Oppo UDP 205 with 2014 Mac Mini - No MQA via USB

HowlarNZ · April 19, 2020, 8:40am

There are quite a few topics on this so trying to condense down to understand the issue on my system.

I have a Late 2014 i5 MacMini as my Roon Core connected to my Oppo UDP-205 via the USB DAC. The Oppo is connected to my Marantz SR7011 via analogue interconnects. I am running 2-channel only.

The signal path on my iPad is telling me I am running all ‘purple’ lossless but on my TV screen, I am not seeing MQA appear in the top right hand corner as others have shown and the signal path appears to be limited to LPCM 2.0 48k.

My Mac is also defaulting to 48Hz so appears to be preventing higher signal paths.

I am wanting to check the settings for both my Roon device set-up as well as those within the Oppo and confirm the Late 2014 Mac Mini is capable of allowing the MQA signal to pass to the Oppo via the USB DAC.

Any help on this issue would be very much appreciated!!

Rugby · April 19, 2020, 3:47pm

If you could post screen shots of your signal path, and the device setup and advanced setup pages, so we can see what is happening.

HowlarNZ · April 20, 2020, 1:22am

Here are the screen shots from my Mac Mini set-up.

HowlarNZ · April 20, 2020, 1:23am

This is the signal path produced and TV screen when Info on the Oppo 205 is selected:

HowlarNZ · April 20, 2020, 1:24am

Finally, these are the relevant settings on the Oppo:

Rugby · April 20, 2020, 4:52pm

My first comment is to change your Oppo’s Output volume from Variable to Fixed.

The Signal Path shows that it is leaving Roon and going to your Oppo just fine. You have set Roon to send the file untouched to the Oppo and it is doing that. The Oppo should be doing the full decode, but, it is not.

Is your Oppo’s firmware up to date? You might also take a look at this thread…

Christoph_Seemann · April 20, 2020, 6:46pm

Hi! There is a new firmware for the USB port, which enables it to understand MQA. You need to update the firmware for the USB port seperately. Its not done when updating the Oppo firmware itself.

Chris

HowlarNZ · April 20, 2020, 8:51pm

Thanks Christoph - that was very helpful as my Oppo was running DAC Firmware 0112 So two updates out of date!

HowlarNZ · April 20, 2020, 9:00pm

Thanks for the help with this as I now have the problem sorted.

As per the feedback from Christoph, my USB DAC Firmware was out of date so I followed the instructions from the Oppo website as follows:

Some minor teething issues as my Mac Mini is running macOS Catalina and the downloaded Firmware Upgrading Tool supplied by Oppo does not appear to be supported. Luckily I have an older MacBook Air running macOS High Sierra so after connecting this to the Oppo vis USB, the update worked perfectly from 0112 to 0115 to 0118.

After this process, glad to report I am now seeing the Oppo decode MQA successfully as per the below pictures:

Thanks for your help here!

Rugby · April 20, 2020, 11:13pm

So your unit did not have the original Oppo MQA update at all? I seem to remember that there was a trade off that Oppo made to get MQA enabled. You might have enabled MQA at the cost of other options.