HEAD acoustics releases MDAQS 2.0

This month, HEAD acoustics GmbH announced the update to its sound quality simulation algorithm, Multi-Dimensional Audio Quality Scores. The newest version, 2.0, introduces category-specific calculations to prevent unfair sample comparisons, in addition to the original universal version. The service will be available to those who have enabled it in the ACQUA platform.

MDAQS 2.0 adds context-specific figures

The new MDAQS version 2.0 adds specialized variants of the scoring analysis: Headphones and Cars. There is also a “universal” variant that behaves more like the original scoring system. Each of these flavors of MDAQS keep the basics of the original, but make the scores more meaningful when comparing products of the same type. Specifically, the pool of sample data used by each specialized MDAQS variant is limited to data from only that product type. MDAQS Headphones contains only sample data from headphones, while MDAQS Cars contains only sample data from automotive audio systems. This way, scores for headphones can’t be affected by listener impressions of loudspeaker performance and vice versa.

In order to ensure that the new MDAQS options were up to snuff, HEAD acoustics conducted new listening tests. Six devices chosen at random from each category were tested with 18 people in order to validate the output of the new MDAQS offerings. Once the new category behavior was validated, HEAD acoustics rolled out the changes.

What’s changed

In terms of what’s changed under the hood, the answer is: not much. The core components of the original MDAQS are still intact, along with the analysis stage, math, and converting comparative ratings to quality scores. The score output is also the same as before, with Mean Opinion Scores (MOS) offered for Timbre, Distortion, Immersiveness, and an Overall score. This method of using a MOS to contextualize data offers a readable means of assessing product performance across different product types.

Although the universal nature of MDAQS’ previous version offered an easy way to digest mean opinion scores (MOS) for almost anything that could play audio, this is sometimes insufficient. For example, headphones and earbuds typically score very well, which can make comparing headphones to other headphones tough when the spread of the score is so narrow. With the category-specific versions of MDAQS, it should be easier to make more meaningful distinctions between product performances within each category of devices.

MDAQS 2.0 is now available via ACOPT 36, while MDAQS Headphones is also available as a standalone package through ACOPT 40. For pricing and other information, you must reach out to HEAD acoustics GmbH for more details.

SoundGuys is making the upgrade too

SoundGuys will be making the move to the new version of MDAQS as well. In order to ensure that we minimize confusion and potential errors, we validated our already enormous body of samples. Though the previous figures we’ve reported are of an earlier version, there shouldn’t be much drift from MDAQS 2.0 Universal; however, there will be some drift between earlier scores and those arrived at with MDAQS 2.0 Headphones. We’ve added labeling to ensure users can see which charts are which.

Over the coming weeks, we’ll be updating our backlog of reviews with updated figures to reflect the migration to the new version of MDAQS, as well as publishing new content with the new scores. We want to thank HEAD acoustics for their continued cooperation, and our readers for the grace to accommodate us as we’ve been making our upgrades behind the scenes.