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Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA

108.249.169.177
Posted on January 7, 2017 at 16:58:45
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Would like to give some early listening impressions listening to MQA files streamed from Tidal and listened to on A Meridian Explorer2 with MQA decoding and an Audio-GD Master 7 without MQA encoding
I listened to 6 albums where I had access to the Original album on Tidal and the same album encoded with MQA Spent most of the time with Fleetwood Macs Rumours and also listened to some Jazz, Classical and Movie music
The Results using an arbitrary rating of 100% as the best sound
Explorer2 ( Non Mqa album)----- 70%
Explorer2 with decoding ( MQA album)--------- 80%
Master 7 ( Non Mqa album)----- 90%
Master 7 ( MQA album)--------- 95%

Just my subjective opinions
I am assuming that Tidal is not decoding the MQA files
Alan

 

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Great list of MQA albums on Tidal, posted on January 21, 2017 at 18:04:23
RJeff
Audiophile

Posts: 1347
Location: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: June 27, 2001
 Apparently many of the MQA albums are not showing up in the What's New / Masters section.

Jeff


"Decaf is for cowards."
Jack Kevorkian

 

RE: Great list of MQA albums on Tidal, posted on January 21, 2017 at 19:04:14
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Most of the albums on that list are showing up on the Tidal site. I found 7 that I did not think that were on Tidal. When I searched for them only one played as a MQA file. The rest played as HIFI. So really don't know what this list is
Alan

 

RE: Great list of MQA albums on Tidal, posted on January 22, 2017 at 08:28:07
RJeff
Audiophile

Posts: 1347
Location: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: June 27, 2001
 I found quite a few albums that were not showing up in my Master -> Show All, including all of the Simon Rattle albums.

So apparently YMMV.

Jeff


"Decaf is for cowards."
Jack Kevorkian

 

RE: Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA, posted on January 13, 2017 at 01:20:58
jazz1
Audiophile

Posts: 2891
Joined: October 30, 2000
 Did not do any comparisons but the few "masters" that I played sounded
amazingly good, but at the end of the day I suppose that only time will tell.

 

RE: Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA, posted on January 11, 2017 at 13:44:58
mstratil
Audiophile

Posts: 35
Location: North Carolina
Joined: December 29, 2006
 Have there been any comparison studies of MQA vs. HiRes?

If you know of any, please post the references.

Thanks,
Mike

 

RE: Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA, posted on January 11, 2017 at 06:50:18
mstratil
Audiophile

Posts: 35
Location: North Carolina
Joined: December 29, 2006
 Have there been any comparison studies of MQA vs. HiRes?

If you know of any, please post the references.

Thanks,
Mike

 

RE: Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA, posted on January 12, 2017 at 09:25:29
PAR
 Not sure what your question means. MQA is not a format and is a way of storing and distributing what are hi-rez files (excepting DSD) i.e. pcm files from 24/88.2 up to 24/384.

Do you mean has anyone compared a, say, native 24/96 file with a 24/96 file, encoded by MQA,then decoded to provide a 24/96 file?

 

RE: Early listening impressions of Tidal MQA, posted on January 11, 2017 at 10:18:58
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Not that I know of
Alan

 

Thanks..., posted on January 7, 2017 at 17:34:14
Ivan303
Audiophile

Posts: 48887
Location: Cadiere d'azur FRANCE - Santa Fe, NM
Joined: February 26, 2001
 Seems that, for the bucks, the Meridian DAC is a pretty good little USB powered portable DAC?




First they came for the dumb-asses
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a dumb-ass

 

RE: Thanks..., posted on January 7, 2017 at 19:52:27
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Some more info from Steven Stone at CES
"Steven Stone L. Brown a day ago
Currently either you get 96/24 from the App's decoder or you let your MQA DAC do the decoding. I have to think that some manufacturer will come ouut with a USB to SPDIF convertor with MQA decoding built in. It's a natural for all those with DACS than can handle higher resolutions but lack MQA.
Then you could put a MQA decoder in front of the Master 7 and get 24/192 resolution
Alan

 

My experiments reveal with the explorer 2 you indeed go above 96khz, posted on January 8, 2017 at 10:44:12
bullethead
 There's a 2L Norwegian album on Tidal, software decode 88.1khz, with the Meridian Explorer 2 much higher bypassing software decoded just into MQA. The lights indicate it.

Very cool, would be impressive if this little DAC would rival my main setup, however more electronics are needed. Blue light is on, MQA and very high resolution, I'll also be fiddling with this cool gadget.

Looks like software limits to 96khz with tidal software decoding, my chain of electronics sound better with that than the Explorer 2, but I am not making judgements yet,

Good to see MQA take off.

 

RE: "2L Norwegian album"..., posted on January 8, 2017 at 10:48:24
Ivan303
Audiophile

Posts: 48887
Location: Cadiere d'azur FRANCE - Santa Fe, NM
Joined: February 26, 2001
 Dang, there be some 'Classical' on that album.

Gonna get our 'bullethead' all cultured up here :-)


First they came for the dumb-asses
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a dumb-ass

 

RE: "2L Norwegian album"..., posted on January 8, 2017 at 10:52:02
bullethead
 I was the first person to let everyone know about radio.cesnet.cz when they figured out how to stream FLAC over a decade ago.

I am all cultured, yes. Just choose to stay with my people, the deplorables :)

 

RE: "I was the first person to let everyone know about radio.cesnet.cz..." , posted on January 8, 2017 at 12:05:31
Ivan303
Audiophile

Posts: 48887
Location: Cadiere d'azur FRANCE - Santa Fe, NM
Joined: February 26, 2001
 And for that we are eternally grateful!





First they came for the dumb-asses
And I did not speak out
Because I was not a dumb-ass

 

RE: Thanks..., posted on January 7, 2017 at 18:29:23
ahendler
Audiophile

Posts: 5151
Location: San Antonio, Texas
Joined: January 24, 2003
 Yes,it really surprised me how good it is at any price
I think when Absolute sound reviewed it in there MQA issue I think Hartley said when playing MQA files it sounded the same as there $18000 CD/Dac player
Alan

 

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