MQA is Vaporware

[Indydan]

I was looking over MQA's PUBLIC Facebook page. On the right, this is written:

 

Our Story

 

MQA·FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 2018

MQA is an award-winning British technology that delivers the sound of the studio in a file that’s small enough to stream or download. What’s more, it’s backward compatible so MQA music will play back on any device. The days of sacrificing quality for convenience are finally over.

 

 

Is it just me? Or is that paragraph loaded with bullshit?!

1. What awards has MQA won?

2. MQA files are the sound of the studio? Does that mean PCM files were recorded in a broom closet?

3. Small enough to stream or download? I must have a magic internet connection, because I download Hi Res PCM files on a weekly basis. I also stream CD quality files from Tidal.

4. MQA will play on any device* Yes, but you don't get the second unfold or uprezzing or whatever it is without an MQA DAC.

5. The days of sacrificing quality for convenience are finally over? How is MQA more convenient than PCM? 

 

That is five bullshit statements in only three sentences! Probably a record. 

Maybe we should leave comments on their Facebook page. 

 

https://www.facebook.com/mqasound/

[Spacehound]

2 hours ago, Indydan said:

I was looking over MQA's PUBLIC Facebook page. On the right, this is written:

 

Our Story

 

MQA·FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 2018

MQA is an award-winning British technology that delivers the sound of the studio in a file that’s small enough to stream or download. What’s more, it’s backward compatible so MQA music will play back on any device. The days of sacrificing quality for convenience are finally over.

 

 

Is it just me? Or is that paragraph loaded with bullshit?!

1. What awards has MQA won?

2. MQA files are the sound of the studio? Does that mean PCM files were recorded in a broom closet?

3. Small enough to stream or download? I must have a magic internet connection, because I download Hi Res PCM files on a weekly basis. I also stream CD quality files from Tidal.

4. MQA will play on any device* Yes, but you don't get the second unfold or uprezzing or whatever it is without an MQA DAC.

5. The days of sacrificing quality for convenience are finally over? How is MQA more convenient than PCM? 

 

That is five bullshit statements in only three sentences! Probably a record. 

Maybe we should leave comments on their Facebook page. 

 

https://www.facebook.com/mqasound/

The original claim, that MQA can give '44.1' quality in a smaller space made some sense. And that (leaving aside the 'studio' stuff, which was never true)  was all they claimed.

 

Since then they have gradually broadened their claims into realms of pure fantasy. 

[Hifi Bob]

5 hours ago, Indydan said:

1. What awards has MQA won?

https://www.twice.com/the-wire/mqa-wins-trio-awards-63268

 

The panel of BEEA judges unanimously agreed that “the development of the MQA audio codec – and its positive reception by leading consumer electronics brands – shows the UK is more than capable of holding its own in this highly competitive market.”

 

 

Urghh— embarrassing.

[Spacehound]

11 minutes ago, Hifi Bob said:

https://www.twice.com/the-wire/mqa-wins-trio-awards-63268

 

The panel of BEEA judges unanimously agreed that “the development of the MQA audio codec – and its positive reception by leading consumer electronics brands – shows the UK is more than capable of holding its own in this highly competitive market.”

 

 

Urghh— embarrassing.

It's somewhat optimistic to award their  "success" when their  last financial report shows a turnover of only £29,000 (which is less than mine and I'm only an 'old age pensioner')  and losses of £3.6 million, all spent on "administrative expenses"

[Don Hills]

6 hours ago, Indydan said:

Forget about Schiit's brand new version of the Yggdrasil. According to TAS, it's already obsolete! I wonder what the Schiit guys would say about that?

 

On the basis that "a picture is worth a thousand words":

 

About a year ago, Schiit said this:

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/schiit-happened-the-story-of-the-worlds-most-improbable-start-up.701900/page-1104#post-13192083

 

And just a few days ago, they said this:

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/schiit-happened-the-story-of-the-worlds-most-improbable-start-up.701900/page-1882#post-13966972

 

 

[FredericV]

12 hours ago, Indydan said:

TAS makes me sick. In the last paragraph of this review, the reviewer says DACs that don’t decode MQA are obsolete!

 

True bullshit!

 

http://www.theabsolutesound.com/articles/nad-c-368-hybrid-digital-dacamplifier/

 

Using the same logic as TAS, blusound must be obsolete, as it does not play DSD.

Adding dsdplay to the BS firmware can't be that hard, unless their arm cpu is not fast enough:

https://github.com/SqueezeOnArch/dsdplay

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

7 hours ago, Indydan said:

Forget about Schiit's brand new version of the Yggdrasil. According to TAS, it's already obsolete! I wonder what the Schiit guys would say about that?

 

 

That’s a good one. Now both of the old guard mags consider the Yggdrasil obsolete. 

[Rt66indierock]

2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

That’s a good one. Now both of the old guard mags consider the Yggdrasil obsolete. 

 

Thanks for an excellent suggestion there a few things I can do with old in your context.

I hope you have recovered from whatever caused the FML post. 

