Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming What HiFi announces Tidal available on Sooloos in 'early 2015'

Gee these guys are really nerdy. Well who cares?

I care, you can get information if you listen...

Name calling helps no one other than to make the name caller feel perhaps a little more comfortable and that's not what I think this forum is about. Most advances in technology, medicine, science etc. are relying on dedicated people who have a real passion for their subject and discussing technical things is an integral part of the process. Guess I must be a nerd too as I understood what they were saying and my grasp of the topics was further enlightened.

I agree, it's a largely technical and commercial presentation. How else do you do it?
Guess I'm nerdy too...I enjoyed watching it

Interesting to read in the What Hi-Fi review that the current CD quality streaming will reduce a little from �20/month and the Hi-Res will be price above that.

I wonder what the 'Full Fat' MQA streaming service will cost.

Also is there going to be a pricing difference between regular Hi-Res and MQA downloads from the likes of HD Tracks.

I imagine in time there will be just one format 'MQA' and it's the user equipment that will define the quality level... well here's me hoping that's the case. I just want MQA to succeed and it's only by becoming the new standard audio format will it have a chance of doing so.

I think you're right, the point of MQA is it is hidden in regular lossless, so no extra bandwidth.

I didn't think that interview was nerdy at all.

It goes beyond just the web bandwidth.

For every album that gets MQA'd they will no longer need to keep the other legacy versions (i.e. standard FLAC or MP3 etc). The files are backwards compatible.

Imagine the impact longer term with vendors and streaming providers just storing one version.

Hard to see how they will make both 'normal' and 'MQA' services work. If only the people with MQA decoders buy into the MQA service then it makes the backwards compatibility redundant.

Non MQA-enabled folks will need any easy path into upgrading and access to MQA files as part of the normal service (a single service) will be enough temptation for many. That will help the adoption rates.

Sorry guys. I was joking. I meant who cares if they are nerdy, not who cares about what they are saying.

Bob Stuart and Atlantic Records interview Here

As nerdy as you want it to be... lol enjoy, Chris

Listening to Bob and the Atlantic Records guy, Bob could not be clearer, even without MQA Hardware/Software, MQA delivers superior Sound quality than CD's. I can't imagine someone like Bob making such a claim unless he was absolutely certain what he was saying is entirely accurate. Just hope Tidal's MQA pricing is reasonable. With limited MQA files initially how they differentiate between them and CD quality is certainly a puzzle to me as far as charging the public is concerned.

That's good stuff. There's so much in that Atlantic back catalogue !!!

The two things that stuck with me on the WhatHiFI interview.

1) "The technology is there, now it's about securing content rights for high-res music, which is a whole different game from Red Book CD quality," says Bratelund. I have said it once or more in the past, this is really a large or driving part behind this. I don't think it will take much to get the studios to sign up, though I notice Tidal's hardware partners are M, Aularic, Sonos, Macintosh, Linn and a couple even more obscure brands. Their entire years production is likely less than one month from Sony, Marantz, Denon, etc. We need the larger hardware players to signup for this to work.
I predict the end of the CD at this point, with studios giving customers the option of buy high and low rez versions of all their music via Tidal, itunes or whomever.

2) "Meridian added Tidal streaming to its Sooloos system earlier this month" Is this the case? Are there people out there beta testing this right now?