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In Reply to: RE: MQA questions posted by Tony Lauck on January 17, 2016 at 11:46:49
MQA provides a software 'preview' tool to people like Morten Lindberg of 2L with a number of profiles. These profiles will give them an idea of how their MQA encoded files will sound through various MQA decoders. MQA decoding is only available, at present, on MQA-enabled DACs.
Trade show demos are one of the things I write about as part of my CES show coverage. They are what they are. What I have said is the MQA demos, which were presented as proof of concept, were convincing. If you take issue with that characterization, fine. Calling me a shill, is not fine.
The demos I heard in the MQA room were through headphones and in a room with one other listener who did not say a word.
In the end, and in my opinion, the only valid way to determine the efficacy of any technology to do with hi-fi is by listening to music through it in one's own system, over time. Questions of people's motive, whether or not they strike someone as being a 'nice guy', etc are irrelevant distractions brought about by a lack of real information and/or direct experience with a given technology.
Michael Lavorgna
Editor, AudioStream.com
Follow Ups:
nt
... Tony Lauck seems to imply as much, but then says that Lavorgna has misunderstood his meaning.
I never accused you of being a "shill". A shill is someone who is paid to deliver a sales message while appearing to be independent. Reviewers are obviously not independent sources of information, being dependent on the manufacturers for information and access, without which they can not ply their trade.
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
"In this thread, your posts are confirming the stereotype of all audio reviewers with the (R) logo as shills for manufacturers. Anyone with the slightest clue can distinguish facts from marketing literature."
Oh please Tony. Stop with the bullshit.
As I just posted, and as you would have known if you'd read my show report, I spoke to a recording engineer, Peter McGrath, at length, about his experiences with MQA. I included quotes from my conversation with Peter in my MQA coverage because they relevant, independent, and come from someone who is in a position to offer the most informed comments on MQA before and after.
Michael Lavorgna
Editor, AudioStream.com
nt
All of these people are in the business of trying to sell me stuff. I have no reason to believe they are independent. They all stand to benefit if a new format can be foisted off on the audio marketplace.
If Stewart were truly interested in furthering the art of audio, he would simply release a specification and open source code for MQA, just as was done with FLAC. Then, and only then, would I believe that his primary goal was to improve the state of the art and not the state of his bank account. I don't hold it against him that he doesn't do it, but conclude that he's just another smart engineer out to try to make a buck by disrupting the industry.
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
The 2L MQA recordings will be available through Tidal. The idea that people make things and try to sell them doesn't cause me to be paranoid, Tony.Cheers,
Michael Lavorgna
Editor, AudioStream.com
Edits: 01/17/16
And when I stream these 2L recordings from Tidal how will I decode them. This is the problem. Just spent $2400 on a new wonderful dac. Unless the decoding occurs in Tidal or there is an inexpensive decoder this format is dead to me and many others. I do not see MQA making any headway until this decoding issue is solved
Alan
While all of the demos at CES used MQA-enabled DACs, software-enabled decoders are in the works. However, software encoders will still need to know what DAC they are talking to in order to provide the full MQA, end-to-end, technology solution.
Of course no one has to buy into MQA. At present there's no reason to rush into something that is in its infancy. As with anything do to with hi-fi and listening to music, I'd wait until I could listen for myself before deciding if its worth it or not.
Michael Lavorgna
Editor, AudioStream.com
I totally agree with waiting for a while as things sort themselves out. The problem is MQA is being hyped so strongly before it is really market ready. When Tidal or Classicsonline have 1000's of titles encoded and there is available software decoders it will have a chance. I think discussions like this are harmful to MQA. By the way having spent many years on the asylum I have learned a lot from Tony and strongly believe his point of view on the MQA rollout.
Alan
Seeing as the OP suggested MQA could be a "hoax", I think it's gone pretty well ;-)
Cheers,
Michael Lavorgna
Editor, AudioStream.com
The only "hoax" part is that it can automatically make up for deficiencies in recordings. However, the fact that it is being promoted as doing this is enough for me to dismiss its promoters as scammers, especially those who know enough not to fool themselves, you know, people who are Fellow of the AES.
As an effective way to squeeze more subjective quality into a 44/24 container I have no problem, except that there is no point in doing this because bits are cheap these days. The only possible case where bandwidth is scarce today is for streaming applications, and most people who stream music do so as background music, rather than critical listening and there is no need for extra resolution in the first place. Ten years ago, or so, when Stewart came up with his ideas for this style of perceptual compression bandwidth was much more costly and there might have been some economic benefit from this technology. That day is long past.
Tony Lauck
"Diversity is the law of nature; no two entities in this universe are uniform." - P.R. Sarkar
JPlay?
Could be. ;-)
I don't believe that the majority of asylum inmates feel MQA is a hoax. It seems the questions are basically how well it actually works and the implementation of trying it
Alan
And I heard one of Bob Stuart's talks at RMAF last year.Lots of problems described. Lots of discussion about how great things sounded when said problems were solved. Lots of talk about MQA fixing said problems but not really how this will all work. Hardware? Software?
Or even exactly what MQA end to end actually entails. Recording? Transcribing? What about MY end? DAC? Software?That said, there were a fair number of credible folks who have direct experience with whatever MQA is who think it great.
We'll just have to wait and see, I guess.
In the mean time, if we post enough about it here, maybe Tony's head will finally explode! =:-0
Edits: 01/17/16
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