As was found after the US Presidential Election last year, Readers need to be extremely wary of the SOURCE of the information they are reading
I have read elsewhere that the German owner of HighResAudio has suffered a SEVERE downturn in his business since the beginning of the new year…and specifically since Tidal launched MQA high res titles
Basically, music lovers aged from 22 to 122 years are faced with the following choice
Buy and Listen to ONE High Res album a month for $20…OR
Subscribe to Tidal for $20 a month…and be able to listen to 2,400 albums in High Res…with another 10,000 to come from UMG soon…[and remember that many were already subscribed to Tidal, and thus there is no real “extra” cost to experience this high res content]
Faced with that choice, it appears many are voting with their wallet…with the net result that HighResAudio’s business model is suffering badly…and thus, he figures out a way to attack the credibility of MQA to try and protect his own vested interests
Ask yourself the question…can I trust this guy’s motives??
You picked an unfortunate example. “Like a Virgin” is an early digital recording from 16 bit or even 14 bit ADCs. So, it does not serve your point about high res or MQA.
Analogue or digital is missing the point slightly. It was actually a digital master. However what makes it a good example of what MQA can do is how much they know about what was used and how.
Jason Corsaro, the record’s audio engineer, persuaded Rodgers to use digital recording, a new technique at the time which Corsaro believed was going to be the future of recording.[6] To ensure this, Corsaro used a Sony 3324 24-track digital tape recorder and a Sony F1 two-track during the mixing of the tracks. Madonna recorded the lead parts of the songs in a small, wooden, high-ceilinged piano room at the back of Studio C, also known as Power Station’s “R&B room”.[6] Corsaro then placed gobos around her while using the top capsule of a stereo AKG C24 tube microphone, with a Schoeps microphone preamplifier and a Pultec equalizer. Once the tracks met with everybody’s approval, Robert Sabino added the keyboard parts, playing mostly a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5, as well as some Rhodes piano and acoustic piano, while Rodgers also played a Synclavier. Madonna, although not required, was present every minute of the recording sessions and the mixing process, Corsaro commented: “Nile was there most of the time, but she was there all of the time. She never left”.[6]
So you basically implied this recording is actually sell as ‘up-sampled’ to 24/96? Who will ever do that? In layman term people will assume this is a HiRes recording done in 1984. Where you get this technology back then? I think this is cheating.
Just as with Music, in Business, Timing is everything…so let’s examine the Timing of this HighResAudio post
They have been happily Profiting from the sale of MQA material for the past 18 months or so…during which time Miska et al have published their blogs with their MQA related claims…[and it should be noted that HighResAudio’s claims are a direct transcription of Miska’s claims, not their own independent work]
Despite the fact that they knew about such claims for 12-15 months, they showed no recrimination in profiting from the sale of MQA material
However, when Tidal start streaming MQA material in early January…and this guy’s business suffers as a result…then he suddenly “grows a conscience” and says that “MQA is compromised”
I guess Readers here can make up their own mind on if this is purely coincidental or not
Just as they should be able to make up their own mind on the benefits, or otherwise, of listening to MQA material…without the constant barrage of posts, essentially telling them what they should and should not be able to hear
It is perfectly fine for HRA to stop selling MQA tracks for whatever reason they see fit. At the same time, it is perfectly for me to take my business elsewhere as a result of it (I got most of my ECM there, in various formats – including MQA).
I do not particularly care for my choices being made for me, especially when the jury’s still out on the merits of MQA.
[quote=“AE67, post:1171, topic:8204”]
Even if this is right, unfortunatly my speakers can’t produce these frequences and my ears can’t hear them
[/quote] Your speakers don’t need to and neither do your ears. If your speakers have a fast enough transient response, you will hear the difference in the envelope, not the frequencies.
Just IMHO, when it comes to listening to music…the Jury doesn’t have 12 members…or 120 members…or 120,000 members who eventually arrive at a consensus
For music listening, the Jury consists of just one member…together with sufficient MQA material…and Redbook & High Res material to compare it against…and sufficient time…to arrive at each person’s own conclusions
I’ve been trying to find the original text of those statements [allegedly] posted by HighResAudio … and failing badly.
I found people quoting the text and some even had links … but on investigation these links where all broken but I can’t find anything from HighResAudio themselves.
Can you share links to the second statement as posted by HighResAudio.
I had a dig around on the highresaudio.com site and it still has this statement:
There is also a section called MQA: Master Quality Authenticated in the FAQ.
That said, what I’m not finding on their site is any MQA downloads, at least their search engine did not list any, but it might just me not using it correctly.
