MQA Dac Required with Audirvana Plus and Tidal?

[Saby72]

I subscribe to Tidal Hifi and have access to Masters encoded with MQA. My computer is connected to my McIntosh MHA100 through USB and I am using eihter Amarra Symphony or  Audirvana Plus (with Tidal) + Itunes. My understanding is that Tidal by itself connected through my McIntosh will not deliver the full MQA experience and need an MQA compatible DAC. So I was told Buesound Node 2 would happen to do just that. My issue with this set-up is that the Burr Brown Chip on this 599$ (CDN) is not at the level of the DAC built in my McIntosh. Would I, at the end of the day ended up with worse quality music than feeding it with the USB cable and using my McIntosh DAC while not having the full MQA experience.

 

Second part of this: The Audirvana Plus has MQA capability, does this solve my issues and would I get the full MQA experience? 

 

I want to integrate Blusesound in order to remove Airplay from my system because it can't stream 24 bit while bluesound could.

 

Hope I make sense here as this is my first post.

 

Thanks

 

Saby

[a.dent]

If you have your computer connected straight to your Mcintosh DAC you can get the first MQA unfold from the Tidal App or Audirvana. This gives you up to a 24/96 stream. To get the full MQA experience you need an MQA DAC, the cheapest of which ATM is the Meridian Explorer2. Personally I would think the McIntosh DAC playing a partially unfolded file should sound better than the cheap Explorer2 fully unfolding the MQA file. You would need to step up to something like the Mytek Brooklyn DAC to get the full unfold and compete with the McIntosh.

 

As for the Bluesound, it is primarily a streaming option. If you connect your Mcintosh DAC to it you won't get the full unfold. If you are using it in a second system streaming from your computer then the internal DAC will (apparently) provide full unfolding. But as you say it is cheap DAC. Reports are though that it sounds pretty good.

 

And lastly we could get into the argument about whether MQA really offers any improvement over PCM and whether it is a rort or not. 

[wklie]

4 hours ago, Saby72 said:

My understanding is that Tidal by itself connected through my McIntosh will not deliver the full MQA experience and need an MQA compatible DAC.

 

Both Tidal desktop app and Audirvana Plus 3 will perform the first unfold of Tidal Masters to MQA Core.  If you want full decoding, you need a MQA DAC.  Please read:

 

[bobbmd]

@a.dent far from being 'cheap' the INEXPENSIVE ME2 is an excellent DAC it sounds better at times than my non MQA 800$ pre multibit Schiit Gungnir plus it totally 'unfolds' TIDAL 'MASTERS" MQA material. I have done a/b/c comparisons of my Gungnir/FULLA/ME2 with MQA/nonMQA via ROON/A+3/Qobuz hifi WEB player and desktop app/TIDAL desktop app/ and even SPOTIFY-all have different SQ/spaciousness/separation etc depending on quality of original source recording to my 70yo ears but MQA really sounds better overall with the ME2.

[Saby72]

Ok let me tell you what I see. MacBook connected to McIntosh through USB. Top right corner of Audirvana shows Flac/MQA with a blue dot and right underneat 24/192 kHz Stereo, then on the top left corner it shows DAC: 32/192 kHz Stereo, on my McIntosh MHA100 front panel I read 32/192 kHz. I know for a fact that my MHA100 is not MQA certified. Now here is the kicker, if I play straight Tidal (without Audirvana) then the same track will show on the front of my MHA100 as 32/96 kHz (half of the MQA Story). This leads me to beleive that Audirvana unfolf the full MQA without the need of an MQA ready DAC. Can anyone confirm all this?

[a.dent]

My guess is Audirvana is upsampling after the initial unfolding. Check your settings. No files are recorded at 32bit so that bit at least is incorrect because MQA will present the fully unfolded file at it's original resolution. I have a Mytek Brooklyn and I've never seen a 32 bit MQA file yet.

[a.dent]

10 hours ago, bobbmd said:

@a.dent far from being 'cheap' the INEXPENSIVE ME2 is an excellent DAC it sounds better at times than my non MQA 800$ pre multibit Schiit Gungnir plus it totally 'unfolds' TIDAL 'MASTERS" MQA material. I have done a/b/c comparisons of my Gungnir/FULLA/ME2 with MQA/nonMQA via ROON/A+3/Qobuz hifi WEB player and desktop app/TIDAL desktop app/ and even SPOTIFY-all have different SQ/spaciousness/separation etc depending on quality of original source recording to my 70yo ears but MQA really sounds better overall with the ME2.

 

I haven't heard an Explorer2 but I do have a Mytek Brooklyn. I must say I prefer the MQA versions of most albums when compared through the Mytek.

I also have a Vitus DAC and I prefer the partially unfolded file played through the Vitus over the fully unfolded file played through the Mytek. Unfortunately I have to use a MacBook/Tidal app as source here rather than my SOtM sMS200 so I'm hoping that when Roon includes MQA software unfolding I will get another step up in SQ.