Hmmm… 
Before it was blurry and MQA deblurred it, or maybe I should reword that… during the MQA process of encoding it interpreted it as being blurred and not natural… now it’s sharp! It looks more natural, doesn’t it?
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Iv been through buying cassettes, vinyl, CD, SACD, DVD-A, HDCD. If it’s worth improving to me, I’ll improve it, if not, I won’t.
You can make your own choices.
I’m thankful I live in a world that I have them.
Let’s hope you are right as MQA’s main goal is to take away choice and make you pay for a “better” sound if you pay for it in subscription and hardware there’s no stopping them reducing the sound quality further in the future for non payers
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Yes sir, like you said: LOSSY MQA GARBAGE IN - LOSSY MQA GARBAGE OUT. Thats truth and only truth, you have interest to do some propaganda here, but we knew what it is. ITS GARBAGE, MQA GARBAGE 
Cheers (after 6 years pushing it, in vain)
Blockquote We are having lots of fun and joy with all these releases, especially the 16/44.1 MQA is surprising many members a LOT
Yea, all we are ■■■■■■ off!
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I must look up the band 1 Hz sine wave to have a good long listen… My kinda Music 
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Yes, you get it shuffed down your throat when you have a Tidal account.
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I’ve no skin in the game with this one way or the other. I also won’t pretend I’ve got the technical know-how to critique or debase the GoldenSounds video. However, I don’t like being lied to or forced to pay more for products for no cause. MQA do have the technical know-how to critique and debase the GoldenSounds video, so if it is so inaccurate why don’t they do so? Or set up some transparent tests that back up their claims rather than just debasing anyone who criticises them?
As said, I’ve no skin in the game and if their marketing claims are right, that’d be great. I’ve no problem with a company making profit if they’ve done a good job. I also totally understand the need to protect their IP and process from copycats but what I can’t understand is the clutching of pearls when they are challenged and the obfuscation that follows: just demo your claims backed up by test results. If GoldenSounds ran the tests wrong (as you claim), just do the same tests with the same files and show the results. No threat to their IP in that and it would put the matter to bed.
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That would put the matter to bed. But it won’t happen.
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I get really mad when I read these things, but @Peter_Veth takes the cake.
Just canceled my tidal subscription. Spread the word.
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I have gone back and forth , volume matched,not blind test ,between MQA and flac and I have yet to see MQA win.
The MQA high frequencies ,particularly in vocals is simply not as clear as regular flac . Listen to Cant Find My way home in MQA on Tidal than then listen to Steve Winwood Tidal flac version of the same song.
Listen to the high frequency vocals in just the first 1 1-1/2 minutes of the song. Tell me Im wrong.
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Orn Orrason - one of your fellow “admins” - said that GoldenSound claimed to never have received an email from mqa. That’s NOT spreading “news” but spreading a lie.
No it’s not, it’s 90% marketing speech and GoldenSound replied to the rest of that mail in his video, starting here : https://youtu.be/pRjsu9-Vznc?t=1741
Maybe your admin can make an apology and post this link on your FB page?
And maybe one of your lost apostles here can do the same?
I read the full mail, and if mqa is all about “master quality authentication” then they have a serious problem. IF their encoder was giving all those warnings… then why were those tracks released anyway on Tidal? Looks like the M the Q AND the A in MQA all seem to be lies.
And don’t tell me they were removed afterwards “because of the lower quality”. They were removed after Tidal/mqa found out what the purpose of encoding those mqas was.
Here is the 16/44 PCM by the way before it was mangled:
Yes I agree, it’s very “surprising”. It looks like an earthquake was happening at the time it was encoded. Maybe mqa can use that as an excuse?
GoldenSound: “The 44.1khz file is NOT lossless at all. And shows evidence of compression/resampling, even though the file sample rate has not changed. (Similar effects are seen when compressing to MP3).”
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Canceled my Tidal account today, upgraded to Qobuz.
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HDT has for years sent files to be tested for fake hi-res before being placed on the site. Doesn’t mean something doesn’t get through. IME, if they are informed of an issue they either remove the file or label it for the consumer.
Now - evangelism is something that really makes me feel uncomfortable!
In any case it isn’t quite as simple as “drop Tidal and switch to qobuz” which is the only alternative external streaming service unless you want to leave Roon - and what motive would advocates of dropping Roon in favour of Spotify Hi-def, Amazon or others have for posting on this forum?
Now, I am fairly ambivalent towards MQA although I find that most MQA files actually sound quite good on my systems. However, I have been pondering a switch to Qobuz for some time for a number of reasons. Because of this, I keep an eye on the Qobuz catalogue from time to time in order to assess my options. I have just carried out such a check in the past few days. My integrated music library has around 2,200 albums in my local NAS, and a further 520 or so integrated by Roon into my library from Tiial.
I have just discovered that as of now, out of these 520 Tidal albums, over 80 of them are not available on Qobuz. Further, a very significant number of these 80+ albums are albums that I currently play very regularly.
For that reason, a move to Qobuz is not on the cards for me for the time being. A move to Spotify, Amazon or Apple is even further away, because I have absolutely no desire to drop Roon.
Roon is here to stay in my household!
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As I said before, the simple conclusion is that MQA is a lossy format where a custom DSP is applied to the original file in a fixed manner; in other words, it is like having an original, lossless file and then employing an EQ to “improve” its sound - nothing else.
So for some it may sound “great”, and for other it may sound “terrible”. On the other hand, normal lossless files are not tampered with and customers are free to apply whatever DSP they prefer without risking further “DSPing what is already DSPed” (as is the case with MQA).
No other explanation is required.
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Love this statement. Sell it to roon as their new slogan/claim
Shouty block capitals always win me over!
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MQA is a trash concept with a suspect/nefarious business model. MQA was not born out of the hifi industry. No artist, studio engineer or recording studio asked for it. Hell, not even record labels asked for it.
MQA is a lossy file format no different than MP3’s, and was designed for the sole purpose of saving the streaming industry some bandwidth (aka, money) and bilking more cash from music lovers via tiered subscriptions and hardware “upgrades”.
“Oooooh, you got the box with the blue dot”.
It’s truly fascinating to me that MQA would have any support on this forum or amongst audiophiles in general.
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Too bad Roon is not supported by most of the other streaming services.
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I don’t necessarily disagree with some of what you say, but it’s irrelevant as far as I can see.
I spend my time these days listening to music! I have no desire to tinker with the sound by endless experimenting and applying DSP or filters of my choice. I listen mostly to PCM standard music, and as I say MQA files, depending upon the (original) master mostly also sound just fine to me and I suspect to very many others who aren’t consumed by the MQA debate.
Goodness me! You only have to make a statement hereabouts that isn’t overtly critical of MQA and the anti-MQA evangelists gather round in packs and hunt you down. A bit like being mobbed by a fluffle of crazed rabid rabbits!
But I degress. Your reply doesn’t touch on the main premise of my post. I have chosen Roon to be my primary source of music on my system and I have no plans to change my view on that. As things stand, for my taste in music Qobuz does not yet provide a music catalogue that meets my requirements. I also suspect that a lot of others will also fall into this category.
No other explanation for my point of view is required.
Find a music library that fulfils your needs, bit your lip if necessary and just listen to the music for goodness sake! I personally wouldn’t mind one bit if Tidal were to replace their MQA content with standard hi-res PCM, but to the most avid MQA ‘haters’ out there - have some perspective please, for goodness sake!
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