 

PS I'm enjoying the Super Bowl in Minneapolis. I find the Phoenix Open after the auto auctions to be just the right big event for this week. Adding the Super Bowl to it can be a little much. Lamborghini's and Ferrari's were in many entertaining places when we hosted both events last time.

[christopher3393]

5 hours ago, Rt66indierock said:

I hope you have recovered from whatever caused the FML post. 

 

?

[The Computer Audiophile]

 

12 minutes ago, christopher3393 said:

 

?

 

On 1/30/2018 at 6:10 PM, The Computer Audiophile said:

FML. 

[mcgillroy]

Archimago has a new set of MQA measurements up and it’s not pretty: 

 

http://archimago.blogspot.de/2018/02/musingsmeasurements-on-blurring-and-why.html

 

In addition to what’s already known about MQA (lossy, strong alaising artifacts,  minimum phase induced phase shift, DRM) they found a 40-50us delay of the high vs low frequencies and up to 1% THD added in the high frequencies. 

 

So MQA introduces additional temporal “blur” and acts as an harmonic exciter.

 

Mr. Atkinson could you please give Bob a call and ask him to “debunk” these measurements?!  Thank you

 

 

[Shadders]

19 minutes ago, mcgillroy said:

So MQA introduces additional temporal “blur” and acts as an harmonic exciter.

Hi,

As per Brian Lucey statement.

The blur could be MQA home grown version of QSound.

Basically - a con.

Regards,

Shadders.

[Brinkman Ship]

Extensive listening test underway. Expect report on Monday.

[esldude]

28 minutes ago, Brinkman Ship said:

Extensive listening test underway. Expect report on Monday.

Describe parameters of your listening test.  Have you obtained MQA files and non-MQA you know are the same master?  Are you able to match levels very carefully?

[Brinkman Ship]

Just now, esldude said:

Describe parameters of your listening test.  Have you obtained MQA files and non-MQA you know are the same master?  Are you able to match levels very carefully?

Yes, and Yes. Full details after weekend.

[esldude]

Just now, Brinkman Ship said:

Yes, and Yes. Full details after weekend.

Please, some details now. 

 

A collaborative effort to have your listening test mean something to other people. 

[Ralf11]

it is always better to write down the methodology before details fade from memory...

[mansr]

31 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

it is always better to write down the methodology before details fade from memory...

It is also good to have someone review your methodology before you spend a lot of time on experiments.

[Fokus]

13 hours ago, mcgillroy said:

In addition to what’s already known about MQA (lossy, strong alaising artifacts,  minimum phase induced phase shift, DRM) they found a 40-50us delay of the high vs low frequencies and up to 1% THD added in the high frequencies.

 

 He found nothing new, he only documented it more explicitly.

 

'minimum phase', 'induced phase shift', and '40-50us delay of the high' all amount to the same.

 

The overload/distortion behaviour was also known.

 

And it must be remarked here that the filter Archimago tested is the oversampling filter for non-MQA CD-rate material, and presumable for MQA CD-rate as well. But this filter may, or may not, play a role in the decoding of high-res MQA. We simply do not know at this stage.

[Rt66indierock]

I just saw that someone had crunched the numbers. There are 7,406 unique MQA albums Tidal.  It's still vaporware.

[Archimago]

14 hours ago, Fokus said:

 

 He found nothing new, he only documented it more explicitly.

 

'minimum phase', 'induced phase shift', and '40-50us delay of the high' all amount to the same.

 

The overload/distortion behaviour was also known.

 

And it must be remarked here that the filter Archimago tested is the oversampling filter for non-MQA CD-rate material, and presumable for MQA CD-rate as well. But this filter may, or may not, play a role in the decoding of high-res MQA. We simply do not know at this stage.

 

Hi Fokus,

Yes, ultimately I'm certainly not saying that this is demonstration of something we do not know or intuit from before. Since Man's work and revelations of all the filters used in MQA - which includes the ones they use for hi-res - we can intuitively state that what MQA is doing results in group delays across the board with each of those filters demonstrated (though perhaps to varying degrees).

 

What I have not seen in any of the magazines/diagrams of course is anyone put it as explicitly which was the whole point of that post. To show with an actual MQA DAC the temporal nature of that filter in the context of everything else like the THD+N the filter induces, the frequency anomalies (imaging), the intersample overload, and now the phase anomaly/group delay...

 

The last piece of MQA's mythology that we should consider discussing and asking of MQA is that it "improves" time-domain accuracy. Beyond just showing the impulse response and talk of ringing and such. Or be impressed by claims of 5us this and that based on "neuroscience" or whatever.

 

Already, we know that the technique reduces bit-depth, employs lossy techniques, introduces imaging, has been shown to cause aliasing distortions even when downsampling to the 44/48kHz container, adds harmonic and non-harmonic distortion. Now we explicitly add to the mix temporal distortion inherent in the filter - which is not only significant for MQA CD's but also when all those 44.1/48kHz albums are upsampled for 88/96kHz "unfold" (stuff like Ed Sheeran, Beyonce, Bruno Mars, etc. already on Tidal)...

