@kijanki Great, thanks! :)
Interesting reading. 99% of that writing has nothing to do with sound quality but marketting and branding concerns, which are very very real. I do worry it’s just a way of taking money out of the market, like GMO corn seeds.
If I read it correctly for Schiit it boils down to being some one new to pay money to, in addition to questions about how well they would be treated as a minor (in volume) manufacturer.
I think Schiit is playing it safe. MQA is brand new and by 2017 could be useless. If Tidal goes down, or worse, gets bought by Apple, it may be all over. One other point is differentiation. MQA could very well be the opposite of this, if all DAC's will be forced to sound much more similar than before. The value proposition is going to have to be high, because honestly I don't think most people will fully understand what's going on with it besides compression.
There’s also the possibility that the algorithms will be analyzed and, using that knowledge, better, open source solutions will be able to leap frog over them. It’s a very dynamic situation.
Best,
Erik