[limpidglitch]

   
For many (popular) tracks I've tried it's only a fade-out or single softer section that makes them need even that. Something that starts loud and stays loud can get into 8-bit range before things get even noticeable, let alone annoying. The next trick is to see how low you can push the sample rate before you hear things. One really starts to see how lossy codecs can work if you think about doing these things on small sections of the track one-at-a-time.
 
 
This seems to be the viewpoint of Opus: resample everything to 48k and get on with life.

 
I'm a little impatient, so I created a selection of files i assumed to be close to worst case. I already knew loud and noisy stuff in 8bit, even without noise shaping, is quite tolerable.
Re sample rate. I only recently realized I no longer can hear the 'mosquito' tone, which is at about 17kHz I believe. I got a bit bummed, I must admit.

 

[watchnerd]

   
For many (popular) tracks I've tried it's only a fade-out or single softer section that makes them need even that. Something that starts loud and stays loud can get into 8-bit range before things get even noticeable, let alone annoying. The next trick is to see how low you can push the sample rate before you hear things. One really starts to see how lossy codecs can work if you think about doing these things on small sections of the track one-at-a-time.
 
 

 
Have you seen the 16 bit vs 8 bit dithered vs 8 bit listening tests with fadeout?
 
http://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_dithering.php

 

[watchnerd]

  Ok you computer nerds and noobs have all got the wrong idea.  This technology I think its a trick and Ive been doing some reading but it all sounds and reads like propaganda and brainwash to me....  I can tell already by the Q and As around the net along with the fact the actual technology and chips are never discusssed that this is really for the RECORD COMPANIES to get back their lost revenue cause of pcs and pirate mp3s.  So from this context can someone explain the trojan horse gotchas of this technology?  I dont care about the Computer Weenie cynical "you cant hear more than 1 FPS debates" that bs is more than dead to me.  So lets get this thread on the right track and stop wasting time and discover the real reason for this new streaming technology.
 
OK to reiterate how is this tech a gotcha and a money maker for the record companies?(I already know Meridian is going to get their money thats obvious cause no one would spend the time and money on this propaganda campaign if they didnt).  LOL artists signing off on MQA files(they wouldnt take the time to do this unless it meant money for them this whole thing to me reads like a new market inculcation)(get everyone participating and doing little things and then make money a hard requirement)....."Its not a file format" yeah its just a data format.... lie to me some more.

 
I don't think you are entirely wrong.
 
Warner Music has signed an agreement with MQA and Warner Music definitely cares about money more than sound quality.
 
The question is:
 
How much is them seeing a new revenue stream (upsell you the same crap again for the 7th time) or a new way to control content?

 

[watchnerd]

Yes, Meridian has filed for a patent.

 

[RRod]

   
Have you seen the 16 bit vs 8 bit dithered vs 8 bit listening tests with fadeout?
 
http://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_dithering.php

 
Yeah I guess I should have qualified that as "8-bit-undithered range". Noise shaping does wonderful things.

 

[ColdFlo]

No special chips are required as I understand it. Just careful design within a specification.

MQA has nothing to do with USB class2 as a format.

There's nothing wrong with fighting priracy if some money actually gets into the artist's hands. But there this may not help, as the record labels and streaming services are taking the lion's share. See articles by David Burne.

No it is not biased to be against something that is going to gouge money out of the world market.  It is on the other hand biased to be for it.  No it definitely requires circuits and I know they are going to use off the shelf dacs so they wont be modified dac chips.  Yes it is inherently, directly, in competition with usb audio class 2.  See what I mean nothing wrong with fighting piracy what about monopolys of record companies that push propaganda.  
 

  I don't think you are entirely wrong.
 
Warner Music has signed an agreement with MQA and Warner Music definitely cares about money more than sound quality.
 
The question is:
 
How much is them seeing a new revenue stream (upsell you the same crap again for the 7th time) or a new way to control content?

Bob Stuart thinks hes some kind of audio genius and thinks he can brainwash the world and make hundreds of millions in the process but it will fail. All of you guys sound younger than I am.
 
 

  Yes, Meridian has filed for a patent.

 
Its a non opensource codec(opposite of flac but close to it in function but a patented paid controlled version), usb decoder chip that feeds a dac(essentially, a paid version of usb class 2(that makes royalties on every track streamed across it) with the added benefit of 1/3rd internet bandwidth(I dont think they even really care about this this is just a ruse feature to sell it to you they can afford the bandwidth)), and mirrored hardware on the production side to sell to them too and an end to end patented owned system that no one will be able to copy only be licensed and if you want high quality streaming you will pay your monthly fee and buy a seperate 600- several thousand dollar dac(if you really want to take advantage of that quality lets face it DragonFly is not going to cut it for any of us thats a consumer level computer weenie product).  Thats where they mess up the dac is mega gouging and its a monthly fee.  Anyone who wants to pay for this is a complete idiot and frankly I think you are aiding the destruction of 99% of the way the head-fi market is now.
 
