MQA won’t play when MUSE headphone EQ enabled

Support
1

I have ROCK on a NUC i7, MSB DAC with renderer, Felix Envy phone amp, and Meze Empyrean headphones.

I’ve been using MUSE headphone equalization for some time and its worked great. However, it recently stopped playing MQA files.

If I disable headphone EQ, the file will play, but with muse enabled it will not. As far as I can tell, this is only true for files that are labeled as MQA.

How to fix??

2

Do you mean MQA files won’t play, or the file is reported non-MQA?

Sharing a screenshot of the signal path or any errors you see would be helpful.

3

How do you have the DAC setup in Roon. I think the correct setting under the Roon’s audio device settings should be “Decoder and Renderer”.

4

Following on from @Rugby’s post in Roon ensure that the MQA Core Decoder is also enabled.

Roon needs to perform the decoding (and preserve MQA signalling) prior to any DSP processing.

If you’re still having issues please post A screenshot of Roon’s signal path page.

5

With MUSE enabled, no file labeled ‘MQA’ will play. Upon Disabling, those files will play. DAC is set up properly. I even deleted it and reconfigured.
Also reinstalled Roon on the rock.
There is no signal path to grab a screen shot of…
What happens is when I press play, the ‘Select Audio Zone’ box briefly appears then goes away and file does not play. I can press play many times and the same thing happens. Disable muse and it plays.

6

Hi @jstrouth,

Thanks for the update and extra information…

I don’t think the community will be able to solve this issue, thus I recommend seeking assistance from Roon technical support.

To equip the Roon Technical Support team to assist you directly, please follow this link to provide the details of your case to Technical Support: Technical Support Request

Respond to the prompts there to ensure that you’ve performed basic troubleshooting and to ensure Technical Support has the full details necessary to expedite Technical Support’s investigation into the case.

Your responses will auto-generate a Community thread in the appropriate section.

Because this Community thread will be in a public forum, please do not include any personal information, such as your email address, postal address or telephone number in your submission. Thank you.

7

Tried that but the questions don’t allow specific answers and in the end just tells me to contact device manufacturer…won’t do anything about further support. Not a good feeling that I cannot get help.

8

Let me tag @support to review this workflow in TypeForm.

Totally, I’m moving this topic over to Support for @support’s attention.

9

Hey @jstrouth,

We’d be happy to take a closer look!

Can you please use the directions found here and send over a set of logs to our File Uploader? Once logs have been uploaded, please let us know so that we can check the server for your files, thanks!

2 Likes
10

Logs uploaded

Thanks!

11

Thanks for sending those over @jstrouth!

We’re seeing an interesting chain of events before playback breaks. Overall, the MQA path is negotiated correctly; the problem is a RAAT endpoint crash/disconnect triggered right after signal-path reporting.

These lines show proper MQA Core unfold by the Roon Core and correct handoff to the DAC:

StreamFormat(... samplerate=88200 ... mqa_core=44100)
sample_subtype":"mqa_core","mqa_original_sample_rate":44100

That means:

  • Source: TIDAL 16/44.1 MQA
  • Roon performed MQA Core Decode (1st unfold) → 24/88.2
  • DAC is receiving 24/88.2 MQA Core PCM, exactly as expected
So we’re not seeing a format mismatch here, and the DAC itself sees the MQA signal: 
GOT {"message":{"signal_path":[
 {"sub_type":"renderer","original_sample_rate":"44100","type":"mqa","light_state":"off","quality":"enhanced"},
 {"method":"analog","quality":"lossless","type":"output"}

But after that:

OnDisconnected: BeginRead read count is 0

It appears that the RAAT socket was closed by the DAC side, not necessarily Roon.

A few good next troubleshooting steps:

  1. Can you check the firmware version of the DAC? See if any updates are available, and if not, see if reinstalling the latest version is an option.
  2. Test using a different cable if available

We have a ticket in with our development team for further investigation as well. We’ll be monitoring for you reply, and should have more information to share on our end as well - although response times will likely be a bit slower over the holiday period. You have my apologies for this, and thank you for your ongoing patience here!

1 Like
12

Thanks for looking at this.
I wondered also if the Dac was at fault, but the Dac will play the MQA file if I disable headphone eq.
I can toggle back and forth, enable, disable - and the file will not play then play.
Have you seen in the logs where I disable hp eq? I would wonder what the Dac sees differently when trying to play a MQA file with hp eq enabled vs disabled.

14

Good day @jstrouth !

You’re welcome.

We will get back to you and let you know once the problem is solved or Root cause is confirmed

Regards.

15

This topic was automatically closed 7 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.

17

Thanks for reopening. I’d like to see this fixed. I didn’t realize how many Tidal files were solely MQA until this started…

18

Is support still on this issue? I ask having heard nothing in a couple weeks which is a bit disappointing

19

What’s up with this issue?

20

Hi @jstrouth,

It’s worth noting that MQA is very sensitive to DSP.

MQA playback typically expects a bit-perfect stream (or at least a very specific PCM format) up until the point of decoding/rendering.

When you enable headphone EQ, the player almost certainly:

  • Inserts a DSP stage
  • Converts the stream to a different internal format (often float)
  • Possibly changes sample rate, bit depth, or timing
Once that happens:
  • The stream is no longer MQA-compliant
  • The DAC may reject it, fail to lock, or the software may refuse to start playback
That would explain why:
  • EQ OFF → MQA plays
  • EQ ON → playback fails
  • Toggling EQ immediately flips behavior without restarting
That toggle behavior is a huge clue that this is software-path related, not hardware failure. Things you can test on your end:
  • Try non-MQA files with HP EQ enabled → do they play?
  • Try forcing:
    • PCM only
    • No MQA decoding
  • Check whether EQ causes:
    • Sample-rate conversion
    • Bit-depth changes

Thank you!

21

with hp eq is enabled.
All
files would play - including MQA - until a few days beforeI started this thread. So something appears to have changed in Roon.
So to me, the question I posed previously still applies…