MQA the next "perfect sound forever"?

[Ki Choi]

I had to be in sitting position for a while last night and picked up the latest TSA. I read the gushing review of the new MQA encoding and decoding scheme and thought - are we talking about the Perfect Sound Forever 2016 version?
The article mentioned encoding 24/88 master files with MQA and playing it back via MQA DAC and the file became smaller in file size and sounding better than the original... Isn't it defying the law of physics?

[MylesBAstor]

I had to be in sitting position for a while last night and picked up the latest TSA. I read the gushing review of the new MQA encoding and decoding scheme and thought - are we talking about the Perfect Sound Forever 2016 version?
The article mentioned encoding 24/88 master files with MQA and playing it back via MQA DAC and the file became smaller in file size and sounding better than the original... Isn't it defying the law of physics?

Is it DOA with streamable DSD?

[Ki Choi]

Considering many file streaming companies including Tidal are signing up, it will work with streamable DSD files. The article said once the files are encoded using MQA, it becomes easier to stream due to smaller size files. However, all the files streaming companies have must be encoded with MQA...seems to be lot of work unless they can do it in batches.

[MylesBAstor]

http://dsd.st/en/

http://www.korg.com/us/news/2015/0122/

I can't find the link but I had a note recently that a company in Chicago was now offering music streamed in DSD.

[bpw]

Check out this article penned by Chris Connaker recently.

[mep]

TAS wrote an article about MQA 2 years ago that was gushing with praise and acted like MQA was just around the corner. Fast forward 2 years and TAS writes another article about MQA that is gushing with praise and tells us MQA is just around the corner. The article Brian linked to said MQA is growing like a snowball rolling down a hill. Really? Where is that big snowball?

The reality is that MQA has yet to enter the marketplace in a meaningful way meaning there is lots of desirable software for sale/download. Like Ki, I too wonder how the original master 24/88 digital file sounds worse than the compressed MQA file. If that isn't digital magic, I don't what is. MQA was originally touted as being exactly what the engineers/musicians heard in the studio. But now we are saying the MQA recordings aren't what was heard in the studio, they are better! Something doesn't smell right to me.

[MylesBAstor]

The other issues is that MQA didn't at the demos I went to, had a comparison between the original and MQA treated file. The Dave Brubeck cut that was played at Axpona sounded dreadful. The cymbals sounded like they were pounding away on with hammers on an anvil. The rest was teribble too. Not to mention the poeple doing the demo really weren't there to answer questions.

Has anyone been to an event where they did the proper demo?

[nc42acc]

My Pioneer XPD-100R has MQA playback support. Not sure what that means but I will have it when it gets here.

[bpw]

Some manufacturers have signed a technical nondisclosure agreement with Meridian and have looked at and experimented with it. So far the MQA material is so curated that it's hard to say how much improvement you get in a more general case. The article I linked above seems to show some really small differences between MQA and high rate PCM. Even if a DAC has the processing bandwidth to do MQA some aren't promising anything at this time.

[1morerecord2clean]

Heard a Meridian dedicated demo last year at Newport. Very unimpressive. In fact they played a Sinatra cut which I own in a Capital mono on record and my record smoked it. Their cut was narrow of field and flat as a pancake. I was sitting dead center up front.

[MylesBAstor]

Some manufacturers have signed a technical nondisclosure agreement with Meridian and have looked at and experimented with it. So far the MQA material is so curated that it's hard to say how much improvement you get in a more general case. The article I linked above seems to show some really small differences between MQA and high rate PCM. Even if a DAC has the processing bandwidth to do MQA some aren't promising anything at this time.

So you would say the prime interest in MQA is not sound but streaming?

[1morerecord2clean]

Isn't MQA really primarily a way to condense info into a very small space during encoding and then expanding the info once decoded enabling recording companies to put more info on a file?

[MylesBAstor]

[bpw]

So you would say the prime interest in MQA is not sound but streaming?

I would venture to say that Meridian intends it to be both, but clearly the jury is out regarding sound.
And if the sound difference is very small or nonexistent, what's the point? But if and when there is a demonstrable improvement in most cases, perhaps there's a market.

[c1ferrari]

The other issues is that MQA didn't at the demos I went to, had a comparison between the original and MQA treated file.
Has anyone been to an event where they did the proper demo?

Myles, I attended the demo at last year's show in Newport (nee Irvine/Santa Ana) and departed with the same reservation.

-Sam