Hello All - regarding MQA. I’ve been paying attention to MQA and its claims since the beginning, and I have been somewhat bewildered by the fairly intense controversy surrounding it since the beginning. I know some mastering engineers who swear by it. I also know some who reject it and some very astute listeners, some with significant technical chops who consider it (various degrees of) less than helpful. This past weekend I had a personal experience which I want to report.
I recently procured a pair of SCS4s which I’m documenting for actual upgrades (for the real world.) I took them to an audiophile friend with a good system and amazingly analytical ears. Our source was various reference pop titles via Tidal. His turf, his call. I was underwhelmed and disappointed by the SCS4s in his setup. On working through the maze of possibilities Saturday night it occurred to me to explore MQA, since John had mentioned it as being offered by Tidal. I read Peter Moncrieff’s MQA section from his ’Digital Done Wrong’ series - coming away with a cogent set of strong arguments against MQA.
Let’s digress to Peter. For those of you unfamiliar with him, Peter has published the International Audio Review since the early 1980s. He is brilliant, self-assured and not deterred by the norms of polite discourse. I have always found him to be right. Peter is who assigned the title CS to our 03b at the 1983 CES. He got it and reported it very succinctly.
Back to MQA. Peter itemizes how the ultra short sampling schema of MQA misses the ’unlucky samples’ that fail to describe sharp transients. What I heard at John’s house was music without upper transients as well as a global haze or ambient cloud, noticeable mostly in the upper registers. I messaged John and he reported that his Tidal MQA filter was indeed engaged. We have not yet had a chance for direct comparisons with and without MQA. I should add that a pair of Klipsch RP600Ms did not exhibit ’the pleasant vagueness’ that the SCS4s did. I felt this note was in order to ask your experience and opinions about the subject. I’ve studied enough about the process and heard enough examples to at least question the process.
