I am a bit new to this and would love some help. Thanks in advance.
I with roon and Tidal, can I stream MQA directly from iPhone (wirelessly) to my MQA DAC (OPPO UPD-205) if I have a Mac set up as a roon node (but only connected to the OPPO indirectly via Ethernet?
Or, do I actually have to have roon node via USB directly into the DAC.
Secondly, after I eventually get the MQA tracks into the OPPO, if I have what I think is a superior but non MQA pre amp, what are the most options for getting the signal into the pre-amp. Do full MQA decoding (unfold and render) in the OPPO and go into pre amp via analog or send a digital signal to the pre amp and let the pre amp DAC work on it. Does that even work in the MQA setting?
The only way your Oppo 205 can do MQA is by USB in. After your Oppo does the digital to analog conversion, you need analog out to your pre amp and analog to your amp and speakers.
@Jim_F, do you run USB out from the NUC to USB in on the OPPO? Sorry if this is a dumb question but I haven’t tried USB in to the OPPO yet. I have tried the HDMI. Seems like I recall the OPPO needed a USB firmware update, separate from the standard firmware update, for MQA. Not sure about that.
I have an Oppo 203 that does not do MQA. I have it connected to my Nucleus using HDMI. If I had an Oppo 205, I would use USB so that I could take advantage of the MQA capability of the Oppo 205. And yes, you need the Oppo 205 firmware update that has been out since 6/29/2018.
You can of course connect the Oppo 205 by usb and hdmi and Ethernet and have 3 different zones defined for that one unit. And setup different settings for each connection as appropriate