MQA had a suite that was open half hour early so I went there before the show opened. To my surprise their demo equipment was not Meridian but MSB with YG speakers!
I got there before a group of press joined. Of course I already had the best seat in the house. Hehe.
My professional colleague and friend Bob Stuart ushered them in:
He then handed the baton to head of MSB Sales which started a long, long pitch about their equipment with zero mention of MQA! I thought it was quite inappropriate as this was MQA booth, not their own.
He also had to keep referring to his cell phone for notes.
The DAC was the "Select Signature" or some such thing with "33 femtosecond" clock.
Notice the MQA prompt. Later Bob Stuart mentioned that the first number in the display, i.e. 24 above, may be incorrect.
Bob said that they had profiled a ton of analog to digital converters. He also said that he is totally dedicated to MQA now! Clearly they turned up the heat as the entire 8th floor suites practically had MQA support and signage.
Back to MSB, we eventually got to hear some tunes.
First up was this: http://www.shazam.com/track/64071180/midnight-sugar#referrer=shz.am
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This sounded exceptional!
The MSB sales guy said in blind test he always picked MQA as sounding better.
Next they played Forest by Snow Arimasa ユキ アリマサ
Bob Stuart then queued up Quiet Winter Night by Hoff Ensemble was recorded in DXD at 24-bit/352 Khz using microphones with 100 Khz response but streamed at 1 mbit/sec over Tidal live: http://www.shazam.com/track/102633761/blågutten#referrer=shz.am
Not sure if this was the track or some other:
MSB salesperson said MQA is an upgrade card for existing DAC owners. I was surprised as before he had talked at length about how future proof their DACs are due to use of two DSPs. I asked why they did not modify the DSP and Bob interjected saying it was faster/more convenient to put in a new card???
Overall, a very strong showing and excellent partnership with MSB as they always do a great job with their hardware.
I got there before a group of press joined. Of course I already had the best seat in the house. Hehe.
My professional colleague and friend Bob Stuart ushered them in:
He then handed the baton to head of MSB Sales which started a long, long pitch about their equipment with zero mention of MQA! I thought it was quite inappropriate as this was MQA booth, not their own.
He also had to keep referring to his cell phone for notes.
The DAC was the "Select Signature" or some such thing with "33 femtosecond" clock.
Notice the MQA prompt. Later Bob Stuart mentioned that the first number in the display, i.e. 24 above, may be incorrect.
Bob said that they had profiled a ton of analog to digital converters. He also said that he is totally dedicated to MQA now! Clearly they turned up the heat as the entire 8th floor suites practically had MQA support and signage.
Back to MSB, we eventually got to hear some tunes.
First up was this: http://www.shazam.com/track/64071180/midnight-sugar#referrer=shz.am
This sounded exceptional!
The MSB sales guy said in blind test he always picked MQA as sounding better.
Next they played Forest by Snow Arimasa ユキ アリマサ
Bob Stuart then queued up Quiet Winter Night by Hoff Ensemble was recorded in DXD at 24-bit/352 Khz using microphones with 100 Khz response but streamed at 1 mbit/sec over Tidal live: http://www.shazam.com/track/102633761/blågutten#referrer=shz.am
Not sure if this was the track or some other:
MSB salesperson said MQA is an upgrade card for existing DAC owners. I was surprised as before he had talked at length about how future proof their DACs are due to use of two DSPs. I asked why they did not modify the DSP and Bob interjected saying it was faster/more convenient to put in a new card???
Overall, a very strong showing and excellent partnership with MSB as they always do a great job with their hardware.
