Audirvana, MQA first unfold, and upsampling...

[miguelito]

Trying to figure out if Audirvana will upsample a first-unfolded MQA stream.

 

Say I choose "No MQA Device" in Audirvana preferences, and I turn off upsampling as well. In this case, Audirvana will first-unfold a 24/48 MQA file into a 24/96 stream. It will also not add the relevant tagging for rendering - I know this because with this setting my Dragonfly Red does not show a purple light, it shows a pink light (ie standard 24/96 PCM stream) (*)

 

The key question: If in this setup I turn on upsampling (and use a higher rate DAC as Dragonfly is limited to 96KHz), will it upsample the first-unfolded signal or will it switch off first-unfold and upsample the raw 24/48 MQA stream?

 

(*) I am well aware that to get rendering in the Dragonfly I need to set the device to "MQA Renderer Device" or let it detect it automatically. This is NOT the question I am asking so please don't answer that.

[miguelito]

Oh cmon... Someone must know the answer to this!

[asdf1000]

6 hours ago, miguelito said:

If in this setup I turn on upsampling (and use a higher rate DAC as Dragonfly is limited to 96KHz), will it upsample the first-unfolded signal or will it switch off first-unfold and upsample the raw 24/48 MQA stream?

 

@mansr do you know if using A+ if upsampling is used when playing an MQA file, is the 1st MQA unfold being upsampled by A+?

 

Or only the original MQA file (with no MQA unfolding done) is upsampled by A+?

 

or @damien78?

[mansr]

Sorry, my only involvement with A+ is that wrote the (open source) sigma-delta modulator it uses for upsampling to DSD. I have never seen the source code of A+ and know no more than anyone else about its inner workings.

[asdf1000]

30 minutes ago, mansr said:

Sorry, my only involvement with A+ is that wrote the (open source) sigma-delta modulator it uses for upsampling to DSD. I have never seen the source code of A+ and know no more than anyone else about its inner workings.

 

No problem mansr but have you done any MQA analysis when your DSD upsampling modulator is used with an MQA file in A+?

 

Is it a difficult thing to run and verify? I guess we wanted to know if in this case with A+ MQA Ltd has allowed DSP after the 1st unfold...

 

[mansr]

25 minutes ago, Em2016 said:

No problem mansr but have you done any MQA analysis when your DSD upsampling modulator is used with an MQA file in A+?

I don't even have a Mac, so no.

[Norton]

I know nothing about Audirvana, but if, like other  upsampling software, it displays source and output formats somewhere and the former shows (e.g.) 24/96, then I'd think it reasonable to presume  it was decoding  MQA before upsampling.  XXHE does so, for example.

[asdf1000]

3 hours ago, Norton said:

I know nothing about Audirvana, but if, like other  upsampling software, it displays source and output formats somewhere and the former shows (e.g.) 24/96, then I'd think it reasonable to presume  it was decoding  MQA before upsampling.

 

Respectfully, unfortunately you need to use A+ to see/know that this info that's asked by the OP isn't explicitly available, hence the question to Damien (the developer) for clarification.

 

In case you're wondering... does A+ tell you the final output sample rate after upsampling? Yes. Does A+ tell you it's an MQA file being upsampled? Yes. But this isn't what's being asked. The question is, is A+ upsampling the MQA file after the 1st unfold.

[asdf1000]

On 03/03/2018 at 10:28 PM, Em2016 said:

The question is, is A+ upsampling the MQA file AFTER the 1st unfold.

 

@damien78 ? Can you help.

[damien78]

With a MQA DAC connected, there is no audio processing to keep the MQA signal unaltered so it is detected by the MQA DAC.

With a non MQA DAC, all the audio processing is available, and the order is:

Load and decode file => MQA unfold => upsampling (if enabled) => audio units (if enabled) => volume control (if enabled)

 

[OldBigEars]

On 3/8/2018 at 10:53 AM, damien78 said:

With a MQA DAC connected, there is no audio processing to keep the MQA signal unaltered so it is detected by the MQA DAC.

With a non MQA DAC, all the audio processing is available, and the order is:

Load and decode file => MQA unfold => upsampling (if enabled) => audio units (if enabled) => volume control (if enabled)  

 

 

On 3/8/2018 at 10:53 AM, damien78 said:

 

 

Damien,

 

Sorry to say the language on your app confuses me.  I have a non-MQA DAC but wish to enable MQA via A+

Here's my set up on Audio System:

- Auto-detect MQA device - checked

- No MQA device detected - MQA Renderer device selected

 

Have I set this up right?

Thanks for confirming

[damien78]

Device set to MQA Decoder = no audio processing done in Audirvana Plus, as the DAC is doing all of the MQA decoding

Device set to MQA Renderer = MQA first unfolding done in Audirvana Plus, and no other audio processing as the DAC is doing the other unfoldings

 

So unless you have a DAC that IS a MQA decoder/renderer, you'll leave this setting to Not MQA device.

[OldBigEars]

Thanks !