I’m not an expert or anything so sorry for any confusions or something incorrect.
From my pi I have a coaxial connection to a CA DacMagic plus. If I connect, for instance, my computer directly to the DacMagic I get 96 there in a track from tidal that I don’t get from Volumio.
Not only I see on Volumio interface the limit of 48 I even see the same thing on DacMagic since it tells me so.
Again I’m not a technical guy and I’m sorry for any mistake but still using a Dac besides the HiFiBerry doesn’t solve the situation.
I’m sure this is a technical thing from Volumio. My complaint is that I need to pay to have tidal integration. And to have a limit of 48 would be better to use, for instance, Spotify since I don’t get the quality I use tidal for.
Is there any way of checking what Volumio reports, and what is actually being played? I don’t use Tidal so have no expertise here; just a thought. I have noticed elsewhere that Volumio reports sample rates incorrectly (from published data on streams etc. No concrete example to hand though).
Well in my case since I have a Cambridge audio DacMagic plus it shows what’s the sample rate getting there. So not only do I see that’s it’s 48 on Volumio interface - and it could be the issue that you say - I also can see that it’s 48 in an independent device. So I’m sure it’s 48… and it might be me knowing this but I do notice the difference in sound
Hi, so far I know DacMagic plus does not support MQA. Would you please specify what exactly do you refer to by a Tidal track which is being played thru Volumio? Bear in mind, Tidal often has a separate a MQA (Master) and a separate non-MQA (HiFi) album. I assume while DACMAgic plus does not support MQA, you are playing a non-MQA album, which is 44/16 on Tidal (always) so you should see this very much on both, Volumio and DACMAgic.
For the second scenario, using DacMagic with your computer (e.g. w/o Volumio), one can assume you are using the Tidal app. Then, this Tidal app on your computer does the unfolding and rendering, and then passes the decoded PCM stream to the DacMagic, and depending on the MQA master this can very much be 96/24 or even 192/24.
I am not saying Volumio works ok, just trying to explain what probably happens.
If you look for the other replies, one has to choose either to use Volumio and a DAC with full MQA support when one want to stream Tidal Master tracks, (e.g. anything different to 44/16) or not using Volumio (as explained above, they will NOT do MQA decoding or rendering - they would have to pay license fees to MQA parent organisation) or not using Tidal, but Qobuz which has highres files not being MQA and those at 48/24, 96/24 or 192/24. Also a 4th option is using Audirvana as player/rendered and Volumio/Pi only as UpNP renderer but this seems to be quite odd, because, why to use Volumio then at all, if Ropieee would be sufficient in this case.
Thank you so much for that complete answer, it helps a lot and answers a lot as well.
The tracks that I’m referring are the Master tracks on Tidal.
I get what you’re saying both with using my pc (and yes, I use the Tidal app there) and using Volumio, it’s definitely clear.
I have a Dragonfly red, would that solve the problem, for instance?
And as you say, Volumio does not work ok in that manner. The “frustrating” part is that I pay Volumio for a service that doesn’t work fully as it should. I get in a technical term what you’re saying but the fact that I’m paying is the “frustrating” part in this. And don’t get me wrong, I really like Volumio, it’s just this part…
Qobuz would be a good option but unfortunately it’s not available in my country yet
Well, Dragonfly Red is a MQA Renderer, so not really… You would still need an MQA Decoder such as Audirvana or Roon and then using Volumio does make really sense.
100% agree with your statement that with Virtuoso, they should provide full Tidal MQA integration, so you do not need specific hardware or an external plater on top. That is the reason one pays for Audirvana or Roon to get such a full Tidal integration.
You can work around the Qobuz country restrictions btw…
Yeah, for sure, something extra to use something you’re already paying for… not the best option, definitely not.
I use a VPN in a daily basis so yeah, that would be easy to work around. Not very experienced with a Pi so would have to check that since I don’t want my router to have the VPN always on, always prefer on individual hardware
Hi there. Maybe some of you already know this so it won’t be anything new, but I question Volumio about this issue and today they answered this:
“This is because we stream TIDAL masters in MQA format. In MQA, the bitrate and bitdepth are lower than the actual final resolution (MQA is a lossy format). in the next versions we will add an option to turn off MQA, so you can have full res.”
So hopefully soon we’ll an option for this problem.
iFi xDSD (using the firmware supporting MQA, and it works fine with Tidal on my Mac and iPhone to play MQA)
The Tidal master in MQA never let the LED show in Magenta (when playing through Volumio).
I’ve searched here for quite many articles but no luck. It appears like the Volumio is not doing the Stage 1 unfold but I cannot find any information about that yet.
