MQA now on Tidal

Another "hierarchy" relationship for me regarding vinyl, R2R, DSD, CD and MQA SW decoded, MQA HW decoded in my system(s) and to my personal preferences are:

Top Tier - All a bit different but top of the class regarding SQ

In no particular order - R2R, Vinyl, Native DSD and HW encoded MQA (None are "better" to me, they are all sonic nirvana with a good recording in these formats)

Second Tier - Still musical satisfying but second tier with respect to SQ compared to the Top Tier

In no particular order - CD, non-native DSD, SW encoded MQA

Third Tier - The trick is that even though SQ wise Third Tier has less SQ than Tiers 1 and 2 Tier 3 is still is TOTALLY musically involving and gives the greatest music selection by far.

Tidal streaming 16/44.1

I listen Tidal streaming pretty much 100% of the time.....it works for me.
 
Streaming to me has a convenience factor but for critical listening I will always fall back to my LP's and well recorded digital or CD's. I found MQA fun, but cumbersome with the same artist all spread out when looking for MQA files not to mention its got a PC attached to it which I don't like (my opinion of course). I just like most of my music upsampled to DSD via my Lumin and I just can't do that with MQA., it is what "ever it is". .
 
CPP said:
Streaming to me has a convenience factor but for critical listening I will always fall back to my LP's and well recorded digital or CD's. I found MQA fun, but cumbersome with the same artist all spread out when looking for MQA files not to mention its got a PC attached to it which I don't like (my opinion of course). I just like most of my music upsampled to DSD via my Lumin and I just can't do that with MQA., it is what "ever it is". .
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Insightful Chris....."the long and winding road":)
 
After just a few days I think I'm also done with streaming, at least or until we see what the other major (and minor) labels are planning for hi-res sreaming. Whether or not my next DAC (whenever that may be) has MQA may affect that as wel, but for now there is no sound quality advantage to streaming, and no real exciting content that I don't already have, and Tidal's interface and search function need significant improvement.
 
Rhapsody said:
Jim, do you have the link to that updated spreadsheet?....thx
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See my post above with the latest data.

I must say since MQA was released on Tidal about 10 day ago I have had some of the most enjoyable listening sessions in all of my years in his crazy hobby. Some of the releases streamed thru my system exceed any SQ I have heard anytime, anywhere. Not every title exceeds some of the better Hi Rez PCM or DSD recordings but none of them sounds bad in comparison. If the Master list I posted above continues to be updated it becomes pretty easy for me to find music I might enjoy the correct MQA version and tag it in Sooloos. I have done this with ~20 albums.

Just as I do with the CD's and Hi Rez music I want to own I look forward to being able to purchase MQA versions of some of this music especially newer releases. If anything happens to Tidal I will want to own some of the releases.
 
Bob

Did you ever get your Windows laptop to recognize your DAC? If not and you were a fairly early adopter of 10 then go into your device manager and delete your audio driver whether Realtek or some other. Re-start the laptop and Windows will install a repaired driver. The original software update had a corrupt USB driver. I fought with it a while before I remembered.
 
Jack said:
Bob

Did you ever get your Windows laptop to recognize your DAC? If not and you were a fairly early adopter of 10 then go into your device manager and delete your audio driver whether Realtek or some other. Re-start the laptop and Windows will install a repaired driver. The original software update had a corrupt USB driver. I fought with it a while before I remembered.
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Hello Jack,

Thx so much for thinking of "my issue". Actually I never did get it working. I spent and hour on the phone with Microsoft and had them log on to my computer, they could not get it to recognize. I DID delete my usb driver and reloaded it again, to no avail.

Right now I can't mess with it because I took my usb module out of my MSB and sent it to MSB to have the module upgraded to the MQA version of the USB module. I should have it back later this week or next.

Andy brought down his Mytek Brooklyn and when we ran the Brooklyn connected to the Aurender the Aurender passed up to 192Hz Master files, SO, when I get my usb/mqa module back I will be able to run it from my Aurender app after having saved the files on my desktop and then bringing them up on the Aurender favorites.

On th flip side, my enthusiasm has been "curbed" as I do LOVE the SQ from the MQA titles, but I am SO INTO listening to certain music that I like on regular Tidal that I've defaulted back to that for most of my listening. The 900 tracks that are currently available don't have ANY of the music that I like to listen to. I also scanned the entire Warners catalogue and although of course there are lot's of good albums from Warner, it's not inclusive enough vs. UMB/EMI, Sony.

For now I have settled in to in some listening sessions listening to MQA and then other sessions I listen to only the 16/44.1 Tidal. The only trick for me is if I want to listen to the 16/44.1 I CANNOT listen to the MQA tracks as sonically they are in a different league, but I'm fine with the 16/44.1 and it sounds great as long as I don't hit the MQA button. I'm much more about the music I'm listening to vs. the SQ of what I am listening to for my personal listening.

Again, thank you Jack for the suggestion, I will actually try that again, once I get my MQA/usb module back from MSB.
 
When playing the Tidal "Master" albums using a Lumin A1 with Roon / Tidal , are there any special settings on the Roon site itself that have to be set to get the best audio from the Lumin player? I am getting 24/48 playing the albums currently with the suggested Tidal settings.
 
calloway said:
When playing the Tidal "Master" albums using a Lumin A1 with Roon / Tidal , are there any special settings on the Roon site itself that have to be set to get the best audio from the Lumin player? I am getting 24/48 playing the albums currently with the suggested Tidal settings.
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Thats what I get from my Lumin when playing back MQA files to a non-MQA dac. 24/48, PS not a Roon user.

