[John2e]

 

 It's really sad that Lampizator has apparently stooped this low - his website used to be about uncovering frauds or lunacy in "high end" audio, and yet here he is - spouting off vague nonsense and spinning mystical yarns to hawk expensive product. 

 

 

Lampizator is the DAC's designer.  Do you mean Scot Hull of the "Part Time Audiophile"?

 

[crooner]

The best R2R DAC's available today are based on discrete resistor arrays. These are implemented using ultra high precision SMD resistors that were simply unavailable in the 1980's and 1990's. Hence the old monolythic DAC chips necessitating laser trimming of their ladder networks to prevent low level linearity errors. That's why there were different "grades" of chips back in the day.
 
Still, the precision was nowhere near the best discrete R2R DACs available today.
 
Schitt and other lower cost R2R DACs use off-the-shelf chips not discrete arrays. Worse still a lot of these are industrial chips not originally designed for audio. The last audio R2R chip being the Burr Brown PCM1704, discontinued a few years ago.
 
Delta Sigma was born out of necessity as it was cheaper to obtain good low level linearity without the low yield of R2R chips which had to be individually selected. Unfortunately high speed 1 bit processing of PCM had its own set of evils, and it proved detrimental in the end.
 
Today you can have your cake and eat it too, and the prices keep coming down. Digital has never sounded better, IMHO.

 

[obobskivich]

Lampizator is the DAC's designer.  Do you mean Scot Hull of the "Part Time Audiophile"?

The section you were referencing appeared to be a quote from Lampizator, not Scot Hull (the article's author). If I misunderstood that, and it was Scot Hull writing, then "whoops" but it appeared to be Lampizator "talking" there ("Lampizator speak for himself..."), and that was/is kind of a sad state to see wild marketing claims from him (them? I've never been clear on if Lampizator is a single person or a group of people fronted by the gentleman pictured in that article) when, historically, that's not what the Lampizator website (by apperance) was about. I completely get the whole idea of being a business (vs a hobbyist/part-time modder) and needing to market and sell your product and all that, but still...

And of course it goes without saying: in no way am I passing a value judgment on the product itself; I'm just taking issue with the marketing. I also fear we're getting quite off-topic.

The best R2R DAC's available today are based on discrete resistor arrays. These are implemented using ultra high precision SMD resistors that were simply unavailable in the 1980's and 1990's. Hence the old monolythic DAC chips necessitating laser trimming of their ladder networks to prevent low level linearity errors. That's why there were different "grades" of chips back in the day.

Still, the precision was nowhere near the best discrete R2R DACs available today.

Schitt and other lower cost R2R DACs use off-the-shelf chips not discrete arrays. Worse still a lot of these are industrial chips not originally designed for audio. The last audio R2R chip being the Burr Brown PCM1704, discontinued a few years ago.

My point wasn't to determine "what's best" but more broadly that "R2R" itself is nothing new, nothing novel, and nothing that need cost an absolute fortune (or wait for "trickle down"). As your post illustrates, its too big of a category to condense anything down into - just like delta sigma is as well; instead (like many other things) there's pros and cons associated with various D/A conversion models, and different designers go after different things. And I'll agree emphatically with this:

Today you can have your cake and eat it too, and the prices keep coming down. Digital has never sounded better, IMHO.

 

[John2e]

  . Digital has never sounded better, IMHO.

Yes this DAC with its implementation of the R2R Tech makes a Huge difference unlike wires which make a small difference IMHO 

 
We should probably start another thread on the degree of difference a DAC makes.  My point was basically you can't lump wires and DACs into the same category with regards to differences they make.  Some people do not even hear a difference in wires but with this DAC there is a distinct change in sound quality.  Anyone who has heard it would probably agree.  We should get back on topic....
 
Has anyone heard MQA and was immediately floored by it ?
 
So far we a just working on assumptions based on specs.
 
I think only ORT has actually heard it and he was not impressed....  

 

[obobskivich]

Yes this DAC with its implementation of the R2R Tech makes a Huge difference unlike wires which make a small difference IMHO :tongue_smile:

We should probably start another thread on the degree of difference a DAC makes.  My point was basically you can't lump wires and DACs into the same category with regards to differences they make.  Some people do not even hear a difference in wires but with this DAC there is a distinct change in sound quality.  Anyone who has heard it would probably agree.  We should get back on topic....

And I agree, especially with the bolded part.

Has anyone heard MQA and was immediately floored by it ?

Okay, so I know this is kind of a "let the rabbit out" question, buuuut:

Is it even possible to demo MQA without MQA-certified hardware? h34r:

 

[John2e]

And I agree, especially with the bolded part.
Okay, so I know this is kind of a "let the rabbit out" question, buuuut:

Is it even possible to demo MQA without MQA-certified hardware?

I believe Mytek makes a Dac (or two the Brooklyn and Manhattan) capable of decoding MQA not sure if Tidal has started streaming some content in MQA but I know some downloads sites have MQA as an option US7Digital  is the name or not sure if they have anything available but I do remember seeing in the drop down MQA as an option
 
Most people would probably be exposed to it at shows and demos like ORT

 

[obobskivich]

I believe Mytek makes a Dac (or two the Brooklyn and Manhattan) capable of decoding MQA not sure if Tidal has started streaming some content in MQA but I know some downloads sites have MQA as an option Digital7  not sure exactly the name or if they have anything available but I do remember seeing in the drop down MQA as an option (I will check when I get home and edit)

