MQA Deep Dive - I published music on tidal to test MQA

[GoldenOne]

Yes I do.

Sticking with the medical/health analogy, I'm not the surgeon. MQA is. Or perhaps a better analogy would be that MQA is a faith healer.

They claim to have a new, untestable, wonderful method of healing people. Way better than proven medicine. Just need to pay the fee and you'll get healed!

Let's say we've got someone who's legally blind. They could get laser eye surgery. Which is proven, its open as to how it works, and thoroughly tested. And in fact it's also free!

OR, they could pay to get the MQA faith healing. There's no proof other than plenty of people saying it works for them. 'Just try it yourself', 'Just have faith' etc. Clinical trials won't work cause you don't have enough faith and don't understand the mysterious ways.

So the blind person goes along and gets MQA faith healed.
Then someone else comes along and asks 'how many fingers am I holding up'?
They can't tell.

This means the person hasn't been healed. You don't need to have a medical degree to understand that the person is still blind and cannot see properly.
And no amount of faith healing supporters saying "you didn't test it right you have to walk them down a specifically shaped corridor and check if they bump into anything, no one is going to hold up fingers in the real world" is going to change the fact that they literally cannot see how many fingers you're holding up and are still blind.

No degree needed, just common sense

 

[firedog]

Do you want me cutting on you or a qualified surgeon ?

terrible analogy.

 

[dmac6419]

Where? When I was going through this thread, I never saw Amir offer any such criticisms of their marketing or claims of losslessness etc, though it's possible I missed it somewhere.

At least, for several pages now, if anything, the pro-MQA crowd has been giving a pass to their marketing and others have been coming up with reasons to justify a misleading use of "lossless."



If your core promises as-defined by your marketing material are misleading or false, then it's not really delivering on core promises.

This isn't like a situation where some bakery has the best cookies ever but can't make an ad campaign to save their life.

The anti MQA crowd thing was MQA is gonna take over the World,MQA ain't taking over schitt,That's why I like Tidal and MQA

 

[Hai-Fri. Audio]

Yes he could, like other, but then what?
You know that there are fields where you won't work with people from country A because they keep it based on a diploma X, while you can work a lot with country B people because you have two diplomas Y and Z in complementing fields... and much more important in their minds, experience.
I know some people without any diploma that can open a digital mixing board and immediately understand what's going on and find a problem faster than one with a diploma. Yes, they have study it themselves, but also with other with a diploma, but they practice more than others.
It's not always the truth, but it happens enough to know that judging one person based on his qualifications only is just stupid, and I'm pretty sure there will be people doing it if he shares it.

OP doesn't show their face, doesn't show their name, puts nothing personal on the line. RISKING ZERO PERSONAL REPUTATION.

Amir actually has qualifications, industry reputation on the line, in public view.

You should check out OP's youtube channel where they opine on the sonic differences between DACs... "smooth, refined, laid back"

Sometimes people have astounding skill and knowledge outside their field of expertise - and you are right not to give ultimate preference - but we are waaaaaaay beyond that now.

 

[dmac6419]

terrible analogy.

Thanks for your opinion,I can respect that.

 

[JSmith]

MQA

This and your last few posts have been uninformative, non-constructive and non-technical in nature.

Do you have further data to assist in studying the MQA codec and will you be contributing to the fund to have this done properly?



JSmith

 

[GoldenOne]

This and your last few posts have been uninformative, non-constructive and non-technical in nature.

Do you have further data to assist in studying the MQA codec and will you be contributing to the fund to have this done properly?



JSmith

That depends. If the process will be completely open and transparent as to what is being configured or adapted then yes absolutely. I will happily put money towards it.

But that won't happen, I'm sure the studios are probably not allowed to talk about what they can/can't change in the MQA encoder or what they have access to. I would love to be shown wrong though, because this would be incredibly useful information.

And to reiterate, the fact that the encoder NEEDS configuring in the first place indicates it isn't lossless. You can't configure how identical something is.
It's either identical or it isn't.