When your blowing money on albums at 20 bucks a pop your gonna find your dac money is gonna get allot slimmer.  Sure the monthly fee will be cheaper at first but it will get worse when some solution(for record companies) becomes popular and then its going to be really hard to dig it back out again.  There is a reason they want it decoded right next to the dac chip.  They want it to be super hard for you to siphon off a digital copy.  It will require hardware mods to do it.  I bet there is some security feature that isnt being talked about yet as well.  Tidal just lets you download all those files? besides it wont be long before someone comes up with a software codec to crack the digital oragami so there will be other encryption involved.
 
Mod Edit - removed personal attacks

 

[RRod]

I listened to some similar treatment, but it only samlled loud compressed stuff.
This is fine. However my point is shouldn't we, as people who hopefully love audio for the music, strive to move forward and inovate?

Currently we cannot reproduce an ensamble as if it is there in the room with us. Most of this is almost certainly because of accousic problems. However as those problems are solved is it beyond the relm of possiblity that current standard def formats may find wanting? Shouldn't we try to be ahead of the other issues?

MQA is trying to do that along with lower the file size. I suspect as the file size becomes less relevent they may do an unfolded version which just does the ADC and DAC correction.

 
I think we have perspective differences. I come from the classical world, where stuff has pretty much sounded (mostly) uniformly excellent for a long time. There's very little reason to have a bad-sounding recording in the genre unless you just really like some 1920s performance of the Ring. If I put on some of my better string quartet stuff on my floorstanders and have the family away, you bet I get a sense of having the ensemble in the room. Yet I'm not at all concerned with what Meridian is trying to do, because I can't blind test 38k versus 44.1k, so what do I care about time-smearing?
 
There's so much that can be fixed to make music sound great and MQA isn't going to force any of it to happen. It's like with Pono: just demanding hi-res formats doesn't suddenly stop sausage mastering. All the folding and apodizing in the world isn't going to turn the Death Magnetic CD into the Guitar Hero version. It isn't going to fix bad mic placement, or bad mixing, or bad mastering. Now do I think it's good to make things better? Sure. But not if it distracts from issues that might make a bigger difference. It's like if you tell someone their goalpost is 10 feet off-center, and they respond by gilding it.

 

[jagwap]

Its a non opensource codec, usb decoder chip that feeds a dac(essentially), and mirrored hardware on the production side to sell to them too and an end to end patented owned system that no one will be able to copy only be licensed and if you want high quality streaming you will pay your monthly fee and buy a seperate 600- several thousand dollar dac.  Thats where they mess up the dac is mega gouging and its a monthly fee.  Anyone who wants to pay for this is a complete idiot and frankly I think you are aiding the destruction of 99% of the way the head-fi market is now.

Why do they "mess up the DAC"? Meridian have quite a good track record with DACs, and they do not insist you play MQA to make it work. It plays PCM too.

I've been designing audio electronics for several decades. What makes your opinion more valid?

Removed personal attacks

 

[jagwap]

A f

I think we have perspective differences. I come from the classical world, where stuff has pretty much sounded (mostly) uniformly excellent for a long time. There's very little reason to have a bad-sounding recording in the genre unless you just really like some 1920s performance of the Ring. If I put on some of my better string quartet stuff on my floorstanders and have the family away, you bet I get a sense of having the ensemble in the room. Yet I'm not at all concerned with what Meridian is trying to do, because I can't blind test 38k versus 44.1k, so what do I care about time-smearing?

There's so much that can be fixed to make music sound great and MQA isn't going to force any of it to happen. It's like with Pono: just demanding hi-res formats doesn't suddenly stop sausage mastering. All the folding and apodizing in the world isn't going to turn the Death Magnetic CD into the Guitar Hero version. It isn't going to fix bad mic placement, or bad mixing, or bad mastering. Now do I think it's good to make things better? Sure. But not if it distracts from issues that might make a bigger difference. It's like if you tell someone their goalpost is 10 feet off-center, and they respond by gilding it.

A fair point.

The audio leveling used in apple music, itunes and spotify will do a better job of discoraging the loudness wars.

 

[icebear]

I listened to some similar treatment, but it only samlled loud compressed stuff.
This is fine. However my point is shouldn't we, as people who hopefully love audio for the music, strive to move forward and inovate?[1]

Currently we cannot reproduce an ensamble as if it is there in the room with us.[2] Most of this is almost certainly because of accousic problems. However as those problems are solved is it beyond the relm of possiblity that current standard def formats may find wanting? Shouldn't we try to be ahead of the other issues?

MQA is trying to do that along with lower the file size. I suspect as the file size becomes less relevent they may do an unfolded version which just does the ADC and DAC correction.

