New Uniti Range Roon 1.5 MQA unfolding

Are you comparing a Tidal 44/16 stream with the MQA version or a local copy with the Tidal MQA - and all through Roon?

.sjb

Tidal for both via Roon on the Atom. 

I think it's going to be a very long and heated discussion about MQA. I was open to see and had not made up any preconceptions, but so far it just a bit meh. Like most things audio some recordings will no doubt sound better but so far i have not found one. Although the current Gogo Penguin album I am listening to now sounds very good but so did the normal version will have to compare it.

Also searching now can bring up 3 versions of an album, as some labels have a 96khz and 192khz MQA master, to which defeats it's purpose of the format that all resolutions are decoded/unfolded  from the same source. 

Compared A hundred Moons on A humdrum Star Deluxe version by GoGo Penguin. Still prefer the 44.1. MQA might be the most accurate one but it did not get me the feeling I got from 44.1.

Hello,

I did not follow the MQA hype in detail yet. But I remember that it is meant to bring reduced quality codex nearer to lossless compressions. So how can it be better than real CD quality? Or are you comparing 96kHz or better MQA with 44.1 lossless data?

I am comparing MQA 192/96kHz flac  to 44.1 flac

I really can't see the point of MQA in this day and age unless your internet conection is too slow to stream lossless HD audio in other formats.  Are MQA files downloadable in which case I guess there might be a copy protection element ?

It's pretty much designed for streaming and a lot of the world and even parts of the UK have pretty rubbish internet still.  Also wirless and 192/24 probably not the best bed partners. i see the mobile market as a growing sector and this could have a big impact there. As for copyright protection there is none and I can't see them adding it but don't quote me on that. The music industry went down that route already and look what happened almost went bust. Hopefully they learnt from that mistake. For streaming it makes sense one file that can be played on any device regardless of MQA decoding or not. If you don't you get 48/24 if you have Tidal Desktop or other software such as Roon that  does the first unfolds you get 96/24 and if you have an MQA DAC then you get the full monty. I'd rather have MQA then aac or mp3. New phones are already started to add MQA DACs and Tidal app now allows it on mobile to.

It's going to be interesting to see what happens.