Interesting update on DAR about Auralic new firmware and its approach to MQA.
The simple answer is that Aurilacās āMQA decodeā is nothing of the sort, based on their description.
To advertise their firmware as having MQA decode would appear at first sight to be passing off. Iād be surprised if MQA werenāt having a few words with their lawyers at present.
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Agreedā¦I donāt believe that the Auralic is neither Decoding or Unfolding in the way that we have come to understand those terms when applied to true MQA Decoders from Bluesound, Meridian, Mytek and others
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We did see it with HDCD though, flags bringing the lights on with uncertified CDās etc. I have no doubt Auralic will be asked to expunge all mention of MQA from their documentation and they will probably comply. But can you stop them from making the lights come on when a MQA flag is detected?
Thereās a discussion on MQA and I agree Auralic views on MQA. Iāve compared the sound quality of Auralic solution vs Tidal app, Iāve a hard time telling the difference.
Out of interest, which MQA DAC were you using when comparing?
Thereās no MQA DAC, just software decodingā¦ Auralicās solutions vs Tidal app, both are pass through a same DAC.
So you havenāt had chance to compare fully decoded then. That is clear and explains much of your p.o.v.
Fair enough but good to note.
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Thatās exactly why I was asking, Nick.
As you say, a fair enough comparison but not involving a full MQA end to end path.
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I think you are missing the point, Nick. Iām not comparing software vs hardware decoding. I want to test out Auralic own software decoding vs MQA licensed software decoding (Tidal app).
If Iāve difficulty telling the difference from both of them, It means Auralic own decoding does indeed up to par to Tidal app.
As for the argument that āMQA will make all music sound he sameā It seems that Auralic is joining the party then as there seems to be no difference reported.
Another Anti MQA argument kicked into the long grass lol
They are not joining the party, they are gate crashing. That is nothing to celebrate if it means anyone can do what they have done. It breaks the security built in to MQA and record labels will not like that.
I agree with your feelings here but as long as they donāt Unfold, they can do what they like however disengenuose.
Thereās no security break if, as they claim, they are just up-sampling. If not, I guess we have to leave that one up to MQAās lawyers. Very naughty to talk about a āde-blurring algorithmā though.
Has it (de-blurring) been trademarked? It might just be a phenomenon known to signal processing experts that now has a more commonly recognisable name thanks to discussions surrounding MQA. Of course if itās copyright or trademarked then itās naughty.
If itās not copyright I can imagine weāll see a lot more custom de-blurring and unfolding algorithms appear over the coming years if MQA sticks around.
Iām pretty sure itās only been invented by / gained prominence due to MQA. And I donāt think that thereās anything that MQA Ltd. can do about use of such a term. But letās be clear: de-blurring in the context of the MQA process is a very specific design goal with very specific technology to achieve that. Some might not believe that it makes a difference, but I do.
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My understanding was that any benefit from the āde-blurringā process was available through standard, non-MQA playback. If that is the case why are people talking about copyright infringement?
The potential infringement comes from their description of their process as an MQA decode. Itās not, it appears to be an upsampling with filters, no unfolding is taking place of the MQA data that weāre aware of.
This may, or may not, sound better to you but it does appear to be misrepresenting their software using someone elseās trademark.
If a vacuum manufacturer started selling their vacuums as āHooversā I think Hoover would have a problem with that, notwithstanding the fact that Hoover is used as a generic term for vacuum cleaners these days.
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Thanks for explaining. Your earlier post #13 quotes from the DAR article (linked at post #16) where Auralic specifically deny using any MQA technology. The authors of the linked article use the term āPseudo-MQA supportā, so where do Auralic claim to do MQA decode?
Claims made about āMQA Decoding Supportā at the link below