[rkw]

A quick question guys, is the HIFI setting in Tidal a true normal FLAC data or it's just the WAV data from MQA edcoded FLAC?

The prevailing opinion I've seen online is that the HiFi and Masters settings use the same MQA encoded FLAC, just that HiFi doesn't apply MQA decoding to produce a higher rate stream.

 

[gimmeheadroom]

A quick question guys, is the HIFI setting in Tidal a true normal FLAC data or it's just the WAV data from MQA edcoded FLAC? I kind of feel the MQA encoding is lacking transparency and have been trying to avoid it. Thanks in advance.

I don't understand the question. There is 0 digital difference between WAV and FLAC of the same file, they're just different encodings/wrappers. I can take a WAV, transcode to FLAC and transcode the FLAC back to WAV and the original and new WAV are bit for bit identical.

MQA is high res but lossy. On my systems (I have several MQA DACs but even the desktop app decoding is extremely good) and to my ears, MQA sounds great in general. Without knowing that you have identical masters, there is no basis for comparison between the MQA and non-MQA versions of anything, and this is troublesome.

Take a listen to Elton John's Captain Fantastic album and see what you think. I bought this album when it came out and listened to it hundreds if not thousands of times over the years. To me, the MQA version sounds analog, a beautiful recording. If you have to pick one song, listen to the title track, or Writing.

 

[edisonwu]

The prevailing opinion I've seen online is that the HiFi and Masters settings use the same MQA encoded FLAC, just that HiFi doesn't apply MQA decoding to produce a higher rate stream.

I have read the same thing too. Below article I have just found the author was able to compare Tidal and Qobuz's redbook and non-MQA files. So I guess in some case the HIFI and Masters settings are different 16 bit 44.1khz files??
https://audiophilestyle.com/forums/topic/62527-testing-mqa-is-it-worse-than-flac/

 

[GoldenSound]

A quick question guys, is the HIFI setting in Tidal a true normal FLAC data or it's just the WAV data from MQA edcoded FLAC? I kind of feel the MQA encoding is lacking transparency and have been trying to avoid it. Thanks in advance.

All Tidal content is encoded in FLAC, though as to whether it's lossless or not it depends.

For any track/album marked with the 'MASTER' badge, you will get served the MQA version, even if you're on the Hifi tier or select the Hifi quality setting. It just disables MQA core decoding and removes MQA Signalling so that your DAC does not recognise it as MQA.

For any track that does not carry the 'MASTER' badge, you will be served genuine lossless FLAC


More info here: https://goldensound.audio/2021/11/29/tidal-hifi-is-not-lossless/

 

[edisonwu]

All Tidal content is encoded in FLAC, though as to whether it's lossless or not it depends.

For any track/album marked with the 'MASTER' badge, you will get served the MQA version, even if you're on the Hifi tier or select the Hifi quality setting. It just disables MQA core decoding and removes MQA Signalling so that your DAC does not recognise it as MQA.

For any track that does not carry the 'MASTER' badge, you will be served genuine lossless FLAC


More info here: https://goldensound.audio/2021/11/29/tidal-hifi-is-not-lossless/

Thanks. That totally makes sense now. I thought it was just my imagination. Most of the Tidal MQA album sounds worse than my CD rips files even though after been switched off Master to HIFI.

 

[GoldenSound]

Thanks. That totally makes sense now. I thought it was just my imagination. Most of the Tidal MQA album sounds worse than my CD rips files even though after been switched off Master to HIFI.

Yep it's frustrating unfortunately.
TIDAL would be pretty much a no-compromises streaming solution if they hadn't done this and actually offered proper lossless on all tracks.

But for some reason they've chosen not to, so my Qobuz sub is staying for now :/

Honestly it seems that a lot of the music streaming services are making weird decisions that prevent any of them from being an easy no-compromises recommendation.

Qobuz: Library isn't as big as Tidal/Spotify/Deezer (though it is improving quite quickly), and is something they're working on.

Tidal: Lots of tracks you can't stream lossless, only MQA

Deezer: Offers lossless....but no exclusive mode/bitperfect output and no roon support. So no way to actually PLAY the lossless tracks bitperfect

Spotify: Indefinitely postponed their lossless offering

Amazon HD: UI is garbage and player does not automatically change sample rate, so to play stuff bitperfect you have to manually adjust your DAC sample rate all the time

Apple Music: No Lossless playback support on non-apple devices

 

[old tech]

I don't understand the question. There is 0 digital difference between WAV and FLAC of the same file, they're just different encodings/wrappers. I can take a WAV, transcode to FLAC and transcode the FLAC back to WAV and the original and new WAV are bit for bit identical.

MQA is high res but lossy. On my systems (I have several MQA DACs but even the desktop app decoding is extremely good) and to my ears, MQA sounds great in general. Without knowing that you have identical masters, there is no basis for comparison between the MQA and non-MQA versions of anything, and this is troublesome.

Take a listen to Elton John's Captain Fantastic album and see what you think. I bought this album when it came out and listened to it hundreds if not thousands of times over the years. To me, the MQA version sounds analog, a beautiful recording. If you have to pick one song, listen to the title track, or Writing.

That's hardly a compliment when analog is distinctly lower fidelity. But then, MQA is lossy, like analog recordings/media.

 

[old tech]

I don't understand the question. There is 0 digital difference between WAV and FLAC of the same file, they're just different encodings/wrappers. I can take a WAV, transcode to FLAC and transcode the FLAC back to WAV and the original and new WAV are bit for bit identical.

