Interesting - didn’t realise there is that delineation. Last time I was digging through the Dolby website I must have picked up the wrong detail.
Yep so if playing Atmos content on Netflix, Tidal, Amazon Music HD and soon Apple Music on an Apple TV 4K for example, Bob Stuart’s MLP is not involved.
That’s not to discredit the great achievement and success he had with MLP of course (kudos) but MLP / TrueHD is on the decline, as disc sales decline.
He’s a really clever guy with DSP speakers and MLP but MQA won’t end well (I think).
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Atmos on Blu-ray uses DD True HD. All of the other implementations are lossy.
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That’s partly because the HDMI was bandwidth constrained until the latest version. I have some amazing Blue-Ray albums that I cannot listen to over True HD as my TV is a year too old. But the compressed DTS HD still sounds phenomenal.
Remember. For every Blu-Ray movie disc sold, Bobbo got royalties/a cut of the sale price because of MLP.
With physical media sales on the slide since 2013 (in fact, Blu-Ray was never considered a commercial success, unlike DVD), I wonder why, oh why. Bobbo ‘invented’ MQA?
Maybe to keep his royalty payments up…? 
MLP was used exclusively by DVD-A. It was basically the DRM Protection Mechanism for the PCM files on the disc. For however long it existed.
MLP was also the basis of DD TrueHD on Blu-Ray. This has been Bobbo & Meridian’s ‘cash cow’ since 2009 when BR became popular.
However, with the rapid demise of physical media, and therefore DD TrueHD, his income has been rapidly sliding. Enter MQA…
Sorry, but this is incorrect.
DD TrueHD was ‘baked into’ HDMI 1.3 over fifteen-years ago. 1.3a was preferred, to solve ‘lip-sync’ issues. Also, DTS HD is also lossless, not lossy.
You don’t need HDMI 2.0/2.1 to enjoy DD TrueHD - just a suitable receiver to decode it.
This is mine, in my bedroom 5.1 system:
It’s relatively ancient, but it still works, and it still sounds great 
Martin I appreciate the feedback and information, but it doesn’t stop it not working on my TV as the it doesn’t have an EARC feed.
Sounds like I might be wrong, but I thought this was the reason that EARC was created. Sonos have said as much when they released the Arc. Maybe it’s how I am feeding it to the TV and then back to my Onkyo HT Amp
ARC can pass ‘vanilla’ Dolby Digital (AC3), DTS and PCM up to 16/48 (stereo & M/C). AC3 and DTS are lossy formats.
To pass DD+ (which includes Atmos), DD TrueHD and DTS-HD/DTS-X you need eARC.
Thanks again Martin.
I can get happily grt DTS-HD no problems and DD+ just not DD True HD.
So this only proves the need for high quality compressed format’s as well as uncompressed formats as well
(Just to keep this thread sort of on track)
I’m not so sure about that…
With increased bandwidth over HDMI 2.0/2.1, eARC and Gigabit internet connections, I’m not sure there is indeed a market for compressed formats.
Apple & Amazon will never probably deviate from the ‘DD+’ version of Atmos, but that’s probably a limitation with their servers, and available codecs from/with titles.
But DD+ isn’t a patch on DD TrueHD, and maybe there’s a market for streaming that in the future.
As for MQA? It’s now irrelevant, IMO.
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I certainly hope not !!!
I can claim to be able to lift a car with one hand. But unless I can prove it, the claim is meaningless. The claims MQA makes are also meaningless until they prove them. And they haven’t even made an attempt to.
Meaningless until you listen, then MQA speaks for itself with a wonderful sound quality.
I think we should judge these ideas based on what they are and not on who invented it. Just because one thinks MQA is ■■, this doesn’t mean that everything Bob Stuart did is junk. MLP is a fine product that does what it claims.
With MQA there’s a lot of weasel words like you say, but also claim that do not hold. Still I’m very interested in what it acutally does and support you idea to open source it. But probably not going to happen…
Like I said, I’d like to understand. In the “MDCP” stream, what does the blue arrow mean? What is output by the ADC that’s not PCM? Similar question wrt the yellow arrow on the other end.
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This is a phenomenal video. MQA is gonna clap back, because they have snake oil to sell. But one fact remains above all: lossless to the original doesn’t mean “for-profit lossy compression scheme inserted into the audio chain ostensibly to save bandwidth but strictly for the purpose of collecting licensing fees when perfectly good FLAC exists.”
GoldenSound, I tip my hat to you. Way to go after these charlatans.
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To you. But many, including myself, hear so many faults with MQA, that we would never want to listen to it ever again.
You must have a system fault or something as my experience is polar opposite with regard to listening to MQA. We will have to agree to differ. I still cannot understand why people don’t just move on if they don’t like MQA. I don’t like Fiat cars, and guess what? I don’t spend any time on Fiat forums or any motoring forum criticising and complaining about it, I just wouldn’t buy one and move on… There are plenty of others to choose. As with MQA, I am always being told B S is just making money but they are going broke and the Major Streamers do not use it. What gives?
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No, they just claim they do. There are artists and engineers who’ve disagreed. As with everything else MQA the process isn’t transparent, and we only have their word to rely on.
They’ve repeatedly shown a willingness to lie and mislead, so why would anyone take their word on trust?
And with the batch conversion of thousands and millions of tracks, I don’t believe for a second that anyone is really finding “the best” master. Much more likely they are using “the most easily found” master.
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Because the existence of Fiat doesn’t preclude choice of an alternative. The existence of MQA already does for hundres of thousands or millions of tracks if you use Tidal.
And Tidal is the only lossless option for some people.
Not a situation any non-MQA fanboy wants to see expanded.
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