content within. So only Tidal/MQA has the potential to achieve this sonic improvement at the moment.
• The practical reality of scaling the above sonic improvement to large music catalogues and archives is probably prohibitive for a profitable business. They might be able to solve that in the future through automation, but at the moment it is not profitable. Just imagine if they could automate that 'white glove' process ...
• So now MQA have the three major labels onboard, the low hanging fruit is a mass dump of their catalogues onto a MQA format, without regard to improving the quality of recordings. It is a cheap step for short term profit, and people's criticism of them are valid.

If the dot points are correct then quitting Tidal/MQA is not necessarily going to make things better. Seeing MQA fail and go bust won't improve the quality of recordings as they are uniquely positioned to induce that paradigm shift. MQA is indeed our last hope.

 

The dynamic range example could easily be explained. What is the recording in question? Was the DR greater on CD release material? Does it pre-date digital and had been remastered during the loudness wars? I have numerous 60's, 70's and 80's pre-digital era vinyl releases that are referenced on https://dr.loudness-war.info/ showing DR scores of 12-15 alongside references to corresponding remaster releases on CD issued in later decades with a DR of 6-10. If Qobuz took the remasters from this era, then there is an indicator of why.

 

If MQA is a genuine attempt to make things better, then the cash-grab of converting back catalogues through batch processing was not the way to win the war.

 

I have no doubt on the potential of the technology when used end-to-end. It's plausible and relatively easy to understand. The way to win the war would have been to do it this way:

• Use MQA end-to-end on new recordings and releases to showcase the capabilities. This starts the revenue stream.
• Leave all back catalogues where the original analogue masters are unavailable as they are.
• Leave loudness war era remasters alone too.
• Go back to analogue masters as a long term project and slowly work the halfway house black magic on those in order of likely popularity (play ratings on streaming services will give the approx. order of work). Clearly you can't do end-to-end magic on these but using the earliest verifiable master is probably a good starting point. This set of steps will undoubtedly become a recognised mastering skill that is unlikely being done right now due to the cold batch conversion process that is ongoing.
• Do not have Tidal remove PCM versions once properly treated MQA remasters are available. Leave consumer choice in play.

If your third bullet point (below) which lines-up with my forth bullet (above) ends-up going into the "too hard" pile, and all we have is back catalogues of mangled, batch processed crap, what then?

36 minutes ago, LHC said:

The practical reality of scaling the above sonic improvement to large music catalogues and archives is probably prohibitive for a profitable business. They might be able to solve that in the future through automation, but at the moment it is not profitable. Just imagine if they could automate that 'white glove' process ...

This is my single biggest worry - I would estimate 60-70% of my listening was written in a time that pre-dates digital. If MQA take-up becomes pervasive amongst streaming services and back catalogues are replaced with batch processed MQA with no quality assurance or care as has largely happened to-date, well....

 

No wonder people see MQA as a huge land-grab to own the audio chain and rinse it for profits.

Edited May 2, 2021 by El Tel
Punchu.. punktoo.. puntchoowashu. Spelling.

[Grant Slack]

23 hours ago, El Tel said:

 

The dynamic range example could easily be explained. What is the recording in question? Was the DR greater on CD release material? ...

Hi El Tel 

 

As well as your excellent points on recording compression, DR Score jumps up and down with:-

• The music itself. I reckon some music would score a 1 or 2 even with a perfect uncompressed recording, or if it were possible, even measured directly off the live microphone feed. 
   
• Making mastering adjustments that have nothing to do with the dynamic range or use of compression. I once saw a video by recording engineer Ian Shepherd, where he took one of his own masters and mixed some of the bass to mono (a la LP mastering), and the DR Score jumped up by six. 
   

Anyway, a bit off the main point. I agree with you about the quality of the recording and mastering. MQA could have built huge credibility by standing firm on high standards for the whole recording chain. They could have changed our world. 
 

cheers

Grant

 

[NonPlayableCharacter]

8 minutes ago, Grant Slack said:

DR Score jumps up and down with:-

 

Bang on. That's why I pointed towards https://dr.loudness-war.info/ - on the entries with many submissions, you can find the year of issue for a vinyl recording (initial releases, represses, reissues, remasters etc) and see the remastering differences in the later CD/streaming releases too. It's an eye-opener.

 

Some component items will screw with the overall DR scores/averages due to deliberate "art" preciousness of silent tracks. e.g. Sigur Rós on Von - "18 sekúndur fyrir sólarupprás" (18 Seconds before Sunrise). It still gets a DR score of 6 even though it is 18 seconds of silence.... Go figure!?

 

 

[Guest Eggcup the Dafter]

1 hour ago, Grant Slack said:

Hi El Tel 

 

As well as your excellent points on recording compression, DR Score jumps up and down with:-

• The music itself. I reckon some music would score a 1 or 2 even with a perfect uncompressed recording, or if it were possible, even measured directly off the live microphone feed. 
   
