Hi-Res Download News (HDTracks, ProStudioMasters, Pono, etc.) & Software/Mastering Part 12**

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Gary, May 9, 2015.

  1. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    DRM is a building block of streaming. As the saying goes, "In for a penny, in for a pound." If one is subscribing to a streaming service, one is already sailing on the Good Ship DRM. He or she is probably well prepared for what happens the day he or she stops stuffing quarters in the Internet jukebox. MQA as a buy-in for someone already happy with streaming doesn't really confound me. (Now, SELLING MQA titles? Yeah, you got me there. WTF?)

    As for whether it's "lossy", that depends on your definition.... MQA currently brags that you'll get 44.1/16 minimum listening out of the deal: even without the licensed hardware; even if the software is buggy. And there are those who call 44.1/16 "lossless".
     
  2. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    Still for me the biggest issue/question are/is the sources they are using-
    I see a member over at CA forums saying jump from standard for Depeche Modes- Speak & Spell was better.
    So who's to say for the 16/44 they are using the current remaster (compressed) and for the hi-rez the 2013 straight dynamic full DR version, of course it's going to sound better because a different master was used.
    For me this is the concern
     
  3. TokenGesture

    TokenGesture Forum Resident

    Location:
    London
    Why is it a concern? Surely its another big plus for MQA?
     
  4. scompton

    scompton Forum Resident

    Location:
    Arlington, VA
    44.1/16 is only lossless if no lossy compression is used. If MQA is using lossless compression, it's just another compression algorithm like zip. Software or hardware makes zero difference in unzipping the files. However, if it uses lossy compression, no algorithm in the world will get the lost data back and no matter what sample and bit rate the expand it to, original data is lost so it is by definition lossy.
     
  5. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    Because the Mode was a rare example of a hi-rez being more dynamic than it's latest remaster :laugh:
    The Joe Blow public (This is including my Sister and Husband :winkgrin:) in the audio world want's to hear a difference, and loudness is the easiest way to achieve this
    TG this is all in fun remember, as all audio should be.
    It's still early so it will be neat to see how this works out :cheers:
     
    Last edited: Jan 16, 2017
  6. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    MQA has been in the public's hand for about a week. Lots of people are going to be saying lots of things. (One thing I see a lot of people saying right now on forums is that for them (like me) Tidal software v 2.1.x, under certain circumstances, is broken on both MAC and Windows.)

    I'm on the bad side of 50. I don't A/B. I don't hear those magic notes people can until they hit the end of their teens. But I certainly know when I am listening to a pain-inducing recording.

    And when it comes time to avail myself of music - particularly if money is coming out of my pocket - I pick the probable-best. If that turns out to be an objectively unpleasant experience for me, I haz sadz, then I move on. So if I'm on Tidal HiFi, and one day this software actually works, and I get to stream "24/96" without paying extra or getting a headache, good for me.
     
    c-eling likes this.
  7. TokenGesture

    TokenGesture Forum Resident

    Location:
    London
    MQA want them to hear a difference - original dynamics, smoother sound. Thats my understanding, Like I say looking forward to hearing from some folk who have done some comparisons. I can say for sure the Remain In Light master on Tidal is NOT the loud remaster of recent years.
     
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  8. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    As of today, one can still stream the lossless "Hifi" flac titles in Tidal, and eschew the "masters". In every case anyone's been able to find, all of the "Master" albums coexist side by side with their plain-vanilla "Hifi" counterparts. (In fact... discerning one from the other without playing a track has been one of the complaints of Tidal users.)

    Because my Tidal software is obviously broken, on two different boxes... I do just that.
     
  9. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    And that's a good start! Now one I'm curious about is Henley's Building The Perfect Beast, the Hi-Rez was destroyed
    Man we've strayed way off topic :laugh:
     
  10. scompton

    scompton Forum Resident

    Location:
    Arlington, VA
    I was just pointing out that if it uses lossy compression, it's lossy no matter the sample/bit rate. To imply otherwise is disingenuous since MQA uses lossy compression. It's basically a new lossy codec. Personally, I couldn't care less one way or the other since I've never been able to hear the difference between lossless and lossy, let alone hires. I buy high res for surround only, or in the case of Qobuz, when it's cheaper since I'm a sublime subscriber.

    For those that do care, Tidal is not the only streaming service to stream lossless, Qobuz does and classicsonline streams high res if they have it. Classicsonline is the best deal in streaming if you listen to a lot of classical music, $40 per year.
     
  11. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    Qoboz is not available to US customers without a proxy (or some other system) pretending that the customer is somewhere else.
     