 

I'm sure most of us already are either aware or suspicious... Beyond "time domain" claims, there is nothing left of MQA that suggests that it is "better" in any way. It literally IMO is just a shell made of promises and claims to incorporate the cryptographic signature, and control "authenticated" playback whether on one's computer or thru DAC firmware.

 

[Spacehound]

"It literally IMO is just a shell made of promises and claims to incorporate the cryptographic signature, and control "authenticated" playback whether on one's computer or thru DAC firmware."

 

Right down at the 'bare metal" it is a last ditch attempt to preserve the existence of Meridian,  which has been a business disaster  from 'Lecson' onwards,  and thus continue  Stuart's income by any means possible (or hopefully in  this case,  impossible).

 

 

[adamdea]

11 hours ago, Archimago said:

 

Hi Fokus,

Yes, ultimately I'm certainly not saying that this is demonstration of something we do not know or intuit from before. Since Man's work and revelations of all the filters used in MQA - which includes the ones they use for hi-res - we can intuitively state that what MQA is doing results in group delays across the board with each of those filters demonstrated (though perhaps to varying degrees).

 

What I have not seen in any of the magazines/diagrams of course is anyone put it as explicitly which was the whole point of that post. To show with an actual MQA DAC the temporal nature of that filter in the context of everything else like the THD+N the filter induces, the frequency anomalies (imaging), the intersample overload, and now the phase anomaly/group delay...

 

The last piece of MQA's mythology that we should consider discussing and asking of MQA is that it "improves" time-domain accuracy. Beyond just showing the impulse response and talk of ringing and such. Or be impressed by claims of 5us this and that based on "neuroscience" or whatever.

 

Already, we know that the technique reduces bit-depth, employs lossy techniques, introduces imaging, has been shown to cause aliasing distortions even when downsampling to the 44/48kHz container, adds harmonic and non-harmonic distortion. Now we explicitly add to the mix temporal distortion inherent in the filter - which is not only significant for MQA CD's but also when all those 44.1/48kHz albums are upsampled for 88/96kHz "unfold" (stuff like Ed Sheeran, Beyonce, Bruno Mars, etc. already on Tidal)...

 

I'm sure most of us already are either aware or suspicious... Beyond "time domain" claims, there is nothing left of MQA that suggests that it is "better" in any way. It literally IMO is just a shell made of promises and claims to incorporate the cryptographic signature, and control "authenticated" playback whether on one's computer or thru DAC firmware.

 

Arch I would like to thank you for taking the trouble to demonstrate the time domain effects of filters on real world musical transients. [btw I seem to be unable to post my thanks on your thread. Perhaps this is a fault with my google account as I would like to hope I have not been banned] . It is a disgrace that the mainstream audiophile press has not done this. 

 

There simply cannot be and never has been any excuse for allowing purveyors of non LP filters to claim that they are better "in the time domain" fullstop and without qualification. This is not an issue of academic interest because the moment that one recognises that any non linear phase filter (and any filter without something like full attenuation at nyquist) must change the shape of the output in the time domain, then one knows that any proper time domain claim must properly be "under these circumstances", "in this respect" and "compared with this" .

 

The audiophile press had  only to require the proponents of MQA, the minimum phase filter. the nos dac  to explain under what circumstances their product will be better,  than what,  and in what respect  -to find the claim largely evaporating. And then they would have to concede that it was worse in the following respects and in the following circumstances. Already we wold be a long way down the line to being able to evaluate marketing claims and to assess whether the hype could match the real technical point.

 

But no one did ask that question so they never did have to answer. So someone had to actually do the work. Thank you for asking the right questions and showing independent thought and intellectual honesty.

[adamdea]

On 2/4/2018 at 8:43 AM, Fokus said:

 

 He found nothing new, he only documented it more explicitly.

 

'minimum phase', 'induced phase shift', and '40-50us delay of the high' all amount to the same.

 

The overload/distortion behaviour was also known.

 

And it must be remarked here that the filter Archimago tested is the oversampling filter for non-MQA CD-rate material, and presumable for MQA CD-rate as well. But this filter may, or may not, play a role in the decoding of high-res MQA. We simply do not know at this stage.

Strictly you are right of course. But it would be a mistake to underestimate the importance of actually showing all of this on a real signal. The idea that MQA is better "in the time domain" is sticky and has gained a lot of purchase because fourier transform pairs are not widely understood and I genuinely believe that most folks assume that what they are told in the press is at least mainly accurate. It therefore needs to be spelt out.

 

Once it is understood that MQA is not accurate in the time domain, then you just have to leave it up to audiophiles to decide whether their ears and systems are good enough to hear the faults.  After all Robert Watts makes a new dac with 1m taps instead of 250k and everyone can hear the difference. 

[semente]

On 23/01/2018 at 12:27 PM, mansr said:

Michael Lavorgna, banned for telling someone to go fuck his mother.

 

Wow, really?