Dr AIX definitely has his own agenda...... as do we all (in the industry).
(Of course, the MQA gang also has
THEIR agenda - which seems to involve collecting licensing fees from
EVERYONE within fifty feet of the music production process.)
However, in Dr AIX defense, I've got to say that (at least IHMO), the MQA gang has brought a lot of this on themselves......
The reason I say this is simply that they've made a bunch of... aggressive... claims - and the details keep changing.
For example, they could have said: "We've got a much better lossy CODEC than MP3; in fact, it's so good that it can sound better than a CD when limited to a similar bandwidth."
That's a reasonable claim, and would have been solidly substantiated by testimonials from a bunch of people who agreed that it sounded good.
HOWEVER, instead, they described it as "a sort of way of
LOSSLESSLY compressing certain parts of the audio spectrum and
FOLDING them up so you could get them back by
unfolding them"
.
As I recall, the original explanation used the word
losslessly about five times; and
never used the word
lossy.
In other words, they sure seemed to be hoping nobody would notice that it is technically a
LOSSY compression scheme.
(Then, only when called out, did they concede that "
parts of the audio spectrum that contain no useful content are in fact DISCARDED".)
Then they talked about their big deal where the "entire music catalog" of a certain label had been encoded.
So we waited, and waited, and never saw any of it.
THEN we hear that, actually, it was only the newer digitally-mastered parts of the catalog that were remastered.
(I don't know the numbers, but I'm thinking this was a major distinction, since lots of folks were probably hoping for better remasters from all those old albums that were mastered on tape.)
Of course, we
STILL haven't seen any of those albums anyway..... but we'll be getting them soon... really... (you believe me, right?)
It almost seems like, while the details and claims keep changing, the "takeaway message" for MQA is:
"It's wonderful; you've gotta have it; and, even if you don't understand exactly why, you should pay for an MQA logo on everything you buy from now on".
I'm forced to draw a comparison to Pono.....
Remember them?
They had this neat little music player.... (I thought it actually was quite nice).
And they were also going to be remastering lots of classic albums in awesome quality...
And every one would have its quality certified by the original artist, so you'd
KNOW it was the best possible copy...
They even had a little LED that would light to prove that what you were listening to sounded great (in case you couldn't actually tell).
C'mon, you
DO remember Pono, right?
RIGHT
(I think I might even have a Pono remastered album somewhere... right next to my extensive HDCD collection.)
But, to get back to old Dr AIX.
On one hand, I think he can be a bit "aggressive".
But. on the other, he does have a lot of credibility in the industry.
At a time when lots of people were cheerfully declaring that certain select MQA remastered files they'd been provided with sounded great.
Dr AIX suggested that, just maybe, this didn't prove much... since you don't know how much of that difference to credit to a good remaster and hos much to MQA itself.
He asked if they would encode some files he provided, so he could offer a fair comparison between the "before" and "after" of MQA encoding.
(We might even imagine that, once the samples were provided, he might have offered us the opportunity to download them and compare them for ourselves.)
Apparently, the MQA gang agreed to this..... then didn't follow through.
Of course, I'm willing to believe that they just plain forgot... or decided there was no point in providing ammo to someone they couldn't win over....
... but it's also possible that they really don't want to encourage people to make actual comparisons.
As per the Doc's description of what happened to his proposed discussion at RMAF - it's just good PR to avoid situations where you might end up looking bad... right?
HERE'S AN INTERESTING THOUGHT.......
The "MQA gang" could select a dozen songs from various well-known albums....
Remaster them in MQA (but get affidavits from the mastering engineers than no other remixing or changes were done).
Then take those new MQA versions, do "the first unfold", and save the results as a "pre-unfolded 24/96k file" (what you get when you play an MQA file through Tidal).
Then offer all of them for download.
They could give us the high-res original master....
And a 24/96k version of the MQA version "pre-unfolded" (so people could hear the result of that first unfold on their
NON-MQA system)....
And a full MQA version you could try on a real MQA DAC....
(Sort of like when they offer to let you taste a little cup of a new food product at your local grocery store.)
As it sits right now, things are too confusing......
For example, the only way to listen to music in MQA (if you have normal tastes) is to sign up for Tidal.....
But, even if someone tells us that a lot of people have signed up for Tidal since they've been offering MQA,
WE WILL NEVER KNOW IF THEY SIGNED UP BECAUSE THEY LIKED MQA OR SIMPLY BECAUSE THEY LIKED TIDAL.
(Perhaps someone could run a survey and ask new Tidal users if they signed up
BECAUSE of MQA - or just because they like the service.)
Seems that his current take on MQA is the same as his predetermined assumptions from before.
"lend me an MQA capable DAC, and let me evaluate the before and after for myself" really, loan me one?? He doesn't have $200.00 and 60 days of review to return it for a full refund, seems a little lazy in wanting any facts. So my audio system sounds better then yours! FACT! No,,,,No,,,,No,,,,, I don't want to hear it, I just know better.
No matter his credentials, perhaps hes not open minded enough to actually hear what he's shoving. This would all carry more weight if he had actually listened to MQA.
Maybe hes right, maybe hes wrong but in many many recordings the MQA tract sounds better, in honesty as Im advocating for, not all tracks improved.
He buddy, can you lend a guy a DAC? Geezzzz
Let it begin,,,,,,,again!
Edit; after some research it seems as though the Dr. has something to sell himself! Humm,,,,
