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MQA

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Rosewind

Rosewind

Lost in Translation

It seems that the good people behind MQA are very protective about their product. I have opened a beer and brought out the popcorn. Apologies to Tony L and his team if this means that they will have to do overtime in the next few days.
 
I've just posted my thoughts on MQA in response to the Tidal (Streaming?) thread in "Music" - Spooky!
As Yank points out, by the time MQA was developed sufficiently to perform well, there was no need for it; compression was no longer required to stream CD quality and higher over fast broadband and 3G/4G for mobile. I've no idea why Tidal sticks with it.
 
Thanks for the video. Since Qobuz is now available here I will try that instead.


And in my case my Rega Dac R doesn’t support MQA, so I would much rather have real high res.
 
At no point in my 40+ year music buying/audiophile life has MQA even appeared on the radar. My only exposure to it is as an administrator of a website that covers audio. It certainly has zero relevance to the way I purchase and enjoy music. To be honest I still don’t quite understand what it is for. It appears to be a proprietary copy protection system for streaming platforms, all of whom are all notorious for ripping musicians off with insultingly low play fees. A overly complex anti-piracy device for something they are selling for tiny fractions of a penny. Why it would annoy anyone in a world full of wonderful limited edition vinyl (or downloads if you absolutely must) available directly from the artists via Bandcamp etc is frankly beyond me. If you care about music please fund it!
 
Yank said:
If "they" get their way, it will. "They" want to start MQA-encoding CDs.
Click to expand...

I’d read that, but I don’t see how it could ever catch on. CD is a mature, arguably dying format, no way in hell is the typical end-user going to cough up for a brand new player to play a handful of new releases. I’m in a distinct minority in being able to play SACD (I can actually play them in two of my three systems as the TV rig’s Cambridge Blu-Ray player is compatible), and I can’t imagine MQA would ever achieve the take-up as a physical medium that has (SACD made far more impact outside of the UK, e.g. Japan). I’d not be interested in what can only hope to be a really marginal format at this point. I suspect it will sink as fast as Elcassette and Neil Young’s yellow Toblerone.

If I was a gambler I’d bet big against MQA at this point. It seems to be a couple of major labels behind it, and really they are only custodians of the past at this point. New music is happening elsewhere. I’ll happily keep buying beautiful Tone Poets etc, but they can stick MQA up their arse. I just don’t see what it offers me that I haven’t either already got or have any need for. I can try new music on YouTube or Bandcamp, if I like it I’ll buy the vinyl. With historic stuff it’s done. I’ve got pretty much everything Miles Davis ever put to tape already, they aren’t selling it to me again!
 
My DAC does MQA... The feature was not even an incidental feature in my purchasing decision...

That way I was not disappointed when I heard how unexceptional MQA sounded via Tidal... A service I have never subscribed to - someone left the login code on my DAC and it stayed there for several months until a software update removed it... I have not missed Tidal :)
 
When I heard it I thought...so what. I quickly moved back to Qobuz. Irritated that it was foisted upon me. Like when Apple forced their listeners to listen to that mediocre U2 album.
 
Yank said:
If "they" get their way, it will. "They" want to start MQA-encoding CDs.
Click to expand...

They've been around for a while. I even have a CD player that will play them, should a didc ever come my way. The facility was unknown to me when I bought the machine.
 
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