  12. scompton

    scompton Forum Resident

    Location:
    Arlington, VA
    You have to start with a VPN, but I don't use one anymore and I stream from it more than any other site. I didn't sign up for streaming until I noticed I didn't need a proxy. Streaming over a VPN would be awful. IMO, it's worth using a VPN to buy from Qobuz because they have the best selection and good prices.
     
    Plan9 likes this.
  13. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    I asked politely a few years ago if I could become a French citizen, they obliged. I have not tried streaming however but I can purchase with no issues
     
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  14. c-eling

    c-eling They're made of light,We never would have guessed

    Qobuz would be great in the US, but they would still run into the same issues of album rights. Their catalog here would not be identical to over there.
    Maybe they are waiting to see what happens with the US streaming efforts before they make a move or just figured too many fingers are already in the pie to be profitable
     
  15. Mickactual

    Mickactual Humble indie rock musician

    :biglaugh:Buzz-cut re-leveled. What a vivid mental Polariod! And such an accurate image of exactly what some of these mastering butchers are doing in recent years.
     
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  16. Stereosound

    Stereosound Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    You also need the MQA equipped DAC for the temporal de-blurring thing as well. May or may not be an issue for some.
     
  17. Grant

    Grant Life is a rock, but the radio rolled me!

    With Pono in limbo, they could make their move.
     
    c-eling and PTgraphics like this.
  18. TokenGesture

    TokenGesture Forum Resident

    Location:
    London
    Do you? Had not appreciated that
    Edit: according to Digital Audio Review the time domain issues at source will be heared regardless of DAC. You do need an MQA DAC to have any timing issues of your own DAC corrected. So you should be hearing the corrected source files via Tidal regardless of DAC.
     
    Last edited: Jan 17, 2017
  19. Veovis

    Veovis Forum Resident

    Location:
    Europe
    I bought three MQA albums from Highresaudio the other day. Two Alanis Morissette albums and Pictures at an Exhibition by ELP. The Alanis albums seem to be fundamentally the same masters that were released last year (that I also own). They seem tonally and dynamically very similar (perhaps identical). I was sceptical about the benefits of MQA, especially since it's in essence a lossy "codec", but have to say the MQA albums sound great. More natural and with a nice "flow", especially in the higher frequencies. And this with albums that were probably recorded in 44.1 or 48 to begin with. So first impressions are positive at least. Hard to know if it's because of MQA or some other thing in the mastering chain though. The ELP album, that I only had an old CD version of before, sounds fantastic!

    For all three albums the MQA indicator on the DAC was shining with a blue colour, supposedly meaning everything in the chain worked. I'm pretty sure the whole point of MQA is that the MQA decoding is made by the DAC chip, in the last step before the analog stage. So you need an MQA able DAC to get the benefits. As I understand it MQA-encoded files do not sound very good when played through a non-MQA DAC. Which seems reasonable since the MQA decoding in some way reconstructs a deconstructed music file. The ELP album for example was reported by the streamer to have a 48 kHz sample rate, while the DAC with MQA activated reported 96 kHz.
     
  20. TokenGesture

    TokenGesture Forum Resident

    Location:
    London
    What DAC do you have?

    It was true that you needed an MQA DAC but this has changed recently with the advent of software solutions being licensed by MQA, so that the track can be "unfolded" to 96k in the app. Resolutions above that you still need the MQA Dac. But at this time I think only Tidal and maybe Roon have this working.
     
  21. Veovis

    Veovis Forum Resident

    Location:
    Europe
    Ah, I see. Guess that would work if you don't have MQA decoding on the hardware side. The DAC is a Mytek Brooklyn.
     
  22. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    For some value of "working". My USB DAC, put into service as "System default Sound" - because for a number of users besides myself, Tidal 2.1.1 doesn't recognize anything as a discrete audio output device - reports 24/44.1 on all the "masters", even the usual suspects like Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours". Anecdotes from working installations do report many 24/88 results, and I'm very happy for them - I hope the Tidal client s/w issues get worked out before Tidal decides to up the monthly subscription price for MQA access.

    Most distressing (to me) were forum tales about these woes from beta testers months before the launch.


    We should have a race: Tidal fix vs. pono store coming back.....
     
  23. 360-12

    360-12 Forum Resident

    Pono is dead. Tidal will be purchased by Apple.
     
  24. TonyCzar

    TonyCzar Forum Resident

    Location:
    PhIladelphia, PA
    Dear God, no.
     
  25. Stereosound

    Stereosound Forum Resident

    Location:
    USA
    MQA Decoding Explained ยป
     

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