Best MQA config in Roon USB DAC

Hi guys!

Due the new update some new features like MQA decoder?
Which will the best config?

MQA capabilities … decoder and render?
When I select that, the streaming goes to 44, but when I go to no MQA support it goes to 88.2.

MQA is not new in this release.
It might help if you said what device you are using.

Seems like if you have a MQA DAC you would want to set it as decoder and renderer and turn off core decoder.

If you use DSP in Roon, you should set Roon MQA Core Decode to ON and yoru DAC to Renderer.

If you don’t use DSP in Roon set Core Decode to OFF and your DAC to Decoder & Renderer.

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Hi,

Whilst the Core Decoder could be switched off, for this use case, there is no need to as Roon will intelligently utilise it or not depended on whether DSP is in use or not.

My recommendation, to most people, would be to leave it on and just Zone’s MQA capabilities as required to match the DAC in use.

I googled “Anthem MQA” and it does not seem to be a MQA DAC.

I may be mistaken, but I don’t think discussing settings for a MQA DAC is relevant / useful to the OP’s case with a non-MQA DAC.

If the OP is not using a MQA DAC, he should use whatever setting that gives him 88.2kHz output for this MQA track, i.e. Core Decoder ON, with MQA Capabilities set to Renderer Only or No MQA Support.

I presumed it did MQA. My bad :slight_smile:

Cheers Peter.

Setting it to decoder and renderer then Roon is under the impression your DAC is capable of decoding and rendering MQA so it sends the stream to the DAC unaltered for it to decode and render. You DAC isn’t MQA capable. If you set it to no MQA and have Roons core decoder on it will decode to the first stage which is 88.2 or 96 dependant on the file. If you have at as renderer only then Roon will decode and send to DAC to finish the MQA process. I suggest you read up on how MQA works.

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Yeah, the way the question was asked suggested that the user had an mqa dac. Sorry for the interruption, carry on.

If the DAC doesn’t do MQA turning on core decoding and setting to rendering will have the same end result as turning on core decoding and setting to no MQA. The only difference is the presence of the MQA signalling which will get ignored by a DAC that doesn’t do MQA.

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