MQA discussion

Al M.

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audioguy

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ack

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PeterA

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KeithR

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Pains me to say this (as he is disabled like me), but Charley has gone off the deep end - the Bob Stuart personal attacks really take away from his position. If you want an analytical debate, that's fine - but he's gone overboard. It reads more like a personal vendetta combined with very liberal politics.
 

opus112

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Its clear to me that Charles sees MQA as an existential threat to his business. Not saying I share that perception but his reaction is understandable in that context.
 

adyc

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Pains me to say this (as he is disabled like me), but Charley has gone off the deep end - the Bob Stuart personal attacks really take away from his position. If you want an analytical debate, that's fine - but he's gone overboard. It reads more like a personal vendetta combined with very liberal politics.

Well maybe because he feels Bob produces something totally unnecessary and the whole purpose of MQA is to grab money and not for the advancement of audio production.
 

audioguy

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There's a Brian Lucey interview up on Fairhedon - http://fairhedon.com/2017/11/05/an-interview-with-mastering-engineer-brian-lucey/

My TL;DR : 'MQA is fatal to the source material'.

I like this quote as well:

MQA has been targeting the weakest players in our world, the audiophiles. And they’re targeting those most dependent on pimping new tech, the audiophile press. Meanwhile, one sided presentations at trade shows leave no time for deep Q and A and any real discussion panels are eschewed by MQA.

Sort of sums it up in a few short words !!
 

rbbert

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http://oppodigital.com/blu-ray-udp-203/UDP203-firmware-54-1108B.aspx

So a simple firmware update to an existing DAC makes it MQA compatible? if it's that "simple", why doesn't everyone do it? Could it be that there might be better ways to improve the sound of a digital file, one that involves actual innovation and complex engineering?

Even though I'm apparently getting a free MQA DAC, I remain skeptical and cynical.
 

bibo01

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http://oppodigital.com/blu-ray-udp-203/UDP203-firmware-54-1108B.aspx

So a simple firmware update to an existing DAC makes it MQA compatible? if it's that "simple", why doesn't everyone do it? Could it be that there might be better ways to improve the sound of a digital file, one that involves actual innovation and complex engineering?

Even though I'm apparently getting a free MQA DAC, I remain skeptical and cynical.

Don't forget that there are also royalties to pay.
 

rbbert

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The "strange" thing in this Oppo firmware affair/business update is that the 205 gets the MQA support and not the 203.

Different DAC chips?
 

justubes

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It looks like full mqa can be implemented to any network capable player.

I believe it is just a matter of certification to a the dac filter or chipset.

Nothing further to the dac stages or circuit.

It has been done in the dcs and esoteric models and i have always asked why will an unfolded mqa file ot pass througt the spdif or xlr in its folded form and subsequently unfolded as these transmission are good till 24/96.

The answer has been exceedingly clear that the mqa certified atreamera and dac can only ynfold mqa through usb or network inputs.

It looks that these 2 transmission for will allow for the full mqa filtering in relation to a particular dac to have the desired (net) mqa filter response being provrammed into these inputs.

Of course, the harder way of implementation in say a fpga dac is to have this mqa filter response as part of the dac algorithm. Much harder or acceptable to the dac manufacturer.

Any thoughts. It now seems rather fishy.

I have adopted partial unfold though bluos based devices once tidal started streamimg mqa and ratjer like the effect.

i have been waiting for a good priced dac to allow the next step unfold through coax, it never happened to date.

The wait resulted in seeing more dacs allowing mqa through the ethernet port only.
 

Al M.

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From Archimago's blogspot:

MUSINGS/MEASUREMENTS: On "blurring" and why MQA probably worsens transient smearing.

From the article:

The group delay plot confirm that with the linear phase filters, there is no delay between bass, mid, and treble - no "temporal smear". In comparison, both the minimum phase and MQA settings do indeed add a delay to the treble frequencies. Specifically, for the MQA filter, by 18kHz, there is about 40µs delay compared to <1kHz (not as bad as the sharp roll-off minimum phase filter with 100+µs). In other words, the MQA filter itself creates temporal smearing instead of "de-blurring"!

And:

2. If we believe "blurring" is similar to "transient smearing" as seen in the use of minimum phase filtering (actually, any non-linear digital reconstruction filter), then the MQA filter worsens this - it actually "blurs" rather than "de-blur"! This was demonstrated using the Mytek Brooklyn DAC.

Oops.

Wasn't the removal of "temporal blur" the whole rationale behind MQA?

(I encourage reading the whole article, with all the presented measurements.)
 

Al M.

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EXOGAL Audio announced that they are ceasing development of MQA for inclusion in EXOGAL products.

June 22, 2018. Said Jeff Haagenstad, CEO of EXOGAL: "We have been evaluating MQA technology and watching the wider MQA ecosystem since early 2016. After much research on the fundamental technology and more importantly on the market demand for MQA, we have reached the decision to cease the pursuit of adding MQA to our products for several reasons:

  • Our products by themselves exceed the performance of our products with the inclusion of MQA,
  • Regardless of the breathless hype by the audio press, actual consumer demand is just not there.
  • Regardless of the announced support from record labels, a suitable base of playable content is not widely available.
  • As for the technical details of our evaluation of the technology vis á vis our own technology, we prefer not to violate our NDA’s with MQA and Meridian.
  • Much like Wadia's technology before us, EXOGAL technology is already oriented in the time domain and does not suffer from the time-smearing effect which MQA is supposed to eliminate.
Suffice it to say we were never able to achieve the advertised level of performance using the MQA technology and thus it does not meet our standards for inclusion in our products. Many experts outside of our company have articulately made the case against MQA and we see no reason to elaborate or comment on those findings."

“We will continue to watch the market evolve but for now, we are out of the MQA game.”

Link:
https://positive-feedback.com/industry-news/exogal-abandons-mqa-development/
 

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