• Making mastering adjustments that have nothing to do with the dynamic range or use of compression. I once saw a video by recording engineer Ian Shepherd, where he took one of his own masters and mixed some of the bass to mono (a la LP mastering), and the DR Score jumped up by six. 
   

Anyway, a bit off the main point. I agree with you about the quality of the recording and mastering. MQA could have built huge credibility by standing firm on high standards for the whole recording chain. They could have changed our world. 
 

cheers

Grant

 

That point about bass is interesting and tends to confirm my suspicion that DR score has come down on a lot of digital remasters because the bass is being "restored" to what was originally intended. It also suggests we can't compare LP and PCM DR scores as some do to push the idea of LP superiority in that regard.

The whole business makes judging format differences a lot harder. Without provenance, we have no idea what we are comparing on different formats or streaming services!

 

 

[NonPlayableCharacter]

7 minutes ago, Eggcup the Dafter said:

That point about bass is interesting and tends to confirm my suspicion that DR score has come down on a lot of digital remasters because the bass is being "restored" to what was originally intended.

 

You're probably spot-on there. Due to physical limitations of representing low frequencies on vinyl, the bass would need to be altered to go onto digital formats otherwise it wouldn't be heard.

 

The DR scores for vinyl on the website I linked to are post-phono-stage. As some will know, part of the phono-stage's job is to apply the RIAA (or alternatives) equalisation curve to the output before amplification. This gets around physical limitations of cutting proper bass frequencies on vinyl.

 

The job of remastering is to take the levels at post phono-stage and mirror them in the digital realm so they sound the same. The problem was that new recordings in the digital age and even those recorded in analogue and mastered in digital for CD were usually subject to over-zealous mastering where all frequency bands were boosted into the loudest section of the full frequency range of the track - "the loudness wars". This spilled-over into digital remastering of old analogue catalogues.

[Guest]

It appears that HDTracks no longer sells MQA music.

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/hdtracks-stopped-carrying-mqa-format-files.19862/

[MLXXX]

20 hours ago, El Tel said:

The job of remastering is to take the levels at post phono-stage and mirror them in the digital realm so they sound the same.

We know that an equalisation curve is involved in the cutting and an inverse curve  is involved in the playing back.  However, over and above that, the bass may need to be throttled back to avoid playing time or trackability issues in a vinyl disc played by a consumer in their home.  That "additional manipulation" is a fact of life that must be accepted for practical reasons.

 

So I would have thought that the job of remastering for digital would be to reflect the original mix (whether it was analogue on open reel tape, or digital), not to try to recreate the "same sound" of the playback of a vinyl pressing, including the "additional manipulation" I have just referred to.  Of course if the original recording mix has been lost, all that can be done is to use a pressing and it may be difficult to restore the bass in those circumstances.

 

I'd agree with the observation that the DR figure for a digital version being less than a vinyl version could sometimes be due to heavy bass of the original mix being retained/restored for the digital version.

[LHC]

A bit off-topic, but this is an example of when a company (Apple in this case) abuses its market position for anticompetitive plays, they get called out by the authorities (EU in this case). This is how things ought to work. 

 

 

[Bunno77]

https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/bits-and-bytes/the-q-sessions-straight-from-the-studio-pure-pcm-recording-available-on-qobuz-r1007/ 

 

First paragraph. Brilliant

[LHC]

6 hours ago, Bunno77 said:

https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/bits-and-bytes/the-q-sessions-straight-from-the-studio-pure-pcm-recording-available-on-qobuz-r1007/ 

 

First paragraph. Brilliant

Cool. If this takes off in a big way then MQA goes to dust bin. 

Edited May 5, 2021 by LHC

[tripitaka]

2 hours ago, Bunno77 said:

https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/bits-and-bytes/the-q-sessions-straight-from-the-studio-pure-pcm-recording-available-on-qobuz-r1007/ 

 

First paragraph. Brilliant

 

Amen

 

[Guest]

Interesting response from Hans...

 

He argues that all that matters is what people hear (he likes it!) and Bob Stewart and people at the company should be given the benefit of the doubt because of their previous scientific endeavour.

[rantan]

17 minutes ago, Snoopy8 said:

He argues that all that matters is what people hear (he likes it!) and Bob Stewart and people at the company should be given the benefit of the doubt because of their previous scientific endeavour.

 

To me the whole video is 13 minutes of being vague and not saying anything likely to change one's mind or shed any new light on the debate.

 

Surely we deserve better than  it must be good because Bob Stuart is a legend and some dude who is an expert in astral telescopes, both know their schit and have your best interests at heart. Just trust us, go away and don't ask questions.

 

The thing is what do they know that the rest of the industry does not ?

 

Also this video by Hans manages to completely avoid any mention of using MQA as an anti competitive plan to force manufacturers and buyers to accept an attempt to sanction a monopoly proprietary format .

