I stopped buying DVDs because of it, a particularly bad unskippable series of nagging pre-film lectures on the evils of piracy pushed me over the edge, as I worked out in the time it was taking for the film to start that I could have nicked it quicker than sitting through all this crap.
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MQA Sounds Really Good!
- Thread starter watchnerd
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Yes MQA original resolution beats 24/192
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Not what I asked, the only original available is 24/192 is what I meant. I see there is no point in this discussion.
No, you are not taking into account the fact that MQA is capable to deblur even a 24/192 recording. This improves the temporal coherency substantially as described in the paper "About MQA (for JAS)" by Bob Stuart
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Eirikur
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Ah, time for my favorite MQA album: Radka Toneff and Steve Dobrogosz with Fairytales, originally recorded on a 50.4kHz/16bit machine, i.e. that is all there is and could ever be!
You should really read more than the marketing materials.
Did YOU read how the MQA white-glove remaster was made from this master..?
"By using a more gentle method to establish a lock, a 192 kHz digital capture was made of the analogue output playing the 50.35 kHz master on the library machine."
"A workflow was designed that allowed the entire set of tasks to be carried out using the absolute minimum number of (in fact just two) 24-bit operations to maintain the highest transparency. Since we had worked closely together on other minimum-processing reclamation projects, we asked Morten Lindberg to do the remastering steps. The chain is outlined here for tracks 2-4, 6-10:
- Bob: Starting with slow stems, correct the ADC bit errors.
- Morten: Top and Tail slow files; fix gross errors (original splices and big clicks); determine level adjust to make per song; insert metadata.
- Bob: processes in one operation to: reverse out MX-80 ADC/DAC in the time domain; adjust track levels; rate correct for pitch; LF phase correction; stabilise noise floor.
- Review the result with Arild (the producer), Steve (pianist) and Andreas (label); Arild requested minor track level changes; repeat step 3.
- Morten: performs magic with extremely light ‘airbrush touch-ups’, very fine dynamics; cuts to length and assemble deliverables.
- Bob: encode for download and CD encodings."
http://www.bobtalks.co.uk/blog/white-glove/white-glove-fairytales-page-2/
http://www.bobtalks.co.uk/blog/white-glove/white-glove-fairytales-page-3/
http://www.bobtalks.co.uk/blog/white-glove/white-glove-fairytales-page-4/
Veri
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That's a lot of bla-bla-bla. White glove fairytales, uh uh... I love me some audiophile fairytale.
On a more serious note, that's literally what you're listening to in the MQA version, another master. Whether it sounds better or not is up to the listener..
On a more serious note, that's literally what you're listening to in the MQA version, another master. Whether it sounds better or not is up to the listener..
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audio_tony
Addicted to Fun and Learning
I think Bob's mum has signed up to defend him...Bob!
Is that you?
dkinric
Addicted to Fun and Learning
It literally says, "performs magic" with "airbrush touch ups"!?
@Listen! , I don't think quoting Bob is an effective way to defend MQA. As this is ASR, verfiable, repeatable, 3rd party measurements is what is lacking. This whole site is based on the rejection of subjective, flowery language, opinion based reviews as a reliable metric.
@Listen! , I don't think quoting Bob is an effective way to defend MQA. As this is ASR, verfiable, repeatable, 3rd party measurements is what is lacking. This whole site is based on the rejection of subjective, flowery language, opinion based reviews as a reliable metric.
... which went through an additional AD/DA process. It therefore is no longer accurate to the original however small the deviations may be.
Yeah, those corny videos showing dodgy characters selling pirated DVDs and showing drug dealers and such in an attempt to equate the two were awful. I was always like 'I'm playing this to have a good time, not see criminals and get guilt tripped when I've actually bought the bloody thing legitimately at full price you arseholes'.
audio_tony
Addicted to Fun and Learning
My longer term fear with MQA (and I'm not even sure if this is possible by the way) - is that I wonder if by default there will be a standard low definition "folded" version of the song and MQA will "unfold" the full "High Fidelity" version of the track following payment? (at some future point I mean - perhaps when it's reached market saturation)
Like I say, I don't understand enough about MQA to know if this is even possible, but I do wonder...!