And I'm not interested in a "perceptually lossless" option. I want either ACTUALLY lossless, with no loss of any information, or something which dramatically reduces file-size like MP3 or the 20 bit sox config someone posted a couple pages back.

Even if we go by the 'perceptually lossless' argument MQA is seemingly trying to use, MP3 could be argued to be perceptually lossless for most people.
And there is also no proof that MQA is perceptually lossless either, just their word.
In fact the fact they are also claiming it sounds better, indicates it's perceptually different and therefore not lossless!

 

[Hai-Fri. Audio]

Yes I do.

I agree, it's an extreme case but the underlying principle is the same.

You can even dial it down and still use doctors:

You want a nobody taking your MRI scans and interpreting them or someone with some qualifications?

 

[mtristand]

Do you want me cutting on you or a qualified surgeon ?

The argument isn't that qualifications are never relevant.

For surgery? Yeah, you want someone qualified. You don't want just anyone cutting into you with no prior education or track record of success.

But this has nothing to do with qualifications being necessary to verify a claim or offer a contradiction.

If you're an industry expert who wears credentials on your sleeve, it should be easy for you to refute GoldenSound's arguments by pointing out flaws in methodology, or showing reproducible results that contradict his and support MQA's claims, etc.

And if you can't do so, then maybe "credentials" aren't the issue, here.

The reason why it's important for results to be reproducible by anyone is precisely so that we avoid arguments-from-authority, which can be easily abused, where the only reason for accepting a claim is because of one's say-so, even if they're wrong.

 

[KSTR]

Amir actually has qualifications, industry reputation on the line, in public view.

Actually, to find out Amir's full name, you have to go to his profile and then you must know that you have to click on the Madrona Digital link, then goto "our team", then search until you find some "Amir" (with a photo showing him probably many years ago).
In my book, that is not that much more direct than contacting GO and ask him for his real name that may then google for.

 

[dmac6419]

OP doesn't show their face, doesn't show their name, puts nothing personal on the line. RISKING ZERO PERSONAL REPUTATION.

Amir actually has qualifications, industry reputation on the line, in public view.

You should check out OP's youtube channel where they opine on the sonic differences between DACs... "smooth, refined, laid back"

Sometimes people have astounding skill and knowledge outside their field of expertise - and you are right not to give ultimate preference - but we are waaaaaaay beyond that now.

read some of these reviewer reviews most if not all of it is BS,word salad,timbre,synergy,i could go on,but asked em what a 4-2 or 4-3 beat is or what key this song is in ain't got a clue.

 

[dmac6419]

The argument isn't that qualifications are never relevant.

For surgery? Yeah, you want someone qualified. You don't want just anyone cutting into you with no prior education or track record of success.

But this has nothing to do with qualifications being necessary to verify a claim or offer a contradiction.

If you're an industry expert who wears credentials on your sleeve, it should be easy for you to refute GoldenSound's arguments by pointing out flaws in methodology, or showing reproducible results that contradict his and support MQA's claims, etc.

And if you can't do so, then maybe "credentials" aren't the issue, here.

The reason why it's important for results to be reproducible by anyone is precisely so that we avoid arguments-from-authority, which can be easily abused, where the only reason for accepting a claim is because of one's say-so, even if they're wrong.

His study was already debunked,by people with more expertise then him,me and most of you.

 

[GoldenOne]

read some of these reviewer reviews most if not all of it is BS,word salad,timbre,synergy,i could go on,but asked em what a 4-2 or 4-3 beat is or what key this song is in ain't got a clue.

This has nothing to do with MQA.
If you have an issue with my subjective reviews that's fine. But it's absolutely nothing to do with the discussion here and is a completely unrelated ad-hominem argument.

You'll notice I did not give any subjective opinion on MQA. I demonstrated it wasn't lossless in an objective manner and left it at that.

