Testing Tidal MQA “masters” on HD800s / Fiio k9pro MQA dac/amp

[Carovigno]

Sounds better than Apple music and amazon music for roughly 80% of songs.

I selected songs with Masters fidelity.

Unfortunately Tidal doesn’t have radio streaming stations like Apple does.

 

[NiagaraPete]

Many of us would dispute your observations.

 

[Carovigno]

so my ears are defective? Or are you going by theoretical analysis?

 

[Leporello]

Sounds better than Apple music and amazon music for roughly 80% of songs.

"Sounds better" is a subjective point of view. Nothing wrong with that of course, we all have preferences. But does MQA sound more like the original masters? That was its original selling point, after all. What do you think? Have you heard the original masters?

 

[Carovigno]

"Sounds better" is a subjective point of view. Nothing wrong with that of course, we all have preferences. But does MQA sound more like the original masters? That was its original selling point, after all. What do you think? Have you heard the original masters?

Have you tried mqa Tidal yourself? Or are you referring to specs on paper?

 

[Leporello]

Have you tried mqa Tidal yourself? Or are you referring to specs on paper?

I am not referring to anything. I am only wondering whether the MQA versions are closer to the original masters than previous versions. I have not heard the originals nor the MQA versions. I cannot say anything about it.

But what do you think? Have you heard the original master recordings and compared the MQA versions to them?

 

[voodooless]

so my ears are defective?

Defective? No, unreliable, yes. Everybody’s ears and brain are notoriously unreliable. What was your method of comparison? What basic controls were in place to removes your biases?

 

[Carovigno]

Defective? No, unreliable, yes. Everybody’s ears and brain are notoriously unreliable. What was your method of comparison? What basic controls were in place to removes your biases?

Can you honestly post on this forum that by listening to both tidal masters is not better than apple or amazon? Be honest please.

 

[voodooless]

Can you honestly post on this forum that by listening to both tidal masters is not better than apple or amazon? Be honest please.

Sure you can. You can like whatever you want. More important is to realize that your mind is fallible and to do a fair comparison, measures have to be taken to compensate for that. Did you?

 

[Leporello]

Can you honestly post on this forum that by listening to both tidal masters is not better than apple or amazon? Be honest please.

No one questions the honesty of your subjective preferences. You have them, we all have them. Have you heard the original master recordings and compared the MQA versions to them? Do the MQA versions sound closer to the originals than the versions we had before MQA?

 

[voodooless]

I think we can realistically assume the actual masters are unknown.

 

[MaxwellsEq]

Sounds better than Apple music and amazon music for roughly 80% of songs.

The reaction you have had stems from this opening statement. I'm sure what you mean is you feel like they sound better to you on your equipment when you were doing the comparison using your methodology. No-one would react to that.

But as written you are apparently stating this is reliably true for everyone, regardless of kit and circumstances. You just can't assert this, unfortunately.

 

[Carovigno]

The reaction you have had stems from this opening statement. I'm sure what you mean is you feel like they sound better to you on your equipment when you were doing the comparison using your methodology. No-one would react to that.

But as written you are apparently stating this is reliably true for everyone, regardless of kit and circumstances. You just can't assert this, unfortunately.

Right. Also not understanding why the anti MQA backlash both politically and business modeling.

 

[Leporello]

Right. Also not understanding why the anti MQA backlash both politically and business modeling.

What backlash are you talking about? Opinions about MQA have been divided from the very beginning. Some have been convinced of the benefits, some less so.

 

[voodooless]

What backlash are you talking about?

I guess asking for how a comparison was performed is called “backlash” nowadays…

 

[terryforsythe]

I'll throw in my 2 cents here - perhaps this is only tangential, though. After purchasing a new set of speakers (Elac UniFi Reference bookshelves) I was listening to a recording I am very familiar with over Spotify. It didn't sound quite right - not bad, but not great. To be candid, at first I was a little disappointed in the speakers. I then decided to pull out the CD and give that a try, and it definitely sounded better. I then decided to do a trial subscription to Tidal. I have a miniDSP SHD, which does not support MQA, but otherwise works with Tidal. That same recording on Tidal sounded noticeably better than on Spotify. There may be difference between the Tidal Stream that the CD, but if there is, I didn't hear it. After that I asked my son, who is a musician, to compare Tidal to Spotify. He also noticed the difference in sound quality, and was impressed with Tidal (again, without MQA). Unless the OP is comparing Tidal MQA to Amazon Music HD, the difference he hears may be the fact that he is using Tidal itself, and maybe not so much use of MQA. I have not yet heard Tidal with MQA, so I can't give an opinion on that.

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

80% of around 200 million songs...that's a lot of listening

 

[MaxwellsEq]

Right. Also not understanding why the anti MQA backlash both politically and business modeling.

What? Where did I say anything about MQA, politically or business model? Read it again! I was trying to help you understand how you could have posted this and instead probably started a healthy debate.

You have presented no structured argument or evidence to back up your opinion that one thing is better than another. With every post you are coming across as more insufficient.

 

[Jimbob54]

I guess asking for how a comparison was performed is called “backlash” nowadays…

I think the poster was trying to open up a wider discussion on the whole mqa topic rather than reaction to his observations.

I.e making this another mqa rehash. Of which we have all surely had enough.

 

[voodooless]

I think the poster was trying to open up a wider discussion on the whole mqa topic rather than reaction to his observations.

Your crystal ball may be working better than mine. I got the opposite feeling. Either way, the end result will be the same: superfluous discussion