Most people would probably be exposed to it at shows and demos like ORT

Yes I've seen the Mytek - "now with MQA decoder" (https://mytekdigital.com/hifi/products/brooklyn/), otherwise I've not seen anything else that appears to have MQA branding. Mytek claims they're the first, and I'm guessing they're probably right (can read here: https://mytekdigital.com/hifi/mqa/). The Mytek site has some links for MQA downloads, including here:
http://www.2l.no/hires/ (appears to be free)
and "Onkyo Music" here - https://www.onkyomusic.com/US/MQA (very small collection and $$$$)

 

[John2e]

I researched a bit and found the Onkyo DAP ,DP-X1, should also support MQA
 
Also purporting to be an industry first (for portable Digital Audio Players)
 
http://www.head-fi.org/t/780642/onkyo-dp-x1-dual-sabre-dacs-balanced-sabre-btl-amp-mqa-dsd-256-android-5

 

[Berdine]

I heard a (late prototype?) Mytek Brooklyn with MQA decoding at CanJam in London.  There was a demo with a small collection of MQA encoded tracks, of which I was only familiar with a handful.  I was able to compare listening to those tracks with the decoder enabled or disabled, but was not able to compare a standard 24/48 FLAC to the MQA file with encoder disabled or the MQA file with encoder enabled to a standard 24/96 or 24/192 FLAC.  With that caveat, to me there was a slight improvement with the encoder enabled.  To me, it was not as big an improvement as the difference between a DR 8 and a DR 11 master of the same recording.  Was I floored, no.  Did I think that maybe it would be possible for a 24/96 file subjected to lossy compression to get a 24/48 MQA file might be able to outperform a 16/44 file, maybe.  Do I have any interest in paying any money for hardware or software with such lock-ins, preventing e.g. computer-based room correction, absolutely not.  But then I'm old fashioned and don't see any point to streaming either, so YMMV.

 

[OldRoadToad]

​Not going to buy the White Album again.   I find it odd that so many audiophiles I have known over the years eschew equalization in their own systems as they are avowed musical "purists" and yet here we have a new codec that is nothing less than just that.
 
MQA is there to sell you your music all over again even if all you do is "stream".  You can bet that there will be fees attached to those that stream this flotsam and it will be passed on in the form of higher subscription rates or even commercials to pay for the privilege of streaming the "superiority" that is a 40+ year old re-equalized via MQA "White Album".
 
I recall the early DSP settings on some of my receivers.  "Church" was an echo that lasted for up to 5 or more seconds depending on the settings and to be honest it sounded stupid.  "Hall" was nearly as ridiculous.  There were more but ultimately unless I was viewing a film in Dolby I left my receiver in...Stereo and didn't mess with the Bass or Treble settings either.  I listened to the new Onkyo DAP at T.H.E. and it had regular and MQA versions of a song and I did it without knowing what was "version" playing first or second and simply turned the dial to hear the two "versions"  and went back and forth several times and got lost in the labyrinth of nothingness that is MQA.
 
No difference.  ENC.  Emperor's New Clothes. 
 
The difference is those that want to foist this on the world as their gift to music enthusiasts are full of schiit (minus an c & i)  and you can bet they want to line their pockets with fees and licensing. 
 
No, it is not the end of the world but neither is it the beginning of a new one.  It's BS PHD.  Follow the money.  MQA hustlers are and cater to the frAudiophiles. 
 
ORT
 
I still can not type. 

 

[Headzone]

DSD sounds much cooler.

 

[erich6]

  I think there may be some validity in the idea of making profiles of common ADCs used to record music and using that to better shape the digital playback, but the rest I consider at best unnecessary and at worst a format lock-in.

​What was intriguing to me about the concept is what you stated here, but more broadly, the idea that an encoding scheme can basically make everything between the original master and the analog signal coming out of your system as transparent as possible with the least number of bits.  Who wouldn't like that? 
 
The problem seems to be how business interests might shape the concept in application...that's the ranting I'm seeing in posts and given the history of similar standards I think there's a reasonable basis for the concern.
 
In the best of worlds, the encoding scheme might promote a more conscious design of hardware and processes that take an original recording to the end user.  In the worst of worlds, it would lock people into a "pay wall" and remove some differentiation between audio products. I can see why low-cost market small manufacturers would not like this.  I can also see how big record labels might see this as a potential cash cow.
 
Also, those that make the MQA argument about the difference between hi-res/lossless and lossy formats are missing the point.  It has less to do with the inherent virtues of high resolution sampling than with how the sampling is done.
 
Finally, while I think the concept has merit, I think more sound quality improvement will come from a broader application of good mastering skills.  Just listen to any track mastered by Steve Wilson and pretty much any decent player and sound system out there will sound better than when playing the same music with a poorly mastered track.

 

[John2e]

Some more stuff on MQA
 
http://www.digitalaudioreview.net/2016/06/an-inconvenient-truth-mqa-sounds-better/
 
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-Q5UohNeMPsO/learn/high-resolution-audio-guide.html

 

[peterinvan]

 

MQA is now streaming!
 
 
Tidal MQA works through my Explorer2, but only through ROON...?

I tried the new Masters using the Tidal Windows desktop, but could not get my Meridian Explorer2 to light up. So I tagged the new MQA albums in Tidal, switched to Roon, re synced to Tidal. Now I get the three LEDs to light up on the DAC, and play MQA.
 
This the Roon path...


The LEDs on my Meridian Explorer2 show Blue/White/White.  Is this correct?

My first impressions are that the MQA stream through Roon to the Explorer2 sounds better than the "MASTER" decoding through the Tidal PC app, e.g. on

Moondance (Van Morrison)
American Beauty (Greatful Dead)
Buena Vista Social Club

 

[John2e]

In the article there were some references to different lights meaning different things depending on the weather an artist has approved the mastering etc...