Advice sought, Airplay vs Nucleus?

Hi all.

I’d be really grateful if someone can help me with some advice.

I have a Roon Nucleus and this goes to a Minidsp shd studio end point.

I control the music with an Android or an ipad.

I understand that the high res tracks like Masters on Tidal will play in full res but the stream info says Airplay if on iPad or the android.

Is this correct?

I’m just trying to understand and get the best out of the kit.

Thanks😊

Disable Airplay and enable the mini-dsp entry under Roon.

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Where do I do this please?

The gear icon on the Airplay enabled entry should have a disable. Then click the Enable button on the Roon entry.

Roon - Settings - Audio

I’m not familiar with this equipment, but I think what they are suggesting is to disable the minidsp via airplay and enable the snd-sun8i-i2s-dac which is the networked DAC in the minidsp. You can also connect to the minidsp via USB, Toslink or SPDIF if it’s close enough to the Nucleus.

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Seems to have worked but I can’t detect any change is sq?

Ah, there’s the rub.

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Are you using an MQA capable DAC? Roon can do the MQA decoding but not the full rendering. Still, you may not hear a discernable difference in SQ. It depends on the quality of your system and your ears.

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I’m using a new McIntosh MA9000 with the integrated DAC.
Speakers are Harbeth 40.1
Shouldn’t be any issue with the quality of these.

Are you using an MQA capable DAC?

Affirm.

I bought a system enhancement CD which I use often. Does it work? Dunno, but I still use it and it makes me feel better. Sometimes I think it makes a difference. Sometimes I know it’s nonsense.

One absolute certainty though; 2 glasses of red = guaranteed system enhancement regardless of which RCA cable/network/power supply/streaming protocol you may be using🍷

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Capable DAC I think Jim meant

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I may be wrong, but isn’t the minidsp a DAC? I think the D/A conversion is being done in the minidsp not the DAC in the Macintosh. I don’t think the minidsp is MQA compatible.

You don’t seem to have Roons MQA decoder on so your not getting Roons first unfold of the MQA data and the minisDSP is not an MQA DAC to my knowledge so you want get the final rendering stage. Try switching on the MQA core decoder on in Roons device settings it’s in the advanced section and set it to no MQA compatibility

Wow, so I assumed my Minidsp and the Mcintosh were MQA compatible.

I’ll turn off MQA in Room and check.

Thanks

No Mcintosh products (Dacs) will preform the last MQA unfold.

Also known as rendering. Roon only does the MQA decoding, basically decompressing from 44.1 or 48 to 88.2 or 96.