NAD C658 no MQA in Roon after BluOS3.8.3 update

Support
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MacMini late 2012 2.5 GHz Dual-Core Intel Core i5 4GB ram SSD drive
Cat 6 Ethernet HP switch
NAD C658 ethernet

After the BlueOS update 2 days ago 3.8.3 I cannot play MQA files.
Another post here said to turn off Renderer Only -

  1. In Roon the C658 must be configured as both Decoder and Renderer
  2. Select NO for “Enable MQA Core Decoder”

Which ever way I set it up: Nothing plays.
I get crackles and static - also “Roon lost control of the audio device” appears.
In the Signal path it has 2 more entries - Equalizer +db and Equaliser Bass Management
It completely crashes the NAD and it needs to be power cycled.

Thanks

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I am having the exact same issue

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I have just sent a support request to BluSound as well.
Using the BluOS app to play - an album finished playing.
The NAD crashed and started the crackling noises through the speakers. This was without ROON being involved. the C658 seems to have lots of issues.

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Hello @Katherine_Dennis & @Brian6751,

The NAD C 658 is not Roon Ready certified, and thus we cannot provide support the device at this time. I recommend you reach out to the NAD support team for further assistance.

-John

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+1

Very disappointed. This hardware has been very frustrating!

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I’m having the same issue with NAD M10. To work around this problem I’ve disabled MQA capabilities so Roon takes care for MQA decoding now.

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John,

The C658 works as it’s supposed to using the Bluesound app so I’m sure you know NAD are just going to say it’s a Roon issue. I don’t understand why the integration with the C658, M10 and Roon is so half baked. This is supposed to be a premium experience and it’s not. It looks bad for all parties. I know you can’t say anything. I’m just giving you my opinion.

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So - Roon signal path prior to the 3.8.3 update would just have the C658 as an audio output.
After the update - the signal path includes “Equaliser +dB” and “Equaliser Bass Management” - so BluOS is reporting back to the signal path of Roon - that there is a subwoofer and crossover active (bass) and Dirac (Eq +dB)
Turning OFF all Dirac stops the crashing.

Which is ironic - as the only reason I moved from a Node 2 to the C658 was for Dirac.
Dirac completely changed my sound in my listening space (a long family room) for the better - I suppose I will keep it OFF until the next update… a pity…

NAD and BluOS really should be friends with ROON and sort this out… surely it hampers their brand?
Upcoming and expensive M33 will have the same issues… no doubt.

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Thanks to all above who posted issues with the update. It is a cautionary tale of updating without waiting several days to see what shakes out.

Along with others, I continue to be underwhelmed with responses from ROON and NAD (Lembrook).

Please post any new information to keep this topic open and informative.

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Just an update. I created a ticket with Bluesound and they suggested i tried re-doing Dirac. Tried it. No change. Same issue. No response back from that result yet.

Personally, Dirac is more important to me than MQA so I chose to turn off MQA ability on the C658 so i can still enjoy Dirac

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Still within my return window so I didn’t want to wait to try any new firmware

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I am having this problem on both my M10 and 658. Bluesound staff suggested I try without Dirac. Will be keeping MQA off for the time being as you did. One feature is significantly more important than the other…

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Is it possible to “Roll Back” BluOS version?

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Reply from Bluesound/NAD:

"…Thank you for your reply and the details you provided regarding this new behavior.

I would first like to mention that the NAD C 658 is not a fully certified ROON endpoint and as such we can not guarantee it can be used as a dedicated MQA decoder through the ROON platform. You should have no issue playing the same MQA tracks via Tidal in BluOS with DIRAC enabled. The BluOS Software is capable of running in ROON as a decoder and renderer as the required code is already built for our other BluOS players but we are not yet certified with ROON on the C 658 so we can not guarantee functionality.

More information about our partnership with ROON here: https://roonlabs.com/partners/nad

Please know that I have forwarded these findings to our Quality Assurance team for further investigation and review. In the meantime, I would recommend that you disable MQA support on the NAD C 658 if you wish to use DIRAC since the ROON implementation is not yet supported.

I’m going to mark this ticket as solved for the time being. Should you need anything else, please don’t hesitate to ask. We’re here to help!.."

So it sounds like the certification process is still ongoing. Im personally OK with that as long as its being worked on and will leave MQA disabled on my C658 until it’s working.

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nope. cannot roll back firmware

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I recieved the same answer as you from Nad. I also tried to contact Dirac, but I have not heard anything from them yet.
Very annoying, music without Dirac sounds awful. Maybe a stupid question, but where can I turn off Mqa on c658?

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Its only in Roon. Go to the device settings and choose no MQA ability from the drop down

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I got this answer from Dirac:

Flavio Fellah commented:

Hello,

unfortunately, I don’t know which difference has been introduced by update ver.3.8.3 vs, the previous version which worked as expected and I can’t help.
Please kindly contact NAD itself from here:
https://support.nadelectronics.com/hc/en-us/requests/new

Thanks and best regards

Not very satisfying😒.
I have tried almost everything, turned off Mqa in Roon etc. nothing helps. But if Dirac is turned off Roon works fine, at least in my case.

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Are you sure you have turned MQA OFF? I have made changes and forgot to save many times

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