Marantz NR1506 A/V receiver decoding MQA?

Audio Gear Talk
1

How does one know if your A/V receiver’s DAC is actually correctly rendering the MQA files? I have a ROCK NUC running directly into my Marantz NR1506 A/V receiver set as a “renderer only” so ROON is doing the first unfold. The Marantz NR1506 is not listed as ROON-Ready but it works/sounds fine (I used the Marantz NR1508 as the device). Still, I want to know if the MQA is being successfully rendered/finished by my A/V receiver. In fact, I’ve been looking for an answer to this and I’m having trouble finding any A/V receivers advertising that they can render MQA files - plenty of DACs but no A/V receivers - am I asking the wrong questions here?

2

Your amp probably doesn’t do MQA rendering. Some onkyo av receivers do.

3

Thanks - I’m having trouble finding any multi-channel A/V receivers that render MQA - there are 2-channel ones that tout it, but that’s it. I’ll keep looking…

4

Keep in mind that will probably need a streamer sitting between the network and it as it only has Airplay and Chromecast.

6

Sorry, didn’t catch that you were going to use HDMI straight into the Receiver, nevermind my earlier post.

7

Thanks - any insight/recommendations are appreciated!

8

So this NAD T 758 V3i mentions MQA

But it says this - “ With full support for High Res Audio formats like MQA (Master Quality Authenticated) included in the BluOS® Player, the T 758 V3i is unique. ”

And this “ Master Quality Authenticated (MQA) is a revolutionary end-to-end technology built into every BluOS Enabled amplifier to capture and deliver MQA music to your speakers in the purest quality. All BluOS Enabled players and systems include a powerful decoder and audio renderer for the millions of the MQA encoded songs, The MQA logo shown in the BluOS app indicates that the unit is decoding and playing an MQA stream or file, and lets you know that you are hearing exactly what the artist recorded and approved in the studio.”

That doesn’t mean my Roon/Tidal MQA files via my NUC into the NAD T 758 V3i via HDMI won’t be MQA-rendered, does it? Does the fact that they wouldn’t be streaming wirelessly to the receiver make some sort of difference?

9

I am not sure. It sounds like a good question for NAD tech support.

To me, it sounds like you have to use the bluos player, nothing about Roon…

1 Like
10

Thanks for the reply and advice…

11

All brands that have at least one device that support mqa is listed here,

https://www.mqa.co.uk/playback-devices

As far I can see there are 13 brands that have an integrated amplifier with mqa support

12

Thanks for the information!

13

My main issue is looking for an A/V multi-channel receiver that renders MQA, and not just a 2-channel/stereo receiver that renders MQA…

14

Why don’t you use a separate streamer in between to render and hook that one to an av receiver?

15

I have surround sound files in Roon and they have to be sent via HDMI to the receiver (unless I’m missing something- always a possibility). Having an A/V surround receiver that can render MQA via Tidal/Roon seems like it would solve this for me and let me have both.