MQA already dead in the water? No full decoding DAC alternatives...

CPP said:
I really don't feel you need to have a $10K + dac or streamer to enjoy MQA. Sure a $300 MQA dac is not going to sound as good as a $10k+ MQA dac. but right now there are some nice units out there that support full decoding for MQA very well and sound good to boot. The Lumins, the Aurender A10, PS Audio Directstream and the Directstream Jr for starters all under $10K. I've heard the Brookynn and I had the DAC in my system for months but the Lumin just sounds more musical to my ears ( Brooklyn = to much stuff in one box to suit me)
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Do all the Lumins do the full HW decoding or are there differences?


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All Lumin's do full except the U1 which is a transport that only does first un-fold. The Oppo has coax, optical and HDMI out.
 
Jack said:
All Lumin's do full except the U1 which is a transport that only does first un-fold. The Oppo has coax, optical and HDMI out.
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Thanks Jack, that means I could do full decoding from the Oppo into the Meitner, I guess.

Do I lose anything if the decoded MQA signal from the Oppo is again upsampled into DSD?


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Not aware of any MQA solution that allows full processing except through the Analog outputs. So unless the Meitner does MQA then not. You would use the OPPO's analog outputs for full MQA and the digital outs to the Meitner for everything else. Same is true of the Lumin's.
 
The 203 is a completely different DAC section and it is unlikely they will submit it for certification. It is a video first product. The Sonica does have the same DAC section, according to Dan Wright, so it should not be hard to transfer the certification and firmware upgrade to the Sonica if they chose to do so.
 
Jack said:
The 203 is a completely different DAC section and it is unlikely they will submit it for certification. It is a video first product. The Sonica does have the same DAC section, according to Dan Wright, so it should not be hard to transfer the certification and firmware upgrade to the Sonica if they chose to do so.
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Sorry Jack, I meant of course the UDP-205.


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I hope they decide to go ahead with finishing the certification and release the firmware upgrade for the Sonica, but time will tell. As the reviews show it is a pretty good DAC for even more than the asking price.
 
Why doesn't Bob Stuart/MQA come out and say, "Hey audiophiles, don't waste your time with something like the $2k Mytek Brooklyn for MQA, the absolute bare minimum to "hear" MQA starts at the $_k soundwaves level."
Why don't they do that?
 
AJ Soundfield said:
Why doesn't Bob Stuart/MQA come out and say, "Hey audiophiles, don't waste your time with something like the $2k Mytek Brooklyn for MQA, the absolute bare minimum to "hear" MQA starts at the $_k soundwaves level."
Why don't they do that?
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Because you will hear it with that $2k Mytek. Then again just like you will not hear the best PCM with a $2k DAC as you will with a $19k Berkeley.
 
So, with the firmware upgrade, the Oppo will do the full unfold of MQA? I use my 103D to stream Tidal and one of the things I’ve been thinking about is to take a digital out to a Sonica DAC. It even has balanced XLRs to feed my Integrated. Sweet and simple and I like the idea of those pieces being from the same family.
 
At this point only the 205 will do MQA. They would have to release the Firmware upgrade to the Sonica for it to do it too.
 
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