Bummed that there’s no MQA upgrade for the MS200.
My Explorer² can’t be updated (a firmware update error). Meridian will exchange it for a brand new one.
Hi Chris,
Yes v1717. I presume that in the future Meridian will issue other updates using the sofware update app that first needs to be downloaded.
Problem is, there’s so little available at present. A few 2L files and Kate Rusby’s EP are pretty much all there is.
Ok so I have read all 166 preceding posts and am still mightily confused.
For the benefit of those that don’t want to read 166 posts and don’t mind being seriously misinformed I’d like to lay out my understanding. (limited to about 5 lines because thats about the sum total of my understanding)
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MQA is streamed / delivered in something like 44 or 48Khz / 24bit at a bandwidth of about 1.5Mbps (in other words much lower bandwidth than current ‘Hi-res’ and therefore workable for the mainstream and streaming services like TIDAL)
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A decoded MQA file, if played back on an MQA DAC/ MQA Hardware will play back at the original studio recording bit rate/frequency, which is why we can see a lot of MQA files in 2L showing different bit rates/frequencies…Some studios will have recorded at lower rates, others higher. It can do this because much of a high res file contains no useful information.
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In other words MQA is not a standard bound by bits and frequencies. It could even be poor quality if that is what the studio recorded in.
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The decoder can actually be software, not hardware, in which case the playback hardware does not need to be MQA certified.
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As well as already being able to pass bit perfect streams to an MQA DAC/hardware, the Roon team is also investigating the possibility of Roon software decoding the MQA stream before passing it on to one or all of the available end points/zones. These zones will play back in MQA as long as they can handle the stream outputs bits/frequency
Hopefully you didn’t read any of the above.
I think points 1 to 4 are correct, the quality will be limited finally by the quality of your equipment. Meridian SE DSP speakers will sound better than a mobile phone with ear buds for example, but the overall quality will rise way above the MP3 streams we have today, even un-decoded.
Point 5 is speculation. Roon does pass MQA untouched to an MQA decoder now.
Have you seen Bob Stuart’s short explanation videos?
Thoughts, Chris
I also would not sign point 4. The decoder can be software. But this does not mean that Meridian will allow software decoding (license fees?) and playback on uncertified DACs. AURALIC was ready to deliver MQA decoding for the Aries. But they had to stop this after Meridian’s intervention.
I and most people here do not use MP3 streams as far as I am aware, my minimum streaming is at 16 bit 44.1.
People do stream MP3 to mobile devices even if most don’t here. MQA will hopefully have a big impact in that arena.
Now I’m messing up the good effort to summarize many posts about MQA but here goes for those who are interested…
On point 2 I think MQA will decode to the highest rate your DAC will support which could be the original studio rate or lower.
To expand Point 3. MQA goes back to the highest quality studio master available and also significantly reduces temporal blur (timing/filter inaccuracies) that can occur in A to D part of the chain. It also contains information to do the same in the DAC at the other end.
Agreed point 4 may not be correct either it is not yet clear what DACs software decoders will support and how. Obviously there is an intent to provide software decoders somehow but how this would work with products like Roon that support many different DACs is not clear.
On the comments on point 5 it is clear from this forum that the Roon team are investigating the possibility of software decoding in Roon but what end points it will be able to work with or if they will be able to do it at all we don’t know yet.
It seems the decoder needs to know things about the DAC it is streaming to do its work properly like what its max/native bit rate is.
Not sure quite how MP3 crept in here but one of the main features of MQA is to stream higher resolution files than16 bit 44.1 CD at reasonable data rates. Data rates are still higher than CD though and much higher than MP3. However MQA will make it possible to stream HiRes files to mobile devices. This is one reason people here might be interested in MQA.
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Here are 2 good brief explanations by Bob Stuart:
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I do… I have a data usage limit for mobile, so when I’m on the go, MP3 for me in tidal and MQA isn’t even an option as it will use more data than flac files now… Of course this doesn’t matter when at home where I have unlimited data per month.
You can make a standard compliant hi-res stream that is quite a bit lower bitrate than MQA stream while not requiring any proprietary decoding technology or new hardware…
Yes (you would certainly know better than I on that). i was just trying ot make sense of the thread. I guess what you are saying is that the MQA stream could actually be an even lower bit rate?
No, because it is typically put into FLAC container and since the extra data is heavily encoded it looks like plain noise to FLAC encoder which makes it non-compressible.
Inside 48/24 MQA encoded FLAC there is 96/17 encoded data. If you make a plain 96/24 FLAC file with same 17-bit worth of information it is quite a bit smaller than the 48/24 MQA encoded one because it compresses better and is playable by anything that can play standard 96/24 FLAC.
So I have done some rounds on forums and also watched a few videos to try and distill MQA into an understandable set of descriptions, at least to me.
Here’s what I came up with - and the video link below is the one video I saw that seems to summarise well all the discussions.
1) Sound Quality
MQA will run a set of algorithms on the mastered recording and the playback device in order to remove the effects of degradation in the music from the original recording brought about by innacuracies in the hardware playing the music. The analogy used in the video below is a clear one and relates to photography and lenses; Camera software can analyse a lens and understand the errors in it, then digitally adjust the image to improve it and make it more representative of the image being captured. Similarly, my own analogy, in astrophotography, the method of taking dark, bias and flat frames in order to remove artefacts from an image (e.g dust on the lens) and then letting software change the image taken actually makes the final image more true to life.
In the same way, MQA will ‘correct’ the sound and make it as close as possible to the original master recording. The amount of calibration the technology will implement will be dependent on the hardware playing the music.
The biggest unwanted effect improved by MQA seems to be time smearing - with claims of better than 192 files.
2) Digital signing
This will be embedded within the MQA file during encoding (same tech as DRM) but it will not be used for DRM. It is being used for quality confirmation. If during decoding the embedded ‘fingerprint’ file remians the same then the quaity will be confirmed as MQA (the blue light)
3) Compression
MQA can be transferred at a bit rate similar to a current 44.1khz WAV file.
Either software or hardware can decode the file - but on the software side there may be a licence required to do that (not clear).
The compression of the MQA file actually involves cutting all the sound above 24kz and dropping it an octave, storing it within the 24khz range. When decoded by MQA the sound that was moved will be moved back again. When played without being decoded by MQA software/hardware the cut sound will just stay in the 24khz range but it cant be heard.
Heres the link to the video from a very clever chap who has done a lot more reserach into it and had his video checked for accuracy by the founder of MQA.
DISCLAIMER : About 75% of the above is beyond my understanding at a technical level, but the guy in the video seems to know what he is talking about at least 
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@stevev1 Could you, please play the Nielsen Piano Works 2L record and tell which LEDs and in which color lights during the playback.
Roon plays MQA files in ASIO mode, but it doesn’t play MQA in WASAPi mode (Windows 10, 64bit, Roon 64bit).
JRiver plays MQA in the both - ASIO and WASAPI mode.Sorry, it does work in WASAPI exclusive mode, my mistake 
Downloaded the test file …1 bright blue light and 1 dim one on the explorer2. No white indicators.
Don’t know what that means 
Sounds pretty good though.
I bought the Magnificat album as I really liked the test file. On that album I got one blue led and 2 white ones.
I truly love that album. Sound is exceptional
Good news! What is the highest sampling frequency handled by your Meridian 818v3?