Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Can an analogue bypass be added to a G68?

I don't fully understand MQA but the recording of the phase / frequency may be just part of the folding/compression scheme. Once unfolded to hires it might be all be there.

But no matter what folks say, MQA or not. Adding extra D/A to A/D is VERY bad (especially in the context of "HiRes"), I don't care how good it is. One reason is you have very little control of exactly matching the dynamic range of the that DAC with the ADC which is what any good Mixing Engineer would do (per album). On a consumer system it will have huge margins to avoid clipping. But a mixing engineer will make sure that doesn't happen while maximizing dynamic range.

That said, good music in any reasonable fashion on a great system will always sound good. Just don't call it Hi-Res/MQA, because that is all about getting the last bit of arguably inaudible ounce of resolution which a (non optimized) D/A to A/D conversion will surely destroy.

I still love "in Theory" what MQA or HiRes can/could do and fascinated with it. But in practice I'm quite skeptical what is really audible about it, in the real world we listen in.

There is a bit of fuzziness (to me) about MQA capturing something that no other recording method can do versus. Versus MQA having a real method in capturing something that is normally lost when reducing to 16/44 that it can restore when unfolding.

I'm sorry for the negative tone regarding MQA and do realize I'm very new/naive to it. I have a difficult time believing MQA captures something new that no system can do in the past. But I certainly believe is a very clever, efficient way to deliver HiRes in a 16/44 size package. Allowing delivery of HiRes through 16/44 channels. It is like the old HDCD idea on steroids.

I feel "Marketing" is partly responsible for this cool techno jargon in MQA and what it really means in practice, other than a new deliver format for basic hires (which is a feat alone as described above). And keeping it confusing and letting customers error on the side of audio benefits. And what is actually responsible for the benefit. Anything that is "different" could be labeled as "better" (even if it's technically not).

Look at Tube users !! or LP Users !!

No Matter what, it's gonna go to PCM before it does anything. MQA isn't rebuilding the entire recording industry.

But like the whole Bluray Lossless thing, content artists want to protect their Studio level recordings and need it to stay protected until it reaches a DAC. I find it hard to believe it can't be done in MultiChannel Preamp and delivered at HiRes (highest Res) over MHR.

Keep in mind though the Explorer2 has a 1000 Mips. A G65 has 750 mips. So does an 861V6 I believe (or it's close to it). Not sure what an 861V8 has. Even if it has more, all those MIPs might not be in the right place to Decode it, up sample an MHR, Room Correct etc. Meridian has really stretched the CP/Code it has used since 861V3/568. Lot of new stuff is on XMOS.

Well, I say again that I am not sure whether I have understood MQA correctly, but what I can say with confidence is that evolutionary processes convince me that it is no accident if humans (as many other animals) are very acutely aware of minute phase differences in sound. Imagine you are in the forest and a Sabre Tooth Tiger (or similar) is creeping up on you. You need your ears and your brain to locate with the highest precision where the predator might be. If you don't then you are dead and you can't pass your insufficiently good genes on.

If MQA is able to preserve/reconstruct these very subtle phase differences (timing) then it really should sound better. My limited personal experience is that it does. And I am a real sceptic. Please don't talk to me about the important effect of super special and super expensive connecting leads, for example. If it makes you feel good then that is absolutely fine (I like David Hockney's pictures, but you may not) but things like similar exotica do nothing for me.

So, if MQA does indeed address the most subtle phase issues in recorded sound (music) humans really should be able to detect it and benefit from it. Super wide frequency response? I don't think so.

Back in 1959 there was a reel to reel tape recorder called a Simon SP4. Expensive for the time it was distinguished by the fact that its specified frequency response was not at all outstanding (about 3dB down at 12kHz). But it sounded magnificent (as a collector I still have two of them). Why? Because it had a really smooth response that tailed off gracefully and it had very low distortion (harmonic and intermodulation) compared with the opposition. It also had a very linear phase/frequency relationship. A subjectively accurate sound experience depends, in my view, far more on phase accuracy and very low distortion (arguably closely linked issues) than on frequency response, for example.

Think again about the forest and the tiger. Foliage, tree trunks, the ground and so on may absorb frequencies in all sorts of different ways, but you still need to detect where the tiger is.