Like I say, I don't understand enough about MQA to know if this is even possible, but I do wonder...!
That's kinda how it works, actually. If you don't have an MQA DAC or a software decoder (Tidal, Roon), you only get the folded version that is basically just lossless CD-quality audio with the lowest bits taken for the MQA coding.
The degradation of this "folded" version can be chosen when doing the encoding, by taking more bits for the MQA part, raising the noise floor.
This could used to only let people hear an 8-bit (or less) "preview" if they don't pony up for the MQA decoder. In turn, this would let them distribute music where the full sound quality is only available in MQA form, which you can't edit or change in any way. I'm not sure whether there is a unique ID already in MQA files, but they could implement that, and even force software decoders to refuse to play certain files, by revoking the specific ID.
The degradation of this "folded" version can be chosen when doing the encoding, by taking more bits for the MQA part, raising the noise floor.
This could used to only let people hear an 8-bit (or less) "preview" if they don't pony up for the MQA decoder. In turn, this would let them distribute music where the full sound quality is only available in MQA form, which you can't edit or change in any way. I'm not sure whether there is a unique ID already in MQA files, but they could implement that, and even force software decoders to refuse to play certain files, by revoking the specific ID.
Your last sentence is the exact situation with DVD, Blu-ray and UHD Blu-ray. You can play 4K video on youtube with hardly any royalty. You can make your own video in 4K with a phone. Yet, you pay boatload of money to patent holders because when they made the format, front and center was motivation to make money from royalties. Here is just one entity among others who want their share of the deal: https://www.one-blue.com/royalty-rates/royalty_rates.html
Note that the above does NOT include other underlying IP you need to license which includes MPEG-2, Dolby and DTS, etc., etc.
I remember talking to Philips years back. They said their revenue stream used to be: players, chips and patents. Chinese destroyed the first business and other chip companies put them out of business on ICs. So they were left with just patent fees in new formats.
Really, there is just no way to defend any existing commercial formats on these grounds. Yet we consume them without complaining but get all upset on a format like MQA which has no prayer of becoming mainstream.
People needed to be "woke" years ago about audio/video formats and help create lower cost versions. Fortunately with the age of Internet, we don't need a consortia to create formats so years from now the problem will be behind us. For now though, let's be consistent and not complain about a little fly in our house where a hungry lion is sitting next to us.
Seems like you are out of touch with the latest news to keep repeating this scare tactic/talking point. Amazon and Qobuz both publish in non-MQA high-res audio formats proving beyond any doubt that the labels have no interest whatsoever to protect their distributed content. As did outfits like HDTracks before that. Labels want money however they can get it and that is the end of the story.
Besides, MQA has no form of copy control. I can buy an MQA track, or capture a streamed version and give it to anyone I want. I can also make unlimited copies of it. So it does nothing to solve piracy problems.
And why on earth would the labels push an 8-bit format for preview when you can already get high-rate lossy MP3/AAC from major players like Apple, Amazon, Google, Spotify, etc.? You think Apple would say, "yes sir; I will go ahead and distribute 8-bit MQA and pay royalties to this little company to boot." There is no dose of reality in what you say.
The world of audio distribution has moved on and did so years and years ago from focus on piracy. Even if they did worry about it, no way, no how the labels would want to king make a company like MQA and allow them to skim money from their profits on every transaction. They would demand any such solution to be free to them. And the entire consumer electronics industry would demand the same.
Those of you who have made MQA hate your life, really need to learn how the industry works before creating these empty arguments which have already shown to be completely wrong.
I'm saying it's a possibility in the format, and perhaps something Bob Stuart wants, that is all. My main complaint about the format is that it is meaningless and a solution desperately in search of a problem.
The world does not need any more proprietary formats, so I rail against all closed formats, not just MQA.
The world does not need any more proprietary formats, so I rail against all closed formats, not just MQA.
That's cool then.
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