CES 2017: MQA announces TIDAL Masters, and more

[rmoody]

Woo Hoo! DRM! All right! Licensing fees! Heck yeah! I can't wait!
 
Ok, sarcasm off now.
 
Yawn. If it's got DRM and/or not open source, kiss my shinny metal ...
 
Just. Not. Interested.
 
The only thing this advances is the pocketbooks of the MQA people. Period. End of discussion. The sooner it dies the better. At least SACD had increased sound quality. This? Just has increased cost and layers of DRM.

 

[pkcpga]

Woo Hoo! DRM! All right! Licensing fees! Heck yeah! I can't wait!

Ok, sarcasm off now.

Yawn. If it's got DRM and/or not open source, kiss my shinny metal ...

Just. Not. Interested.

The only thing this advances is the pocketbooks of the MQA people. Period. End of discussion. The sooner it dies the better. At least SACD had increased sound quality. This? Just has increased cost and layers of DRM.

If you want technology to advance in sound quality than someone has to pay for the research and work. Open source is a nice concept but it doesn't pay the bills or promote drive.

 

[canthearyou]

What a bunch of negative Nancy's! If you don't like it or understand it, that's ok. Just move along and let others enjoy it.

 

[Left Channel]

I'm trying to keep an open mind, and am mostly just frustrated with the way Tidal is rolling this out. I just found a review in which the author says he was given matching MQA and original FLAC files to compare. This is impossible to figure out on Tidal alone, and though in some cases I can find matching non-MQA downloads on HDtracks, I don't have an MQA DAC so that still wouldn't be a true comparison. Maybe I'll get a chance to do a real A/B comparison at a store or a meet. 

 

[drez]

So MQA has licencing?  
 
Frankly I'm not convinced with the information about why full decoding is not possible with software.  If they are compensating for DAC digital filters surely there would be a way around this?
 
Secondly storage is cheap.  Frankly I would rather deal with 786kHz file sizes than have to purchase a whole new digital chain, or pay premium for MQA hardware.
 
Thirdly this is going to divide the high-res community into those with MQA and those without.  The proprietary nature will add cost and restrict full performance to more costly products and unfairly disadvantage smaller manufacturers and low cost products.
 
Lastly I could imagine this being an existential threat to existing high-res formats and distribution.
 
End rant sequence.

 

[lantian]

  So MQA has licencing?  
 
Frankly I'm not convinced with the information about why full decoding is not possible with software.  If they are compensating for DAC digital filters surely there would be a way around this?
 
Secondly storage is cheap.  Frankly I would rather deal with 786kHz file sizes than have to purchase a whole new digital chain, or pay premium for MQA hardware.
 
Thirdly this is going to divide the high-res community into those with MQA and those without.  The proprietary nature will add cost and restrict full performance to more costly products and unfairly disadvantage smaller manufacturers and low cost products.
 
Lastly I could imagine this being an existential threat to existing high-res formats and distribution.
 
End rant sequence.

For full decoding one has to pay meredian the licensing fees so they add support for your dac, atleast that is what they are saying, yes there is nothing special about it that would prevent existing hardware from using it. Only thing stopping it is money,  it can also be done in software, but again it's all about money they are greedy after all...

 

[bigro]

   
All good points. I don't know how experts define remastering, but The Bob claims that in the first phase they are starting with original tapes, researching the original equipment, and working with the original engineers and artists. That's all good. However, his long-term goal is to put everything into MQA regardless of source quality, and "break the back" of the resistance. That's where it becomes completely smoke-and-mirrors for me, but I'm not sure the first phase is entirely above-board either.

The source of hi-res music is often not specified, so it can be very hard to do any real listening comparison. MQA doubles down on that kind of obfuscation. The first "Tidal Masters" I stumbled upon included the "Steve Wilson Mix & Master" of Jethro Tull's Aqualung. Sure, it sounds better than the "Tidal HiFi" version of Aqualung, but so what? Is the difference I'm hearing MQA? How would I know? Why doesn't Meridian or MQA or whoever offer 1-to-1 comparisons of the same source? Like maybe Jazz at the Pawnshop in MQA and FLAC, at the same native resolution from the same original tapes. Or is it to be "Don't look at the man behind the curtain!!!"? This is getting very frustrating, Toto. Sometimes I wish my feet weren't too big for the ruby slippers. 

