@mofimadness
Every MQA-compatible DAC I have seen has degredated PCM performance. It’s not the manufacturers playing a trick, one stating it simply is a drawback of merely having the capability. So it’s no wonder you hear PCM as worse if using an MQA-compatible DAC. Look at the Stereophile measurements of the Mytek Liberty when fed a 44.1kHz PCM signal, it’s filter response is absolute garbage and causes aliasing (here’s the filter response of the Chord DAVE as a reference).
I find "almost" without fault that the MQA tracks sound better than their standard CD counterparts. Not all the time, but pretty much. Is MQA perfect, hells no, but I sure do hear an improvement.
Every MQA-compatible DAC I have seen has degredated PCM performance. It’s not the manufacturers playing a trick, one stating it simply is a drawback of merely having the capability. So it’s no wonder you hear PCM as worse if using an MQA-compatible DAC. Look at the Stereophile measurements of the Mytek Liberty when fed a 44.1kHz PCM signal, it’s filter response is absolute garbage and causes aliasing (here’s the filter response of the Chord DAVE as a reference).