They used to give timelines. I may be remembering this all wrong but it was before MQA. I could have sworn they gave a deadline for its release but ended coming out close to a year later due to unforeseen complications. So it’s funny all these years later we’re waiting on a fix to move away from MQA. If I’m completely off on this, delete this post.
Edit: looks like MQA came out in version 1.5 in May 2018, four months after 1.4. So think it was supposed to come out in 1.4 but got delayed and everyone was upset. So now for most part we don’t even know what new features are in the pipeline until hits early release. The fact they say they are working on Tidal Max is better than before. Although it’s public knowledge everyone is either working on this or has already released the update. Tidal said 3rd party expected due date was supposed to be by end of 2023 but even my streamer, Naim, looks like they won’t make it. And unlike roon, they won’t even acknowledge they’re working on it.
I was just basing off what I saw posted earlier this year in Naim forum. So assume Tidal Connect update meant most streamers would have it out by end of the year.
I asked Tidal support and here is their answer:
“Currently HiRes FLAC is only available streaming directly from iOS, Android, Desktop or Web. TIDAL Connect, Sonos, and Chromecast support are coming later in 2023. We appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback. We’ll be sure your request gets in the right hands. Your feedback helps us improve and we appreciate your thoughts! ”
My interpretation of this was merely they would provide Tidal Connect support to manufacturers before the end of the year. I never thought of this as a due date for manufacturers or Roon, but I could see how users might interpret it differently.
Yeah read it as we’ll be supporting (offering) Tidal Connect by end of the year. I’m assuming your interpretation was the right one since only a handful of vendors ended up releasing updates.
And things like this are a good reason not to give deadlines that eventually don’t hold. (Maybe they changed their strategy after that 1 year delay I don’t know)
I have Lyngdorf TDAI-1120. After recent software update , it supports now hires tidal connect.
All tracked I checked in TIDAL CONNECT sound better than same tracks in Roon MQA.
My set, have a Matrix Element S streamer on a McIntosh MA8950 with Da2 driving a pair of Dynaudio Confidence. When playing the same playlists via Roon or Tidal Connect, it appears that Tidal Connect sounds much better. I actually think the difference is too big! Understand that Roon is working to implement this, but you will not receive any information about this. Not really customer friendly!
Their staff commented in this thread they are actively working on Tidal update. What else do you need them to do at this point? They won’t give exact dates. So now it’s just wait and see. I have a Naim streamer and they won’t even comment that they are working on an update.
I downgraded from hi-fi plus to hi -fi and all the “master” mqa albums in my library play fine in 16/44.1 flac (although there are still a bunch of 16/44.1 mqas hanging around). Hopefully it will still work the same way.
I’ve done the same downgrade, and also had no problems, but in that case the MQA version is still there, you just get a butchered version when you play it. I do think roon will be thinking this through, but reassurance before the upgrade comes out would be good.
There are many opinions about how it should work - whether any align with Tidal’s wishes (or contractual obligations… ) I guess we’ll find out in time.
Tidal Connect itself now supports Max/HiRes. And I’m actually just waiting for this feature to be added to roon before I can finally slim down to just 1 streaming service (running tidal and qobuz currently).
It’s a shame that we still can’t play HiRes from Tidal through Roon
Temporarily option is to switch under services / Tidal Hires but this will cap it to 44.1k Flac, but this won’t support “max” Flac files 48k, 96k and 192k
Picked up Tidal again as a test. Tidal Connect through my Cambridge Audio CXNv2 results in MQA. But with a recent firmware upgrade my Bluesound Node X plays hi-res FLAC with Tidal Connect.
Cambridge hasn’t updated yet. My guess KEF will also have to upgrade their firmware.
I don’t know)
