MQA CD

[Shevans]

FYI If anyone has a Bluesound Vault then you can rip MQA CDs with it and they playback in MQA.

[antonio66]

I do know my brother favoured MQA recordings when he was using Tidal.

[Latteman]

I do know my brother favoured MQA recordings when he was using Tidal.

I really like mqa from Tidal
Sounds stunning

[George Hincapie]

Oh yes, afterthought ....

One thing I will say in favour of MQA is that the format does seem to be very resilient to jitter-induced problems. Seeing as the DAC does most of the work in unfolding and expanding the analogue signal from the 16-bit datastream, any slight timing problems appear to be eradicated by the MQA processing.

This is a big plus-factor as the struggle to reduce jitter is one of the major hurdles for digital-based audio.

Have you watched the Golden Sound MQA video on YT? You may find it interesting if not.

[Fretless]

A rather damning view of the format that extensively blows many of MQA's claims out of the window.



I'm now testing a 'first unfold' to 88.2 KHz with DbPowerAmp, see what that does.

[Bencat57]

Okay - now that's interesting ....

From the above video I gleaned the fact that MQA decoding is a multi-step operation with Step 1 being to double the sample rate from 44.1 to 88.2 KHz. This is something that I can also do with DbPowerAmp Audio Converter. So, from the straight WAV rip of the CD, I resampled that to a new file with rate 88.2 (still 16bit) and went off to have a listen.

Non MQA-setup with my audio workstation rig based around the Metrum Musette DAC: I can split the 3 file versions as follows
1) straight 44.1KHz / 16 bit - rather muddy and vague. MP3 quality
2) 44.1KHz / 24bit resample - less muddy, sort of soft Apple Lossless character.
3) 88.2KHz / 16bit Now we're talking. Up to around CD quality

For a more critical appraisal and the chance to compare to direct MQA decoding it was back to the Upstairs rig with Sabaj A20d DAC.
Here things became more obvious and pronounced with the 88.2 version sounding very full and detailed with a pleasing, organic feel and good insight into the instruments.

Oddly, where the resampled 24bit file does trigger the MQA circuit in the DAC, the 88.2KHz version does not. The system no longer regards this as an MQA-signal. Must have done something right. Switching over to the original CD via coax SPDIF, I now notice a definite artificiality to the sound with oddly forced imaging / phasing which is impressive at first, but doesn't feel as natural as the 88.2 file.

Putting Volumio's resampling setting back on to 352.8 KHz - which is what MQA processing also does - gets a slightly silkier sheen to the music but retains the bite and detail. I had just re-ripped my CD of the Au Pairs' 'Playing With a Different Sex' (one of the best-recorded Post-Punk albums there is) and used that as an example of a non-MQA-encoded, standard CD. Here I can say that the 88.2 'unfolded' MQA audio is up to CD quality - but not better.

Looking at the 'Fourplay' sleeve, there is very little info about MQA, just that is has been done with the original master tapes, so one would assume that the source material is of high-resolution. The strangely-wide soundstage that I get from the CD with MQA processing also indicates that this format has probably been designed to sound impressive on less-than-optimal installations and will very probably do so. There are some here who like the sound of MQA and as we always say - Trust Your Ears !

Me, I'm just an over-curious bumbler who has time on his hands.

[Bencat57]

Further nerd-musings:

Once or twice a year I clear out the files of ripped-CD's from my music-station laptop in order to free up some disk-space. All the albums have been copied over to the NAS, so the PC copies are redundant. Before deleting them, though, I usually do a quick scan with Foobar's HDCD-scan utility to see if I have missed any HDCD-encoded discs - sometimes there are a couple that turn up and this was again the case.

Simple Minds 'Neon Lights', (their first covers-album) has never got to me before, I found it dull, uninteresting, muddy. But converting it to a 24bit file in DbPowerAmp transformed the sound into something vividly clear and lively. The same also happened with The Tragically Hip 'In Violet Light' (next on my 'Bands To Discover' list), turning a so-so record into one with vital edginess and bite.



Like MQA, HDCD encoding is placed withing the datastream of a standard CD. Technical jiggery-pokery 'hides' 4 bits of extra dynamic-range data within the 16bit music signal and decoder-equipped players can extract and add this to provide enhanced 20bit reproduction. Similarly to MQA - playback of these CD's without decoding provides a somewhat dissatisfying experience, which is probably why the format never really got generally accepted. HDCD was popular from about 1995-2005 and many artists issued discs in this format: Neil Young, Mike Oldfield, Roxy Music, King Crimson, Joni Mitchell - to name but a few.

Unlike MQA, HDCD (when decoded) does sound better than standard CD playback; you have the full 16-bit music signal plus 4 bits of extra information that increases the dynamic range allowing for more depth and clarity. MQA starts off with a 13bit compressed signal that it then processes heavily to tweak the sound into becoming apparently 'better'.

Those still with CD collections lying around will probably have a couple of HDCD discs in-between, normally recognisable from the 'HDCD' logo on the back cover or on the disc itself:



I usually rip to uncompressed WAV files using EAC, then scan using Foobar, you will need to install the HDCD plugin which then appears in the 'utilities' menu section when you select the tracks you want to check.
Finding an HDCD-encoded CD I then use DbPowerAmp Audio Converter to process the files into 24bit WAV format. This unlocks the encoding and adds it to the music stream. All ready for playback !

This process is seriously worthwhile if you have HDCD discs, they really do sound so much better. You need 24bit-capable streaming devices though. My old Sonos Connect units could only handle 16bit playback - but they have now been retired. Irritatingly though, not all albums that have this encoding are marked as such, so it can be a surprise when you spot them.

Suck it and see.