Play around with your upsampling on your Lumin, that 24/48 file can be upsampled to DSD
 
CPP said:
Thats what I get from my Lumin when playing back MQA files to a non-MQA dac. 24/48, PS not a Roon user.

Play around with your upsampling on your Lumin, that 24/48 file can be upsampled to DSD
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.....CPP...thanks...I am doing that, which does help significantly and the Masters albums do sound better....most....at 24/48 when compared to the regular upsampled pcm to dsd albums.
 
Re: MQA on Tidal

KeithR said:
well, consider me confused. is the gist that people with non-MQA dacs can run MQA files through Tidal and sound better than the non-MQA version? or do you need a MQA dac for the files to sound better.
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Supposedly, but I did not have that experience. It sounded very compressed to me and a buddy. I posted to the MQA Thread and just saw this one...I posted more details there. At the end of our session we played back over my Debussy direct from Tidal, (as one example), The Postal Service's, "Such Great Heights" was loud at the intro and last few seconds, but the middle sounded at least about 25% less loud or thereabouts. It also had passaged that went loud and then low -- I really should have pulled out my meter and filmed it, but I'm expecting other's will have a similar experience. FWIW, my copy from HDTracks (http://www.hdtracks.com/give-up-deluxe-10th-anniversary-edition) which is 24Bit 44Khz, sounded much, much better than Tidals MQA (through an MQA Dac/Player) and straight through my Debussy.

Now this could be just the couple of tracks we found that I also had a digital version of or SACD/CD. Perhaps something else was at play or it was just a bad selection of tracks on our part. I'm not poo-poo'ing MQA, I still want to keep trying it out and figure out why it didn't blow us away.
 
Hey Jim,

Would you mind recommending a few albums that sound great in the Master's section? I'd much appreciate it. It would help me in figuring out what the heck's going on with my playback as I'm not getting what I'd expect in quality from what I've been toying with.

Thanks,

Bryan

still-one said:
Two that I have tagged are Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly" and Van Morrison's " Moondance".

It's funny but there are 88 and 96 files that sound better than these two. The original does not have to be 192 to get great sound.
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Interesting point, but if Apple (the currently rumoured to-be-most-interested) buys them out, I wonder how much they would embrace MQA? Just look at what they did to the lossless format...

mep said:
Well, judging by the reaction of many digital audiophiles that have proclaimed MQA as the second coming, even if Tidal goes under, one of the other streaming services will probably pick it up.
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radioactive said:
Interesting point, but if Apple (the currently rumoured to-be-most-interested) buys them out, I wonder how much they would embrace MQA? Just look at what they did to the lossless format...
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You may want to try these.
-Emmylou Harris (with Rodney Crowell) "The Traveling Kind"
-Rhiannon Giddens - "Factory Girl"
-Van Morrison - Moondance

I haven't compared the following to Hi Rez versions but they sound better than the CD's
-Mark Knopfler - Sailing To Philadelphia
-Richard Hawley - Hollow Meadows
-The Drifters - "up On The Roof"
 
Re: MQA on Tidal

So I may have to retract that statement. Today, I opened up Tidal and there was an update to the software (not sure this was the "fix"), but I compared Led Zeppelin's "Since I've Been Loving You" in their Master's to my HDTracks 24Bit 96Khz version. NOTE: My buddy's DAC/Player wasn't here so it was just comparing their playback to my FLAC copy. Also the Tidal version showed up in my Debussy as 24/96 so it's a descent comparison I suppose. I have to say the "compressed" sound was not present. In fact, they (Warner, whomever did the MQA release) seemed to have cleaned the track up, as John Bonham's notorious Ludwig Speed King model #201 bass drum pedal's squeak wasn't as noticeable in the Tidal version. There was a good deal of space that was also more appealing, and the phantom center presented by my Alexia's was much more coherent in the Tidal version. That said, it also had a bit less "oomph" (for lack of a better word) and the level of midbass was seemingly thin to me. All in all, I'd call it less fatiguing, but in it's a tie. They both sound good and each have their pluses and minuses. I'm going to go back and listen to other tracks now and see if this update helped The Postal Service's track too and some other's.

This is fun!



radioactive said:
Supposedly, but I did not have that experience. It sounded very compressed to me and a buddy. I posted to the MQA Thread and just saw this one...I posted more details there. At the end of our session we played back over my Debussy direct from Tidal, (as one example), The Postal Service's, "Such Great Heights" was loud at the intro and last few seconds, but the middle sounded at least about 25% less loud or thereabouts. It also had passaged that went loud and then low -- I really should have pulled out my meter and filmed it, but I'm expecting other's will have a similar experience. FWIW, my copy from HDTracks (http://www.hdtracks.com/give-up-deluxe-10th-anniversary-edition) which is 24Bit 44Khz, sounded much, much better than Tidals MQA (through an MQA Dac/Player) and straight through my Debussy.

Now this could be just the couple of tracks we found that I also had a digital version of or SACD/CD. Perhaps something else was at play or it was just a bad selection of tracks on our part. I'm not poo-poo'ing MQA, I still want to keep trying it out and figure out why it didn't blow us away.
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Re: MQA on Tidal

radioactive said:
. In fact, they (Warner, whomever did the MQA release) seemed to have cleaned the track up, as John Bonham's notorious Ludwig Speed King model #201 bass drum pedal's squeak wasn't as noticeable in the Tidal version. .

This is fun!
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Wouldn't that be a bad thing to be missing?
 
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