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Question to Devialet regarding Roon and MQA
#38
When I first heard MQA at a Bluesound demo last year in Dublin I loved the natural "LP" like feel to the sound. The imaging was fantastic even though the timbre of instruments changed little. Rhythm was good too. 

On the strength of that audition I went out and bought a Meridian explorer2 MQA enabled DAC , to compare hi-res 2L tracks on Roon / AIR  to MQA versions decoded by the explorer2 (see my previous post on the matter ). Then,  I found hi-res 192/24 and explorer2 decoded MQA sounded equally good.

Now that Tidal is finally offering MQA, I have compared MQA tracks decoded in the Tidal Mac App (USB) to explorer2 decoded tracks via ROON on my D440 system. 

Each time I worked hard to match volume levels. 

I expected the hardware "fully" decoded tracks to sound best, but that is not what I found (at least on my wonderful D440 Pro [Image: smile.gif])
My clear impression is that (with the usual caveats - my ears on my system):

Tidal App decoded MQA consistently sounds the best by a margin, wonderful, "holographic" as another poster said.

then 
HiRes FLAC @ 24/192 (2L) Local ROON files via AIR/ ethernet 
and
Tidal MQA fully decoded by the explorer2                           were about equally nice.

and each is much better than 24/48 or 24/16 tracks from ROON via AIR ethernet (though these still sound excellent by any objective standard!)


I continue to be enamoured with the sound of MQA. The natural deep and wide soundstage, the tightly localised solid "body" to instruments and singers. The hi-Res PCM versions do seem initially more "lively" or "busy" with lots of sounds "in your face". No one would say it sounds bad, but the decoded MQA version pushes the music back into the sound stage, which you quickly realise is a much more natural and musical presentation. 

There is also an effect I can't quite describe that makes one want to keep listening to the end of the whole track - you are sucked into the music more. It brings more emotion to already good performances. For example I have never heard Phil Collins perform better on  "The Roof is Leaking" Face Value (2015 remaster MQA). 

The improvement is big enough that I think sooner rather than later Devialet will be obliged to include MQA decoding notwithstanding their "Not invented here" stance heretofore. 

Bob Stuart is right - MQA is an important step towards perfecting "digital" sound.
iTunes & TIDAL HiFi --> ROON on iMac --> ROON RAAT over Ethernet --> D440 Pro-->  ProAc  D40R floorstanding speakers (SAM)
Also:  Linn LP12/Ittok turntable Cables: Nordost Shiva power, Nordost Flatline2 speaker cable

Dublin,  Ireland
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RE: Question to Devialet regarding Roon and MQA - by Markpd - 12-Jan-2017, 14:00

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