Thinking of subbing to Tidal? Watch this MQA review first

[qubit]

As you can guess from the title, the review isn't good, revealing lots of false claims and shady practices. I wouldn't touch them. Check it out.

 

[CityCultivator]

The moment I saw the title, I knew what video you were going to post.

When I saw the overall design of MQA, I immediately realised it would be a mess.
Encoding data on the audio itself sounded nonsense from the start. This would create high level of noise and distortion, which usually cannot be completely removed. Yes, with MQA, irreversibly manipulated audio is "Master quality".
You want to encode additional data, you use a separate data stream. DTS-HD codecs is able to do that. Open source WavPack is able to do that. These codecs are able to do hybrid encoding (Lossy with Lossless stream addon).
Or just don't. FLAC is perfect for lossless transmission and most users of lossless audio streaming will have available bandwidth for FLAC streaming.

 

[qubit]

Exactly, it's snake oil and I hate to see scammers getting away with garbage like this, hence why I posted this video, to help warn people who may get sucked in. It's clear from the video why Tidal makes it so hard to test their claims, too. Respect for this YouTuber for the lengths that he went to expose them.

If one wants to capture more information than is possible in a 44.1/16 stream then you need more bits and/or faster sample rate, it's as simple as that. Basic physics.

 

[CityCultivator]

The silly thing about MQA is the encoding scheme.
That is no quality encoding procedure.
A terrible encoding coupled with no normal testing method allowed.