In another thread Jason Stoddard of Schiit Audio pointed us to some actual analysis on the following site, where I found objective measurements and discussions of both Tidal/software decoding and Mytek/hardware decoding. It's worth a look:
* COMPARISON: TIDAL / MQA stream & high-resolution downloads; impressions & thoughts... | Archimago's Musings
* COMPARISON: Hardware-Decoded MQA (using Mytek Brooklyn DAC) | Archimago's Musings

Thank you. That was as one of the More informative articles on MQA I have seen beside the, Its sooo Much better. I am not sure if this was posted here, it was on other threads. It has little to do with Sound quality but goes into what the possible model behind MQA is.
https://www.linn.co.uk/blog/mqa-is-bad-for-music
 
 
 
 
Quote:

What a bunch of negative Nancy's! If you don't like it or understand it, that's ok. Just move along and let others enjoy it.

Negative??? Yeah a Little. There is a lot of confusion about what MQA is and If meridian and MQA Chooses to leave everything so Ambiguous it leaves us to question their claims. At the end of the Day if it is your cup of tea and it sounds good to you that's all that matters, Enjoy. Im sure you know that This is a Hobby where people can be very OCD about every little detail from the alignment of the electrons in their power cables to the specific mine the Gold came from that plated their connectors. Smoke and Mirrors does not fly for many.

 

[pkcpga]

For full decoding one has to pay meredian the licensing fees so they add support for your dac, atleast that is what they are saying, yes there is nothing special about it that would prevent existing hardware from using it. Only thing stopping it is money,  it can also be done in software, but again it's all about money they are greedy after all...

What I don't understand is if you work, you get paid, so why is it greedy for a new format and remasters, that obliviously took some time and work, to charge people for the ability to use it. Why don't you go to work and than not get paid?

 

[lantian]

We can buy the new music but why do we also have to buy new equipment for it when there is nothing on a hardware level that prevents it from working on any modern dac. I will gladly pay for better quality music, but not for equipment.

 

[canthearyou]

There is no need to buy additional equipment. I believe the improvement "most" are hearing is due to the "remastering" of the album, not the higher bit rate. If you want extra fancy glowing blue lights or big numbers on your DAC display, have at it.

 

[all999]

There is no need to buy additional equipment. I believe the improvement "most" are hearing is due to the "remastering" of the album, not the higher bit rate. If you want extra fancy glowing blue lights or big numbers on your DAC display, have at it.

I don't think the mastering is different from "regular" release.

 

[canthearyou]

I don't think the mastering is different from "regular" release.

Isn't that what I read multiple times?

 

[ThurstonX]

Isn't that what I read multiple times?

 
Sure, but what are the sources?  It's all speculation.  No offense to anyone, but I'd like to hear a plain and simple answer to that question from the horse's mouth (reckon that'd be Bob).  If anyone has a link to a quote from him answering that question, please do post.

 

[pkcpga]

We can buy the new music but why do we also have to buy new equipment for it when there is nothing on a hardware level that prevents it from working on any modern dac. I will gladly pay for better quality music, but not for equipment.

I guess only time will tell if it becomes popular, than manufacturers will have to pay for the decoding. They'll always be companies that are first adapters and than mass adapters when it becomes more popular and non adapters like schiit. So it depends where you fall in the chain as well, I like being a first adapter, if I like the product and I don't mind if it's gone in a few years like dvda or sacd. I enjoyed the musical edge while it lasted until the next thing hit. I understand others are nonapadters and wait for things to go mainstream and that's their choice but I don't understand why nonadapters feel the need to state anything new is worthless.

 

[rmoody]

If you want technology to advance in sound quality than someone has to pay for the research and work. Open source is a nice concept but it doesn't pay the bills or promote drive.

 


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