LOL,

 
1. I certainly think that for us the people there are much more serious issues to solve than a new licensed file format
 
2. a) Yes absolutely, because everyone and his grandmother are focusing on topics that are close to irrelevant to the ability to capture live music. Recordings from the late 50 and 60 on analog tape with just three microphones live to two or three track open reel are simply stunning. The arguments about what file format is superior are completely wasted. The choice and positioning of the microphone in the room and in relation to the musicians is so much more important than PCM vs DSD, 24bit vs 32 bit or high rez vs red book and obviously the latest and greatest MQA. The digital format is just the recording medium, the sound gets captured by the microphone, the medium is just there to preserve what has been captured and avoid any degradation during post processing. All choices that the people involved in the production make are much more essential for the sound than the format itself. These choices and particularly any compression does not depend on the format itself but by marketing decisions. MQA is not going to change anything in this respect.
 
2.b) Given capable speakers and an appropriate room the reproduction can be pretty darn good nowadays and again the file format is by any measure NOT the limiting factor here.

 

[eio]

   
I know it has been brought up before (by RRod among others), but even 16/44.1 is more than enough.
 
I put together a little script that creates 10-16bit versions of a given input file. The files are themself 16bit, but the data is of lower resolution. I've only gone through a few, but already at 12bit it is getting really difficult to hear a difference.
 
#!/bin/bash
for i in {10..16}
do 
  sox "$1" -b 16 -r 44100 "${1%.*}-${i}bit.wav" \
    dither -s -p $i stats 2>&1 | grep depth
done
 
 
eio, this might be a good place to start. Rather than reading all sorts of opinions, test yourself and get some real data

yes, even undithered 12bit is acceptable for compressed music, 16bit is mostly necessary for highly dynamic music like classical.
 
but it seems there is NO way to decode MQA in software for now,  which made it hard to test.
and this approach made it smells kinda bad.

 

[eio]

The audio leveling used in apple music, itunes and spotify will do a better job of discoraging the loudness wars.

personally i think the loudness war is also meant to satisfy customers' needs...most people consume music in noisy environments now, that results in extremely low SNR, hence the necessity of extremely low DR in content...

 

[haiku]

As long as the guys from Schiit Audio keep their opinion about MQA, I won´t bother with it. I think they know their stuff and they´re reasonable.

 

[jagwap]

personally i think the loudness war is also meant to satisfy customers' needs...most people consume music in noisy environments now, that results in extremely low SNR, hence the necessity of extremely low DR in content...

I think that is one logical reason for it.

The reality does appear to gone past that and end up the music industry trying to out shout each other

An example: DAB radio, (where a built in optional compressor was available for the hardware manufacture to dial in) the commercial radio stations all added huge compression, to be louder than the others to try and get more customers for their paying advertisers'. Far more compression than is needed for intellablity. Really unfortunately the BBC followed suit. I was there as they installed the digital Optimods for this. We were all very sad. The AES a few years later gave a lecture on this from an engineer from the BBC showing the damage done. Even Radio 3 uses it during drive time. It could all be in the receiver as an option.

(Back on topic) Now that people are listening on iems, noise cancelling headphones and hopefully at home on a decent setup, I really hope they can turn the dial back, and the new intelligent car av systems can add a speed related compression when needed. If MQA is an end to end process as originally advertised, and evidence is starting to suggest that is fading, this may help.

My cynical side says "fat chance"

Edit: Oh,good news. It seems some DAB systems are adopting the same normaisation software that is making the mastered in compression less relevant.

 

[limpidglitch]

I think that is one logical reason for it.

The reality does appear to gone past that and end up the music industry trying to out shout each other

An example: DAB radio, (where a built in optional compressor was available for the hardware manufacture to dial in) the commercial radio stations all added huge compression, to be louder than the others to try and get more customers for their paying advertisers'. Far more compression than is needed for intellablity. Really unfortunately the BBC followed suit. I was there as they installed the digital Optimods for this. We were all very sad. The AES a few years later gave a lecture on this from an engineer from the BBC showing the damage done. Even Radio 3 uses it during drive time. It could all be in the receiver as an option.

(Back on topic) Now that people are listening on iems, noise cancelling headphones and hopefully at home on a decent setup, I really hope they can turn the dial back, and the new intelligent car av systems can add a speed related compression when needed. If MQA is an end to end process as originally advertised, and evidence is starting to suggest that is fading, this may help.

My cynical side says "fat chance"

Edit: Oh,good news. It seems some DAB systems are adopting the same normaisation software that is making the mastered in compression less relevant.

 
I thought DAB as other broadcasting in Europe were covered by the same R128 EU recommendation?
We're adopting DAB here in Norway as well. Yesterday the first of 18 blocks shut down their FM transmitters and within the end of the year we will be entirely without FM (except for a few special exceptions).
 

  yes, even undithered 12bit is acceptable for compressed music, 16bit is mostly necessary for highly dynamic music like classical.
 
but it seems there is NO way to decode MQA in software for now,  which made it hard to test.
and this approach made it smells kinda bad.

 
You don't need to test MQA directly.
Either you can test if moderate degradation of regular audio is audible. If it isn't, then that's a strong indication a moderate improvement won't matter either.
Or you can test the claims of MQA. Decoded MQA is claimed to be some lesser version of 24/96, so why not just compare that with regular audio?