MQA is high res but lossy. On my systems (I have several MQA DACs but even the desktop app decoding is extremely good) and to my ears, MQA sounds great in general. Without knowing that you have identical masters, there is no basis for comparison between the MQA and non-MQA versions of anything, and this is troublesome.

Take a listen to Elton John's Captain Fantastic album and see what you think. I bought this album when it came out and listened to it hundreds if not thousands of times over the years. To me, the MQA version sounds analog, a beautiful recording. If you have to pick one song, listen to the title track, or Writing.

That's hardly a compliment when analog is distinctly lower fidelity. But then, MQA is lossy, like analog recordings/media.

 

[MrWalkman]

Maybe it would be a good idea to focus on what you hear rather than thinking "ooh, MQA is lossy, etc., etc.". This will most likely lead to someone being biased, which will already lead to the impression that the sound is not as good as X or Y.

I have to agree with @gimmeheadroom, MQA sounds great, and I don't feel like I'm missing something in comparison with lossless FLAC.

Yeah, it would be nice if Meridian would be more precise/transparent about their MQA encoding process, but I think that some people are missing out on great audio experiences just because of focusing too much (sometimes) on some technical aspects.

 

[old tech]

Well I don't think all Flac files sound better than MQA or vice versa as every master is different and what sounds best is purely subjective to any individual. If anyone does believe that all MQA files or FLAC files (or indeed analog recordings, sigh) sounds the best then that really is mind over reality. I've listened to many MQA tracks and they really are no different to having a slightly different mastering of the same album - some may sound better to some ears while others would not. But for accuracy, well certainly no classical or full orchestral enthusiast would be interested in MQA.

 

[rlw6534]

Yep it's frustrating unfortunately.
TIDAL would be pretty much a no-compromises streaming solution if they hadn't done this and actually offered proper lossless on all tracks.

But for some reason they've chosen not to, so my Qobuz sub is staying for now :/

Honestly it seems that a lot of the music streaming services are making weird decisions that prevent any of them from being an easy no-compromises recommendation.

Qobuz: Library isn't as big as Tidal/Spotify/Deezer (though it is improving quite quickly), and is something they're working on.

Tidal: Lots of tracks you can't stream lossless, only MQA

Deezer: Offers lossless....but no exclusive mode/bitperfect output and no roon support. So no way to actually PLAY the lossless tracks bitperfect

Spotify: Indefinitely postponed their lossless offering

Amazon HD: UI is garbage and player does not automatically change sample rate, so to play stuff bitperfect you have to manually adjust your DAC sample rate all the time

Apple Music: No Lossless playback support on non-apple devices

FYI, Amazon Music plays all tracks at 192 kHz on my high-res capable Android DAPs, upsampling lower bitrate tracks.

Also, Apple Music plays lossless and high-res bit-perfect with no issues, again on capable (recent) Android DAPs.

 

[PortableMusic]

Dear All:

i've been enjoying Tidal MQA and my full hardware unfolding audio equipment for around 2 years now, and overall, i'm happy that i went with Tidal.

thinking about this recently, it seems to me that with bandwidth no longer really an issue for the vast majority of us, if not all of us, when will the need for MQA no longer exist?

if the need for MQA no longer exists, will Tidal still be around to compete with, say, Spotify?

if and when that time comes, would most Tidal folks migrate over to Spotify? or...?

look forward to hearing your thoughts. thank you.

 

[amarkabove]

Dear All:

i've been enjoying Tidal MQA and my full hardware unfolding audio equipment for around 2 years now, and overall, i'm happy that i went with Tidal.

thinking about this recently, it seems to me that with bandwidth no longer really an issue for the vast majority of us, if not all of us, when will the need for MQA no longer exist?

if the need for MQA no longer exists, will Tidal still be around to compete with, say, Spotify?

if and when that time comes, would most Tidal folks migrate over to Spotify? or...?

look forward to hearing your thoughts. thank you.

I certainly hope not. I'm not on Tidal because of MQA. I'm on Tidal because it actually cares about artists unlike Spotify.

 

[gimmeheadroom]

Dear All:

i've been enjoying Tidal MQA and my full hardware unfolding audio equipment for around 2 years now, and overall, i'm happy that i went with Tidal.

thinking about this recently, it seems to me that with bandwidth no longer really an issue for the vast majority of us, if not all of us, when will the need for MQA no longer exist?

if the need for MQA no longer exists, will Tidal still be around to compete with, say, Spotify?

if and when that time comes, would most Tidal folks migrate over to Spotify? or...?

look forward to hearing your thoughts. thank you.

Compression is dumb, MQA was a great idea in 1971. In 2020, not so much. I do like the sound quality and Tidal Hifi Plus is cheap here. If we get another bit perfect streaming service here (Qobuz is not available) I would just add it rather than leave Tidal.

 

[battermoose11]

A quick question guys, is the HIFI setting in Tidal a true normal FLAC data or it's just the WAV data from MQA edcoded FLAC? I kind of feel the MQA encoding is lacking transparency and have been trying to avoid it. Thanks in advance.

How do you define "Transparency"? I have been a Tidal listener for about 4 years and although I do not have a dac that is MQA unfolder, I find that listening from computer thru Modi to a Vali 2 to my Hifiman HE400i to be excellent sounding. That being said, I can say there is far less fatigue listening for longer periods of time. I have my settings for Tidal set for MQA on the app.