 

The anti MQA debate is much less to do with sound quality than it is to do with anti competitive practices and gaining control of music releases.

[zippi]

Agree 100% @rantan.

 

I generally quite like(d) Hans's videos though always thought there was a tendency towards fence sitting and hedging of bets. This latest one really takes the cake as it's completely vague and a non-statement. Given the track record of indipendent opinion -  I (foolishly) expected something of value would be said in either direction. Not to be. Have promptly unsubscribed as I feel this really is a topic not to be taken lightly given the anti competitive aspects of the issue very likelyu unfollding before our eyes and ears.

 

And I don't even stream. Nothing - no QoBuz no Tidal no Spotify ------ nada!

So don't really have skin in the game. However can easily recognise thhe weight and size of potential implications of this unfolding (pun effin intended) situation.

[Gee Emm]

16 hours ago, rantan said:

Also this video by Hans manages to completely avoid any mention of using MQA as an anti competitive plan to force manufacturers and buyers to accept an attempt to sanction a monopoly proprietary format .

 

The anti MQA debate is much less to do with sound quality than it is to do with anti competitive practices and gaining control of music releases.

 

This is the guts of it really for me.

I keep thinking it's more "greed and ego", than "master & quality"

[TP1]

 

Hans  suggested that perhaps MQA is effective with cheaper , less accomplished DACs with the corollary  being that better designed DACs will sound better without it.  There is no hard  evidence for this of course  but I would be interested in hearing  what people think if they have  compared Tidal/MQA to their own lossless recording  through the same DAC.  I have been struggling to find anyone who has preferred the streaming version

[tripitaka]

19 hours ago, zippi said:

@rantan

19 hours ago, zippi said:

 @rantan.

However can easily recognise the weight and size of potential implications of this unfolding (pun effin intended) situation.

 

 

Bonus mark for pun

Edited May 9, 2021 by tripitaka

[Guest]

53 minutes ago, TP1 said:

There is no hard  evidence for this of course  but I would be interested in hearing  what people think if they have  compared Tidal/MQA to their own lossless recording  through the same DAC.  I have been struggling to find anyone who has preferred the streaming version

If you have a MQA capable DAC, you can do your own using 2L samplers, which have the same masters. 

 

Some comparisons online:

https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/37248-mqa-v-pcm-same-song-same-sample-rate-same-equipment/

https://community.roonlabs.com/t/listening-impression-of-decoded-mqa-albums-vs-hi-res-pcm-dsd/18120

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/dsd-vs-pcm-vs-mqa-group-listening-experiment

 

And a recent one from ASR

 

[Guest]

It is interesting that there are quite a number of pro MQA "audiophile influencers"  :  Amir at ASR, Hans Beekhuysen, John Darko,  John Atkinson (Technical Editor, Stereophile). No wonder MQA has generated such momentum among consumers. Articles exposing MQA flaws by Archimago at AS and now GoldenOne (AS & ASR) have galvanised the opposition. 

 

But are the consumers the key here?  Or is it the record labels, with Warner leading the MQA charge?  Or is it the music streaming services that will determine MQA's fate?  Tidal has doubled its bets on MQA, but so far, none of the others, Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer, Qobuz have adopted it. 

 

I think music streaming services will determine MQA's fate... 

[LHC]

3 minutes ago, Snoopy8 said:

I think music streaming services will determine MQA's fate...

I would argue it is Google and Youtube. Bob in the latest interview with What Hi-Fi, he talks about moving MQA into video streaming at 17:00 min mark.

 

A gem at the 20:50 min mark: Lucy Hedges: "Absolutely, MQA domination, broadcast video, ... " Bob: "Well, yes, except we're not trying to dominate. We're just trying to make sound better whenever we can make it better."

 

 

 

[tripitaka]

6 minutes ago, Snoopy8 said:

It is interesting that there are quite a number of pro MQA "audiophile influencers"  :  Amir at ASR, Hans Beekhuysen, John Darko,  John Atkinson (Technical Editor, Stereophile). No wonder MQA has generated such momentum among consumers. Articles exposing MQA flaws by Archimago at AS and now GoldenOne (AS & ASR) have galvanised the opposition. 

 

But are the consumers the key here?  Or is it the record labels, with Warner leading the MQA charge?  Or is it the music streaming services that will determine MQA's fate?  Tidal has doubled its bets on MQA, but so far, none of the others, Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer, Qobuz have adopted it. 

 

I think music streaming services will determine MQA's fate... 

 

Sounds right.

 

There was presumably an MQA marriage of convenience with Tidal - which needed to differentiate itself from Spotify.

 

So Tidal rolled the dice and the other streamers probably didnt care - if MQA took off they too would jump on the MQA bandwagon. It makes the Australian Tidal trial very interesting, how many are still paying the MQA premium?

 

Interesting times