 

[Hai-Fri. Audio]

This isn't like a situation where some bakery has the best cookies ever but can't make an ad campaign to save their life.

I'm not defending/supporting MQA. I'm pointing out that we don't have the whole picture, that the picture is complicated, and that people should hold their horses and judgements until we have more clarity. Until then, no one has to pay for anything MQA if they don't want to.

 

[dmac6419]

This has nothing to do with MQA.
If you have an issue with my subjective reviews that's fine. But it's absolutely nothing to do with the discussion here and is a completely unrelated ad-hominem argument.

You'll notice I did not give any subjective opinion on MQA. I demonstrated it wasn't lossless in an objective manner and left it at that.

Remember I told you when you first posted your study that I respected your views,although they were flawed.

 

[GoldenOne]

His study was already debunked,by people with more expertise then him,me and most of you.

No it was not. The argument has been put forward many times that the tests were invalid because they didn't adhere to "natural sound". Which is silly in the first place because any "lossless" encoder that has subjective parameters isn't lossless.

But if we take a look at a normal music release from a major label and studio we can see that the MQA version isn't lossless either.

If you want to prove MQA is lossless, provide some evidence for that.
So far there is none.

 

[VintageFlanker]

Actually, to find out Amir's full name, you have to go to his profile and then you must know that you have to click on the Madrona Digital link, then goto "our team", then search until you find some "Amir" (with a photo showing him probably many years ago).
In my book, that is not that much more direct than contacting GO and ask him for his real name that may then google for.

Or

https://letmegooglethat.com/?q=amir+audio+science+review

 

[Music1969]

Do you want me cutting on you or a qualified surgeon ?

This guy is qualified and did harm - you may have caused less harm

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...entenced-for-carrying-out-needless-operations

I'm sure there are hundreds/thousands more examples

 

[raistlin65]

No it doesn't sound like MQA. Demand for high-res audio has existed for decades. Remember SACD and DVD-A formats?

Have you forgotten? That demand was created by the audio industry. lol

They died and got replaced with lossy audio online. Fidelity went down instead of up. Tidal took the initiative to push high-res online and did so with MQA. That likely had an influence on big guys trying to now offer high-res. And they are offering it without MQA. So no way you can put the market demand at the feet of MQA. They are providing a solution just like MPEG-2 AAC did by enabling high sample rates and bit depths decades back. And unlike Fiji water, they are not trying to charge $5 for a penny worth of water. People selling massive DSD and PCM files online are doing that to some extent and again, without MQA.

MQA's pitch is that it is a more efficient way of doing the delivery.

Have you forgotten about FLAC?

MQA appeals to audiophiles because it's a new technology that they don't completely understand, but are being lead to believe by MQA's marketing that it improves sound quality over FLAC. That's why MQA has described itself simply as "lossless" to put it on the same playing field as FLAC, even though it's perceptually lossless (no, I don't agree with your attempt to define it as some kind of new lossless type; it's a new type of perceptual lossless). And they use flowery language like "origami folding" even though there are no cute animal figures here. As soon as audiophiles get in their head what MQA wants them to believe, expectation bias will convince them it's better than FLAC.

So I guess if one thinks of audiophile gullibility as "demand," then yes. MQA did address a "demand" in the market. This idea that audiophiles are going to get better sound because it's a newer fancier encoding and decoding process than FLAC is not much different from how expensive cable manufacturers describe their space-age technology cables. It's not much different from how Schiit Audio leads people to believe that their more expensive equipment that measures audibly transparent will sound different from the Modi/Magni series.

As for your point about pricing, it's not possible to have a discussion about costs with someone who keeps asserting MQA is free to users in denial of how all MQA licensing fees are passed onto the consumers.

 

[dmac6419]

This guy is qualified and did harm - you may have caused less harm

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...entenced-for-carrying-out-needless-operations

I'm sure there are hundreds/thousands more examples

But I said qualified surgeon,I should have added respected