@brian I tested some MQA tonight in headphones on the Pro-Ject S2 dac, and beside the stutter during transition phase it did drop out of MQA a couple of times in the middle of the tune, back to PCM for a few seconds then up to MQA again. Bit-perfect playback of course (purple star). The tune was Kicks from Lights latest record Skin&Earth, which is on Tidal Masters.
I was streaming the tune, but this does not feel like a streaming issue since there was no full drop-out, just jump down to PCM and back to MQA (music continued playing).
I have not experienced this in Tidal or foobar, and I know John is going to blame Roon, so thought I should check with you if you heard about similar behavior from Brooklyn or Explorer2 users using Roon?
Iāve reproduced this problem with that track in four different configurations.
Roon + Pre-Box S2
Roon + Brooklyn
TIDAL app + Pre-Box S2 in MQA Passthrough mode
TIDAL app + Brooklyn in MQA Passthrough mode
(Itās important when comparing the apps to enable MQA Passthrough mode in TIDAL0-- otherwise youāre not comparing apples to apples since the DAC is operating in a totally different mode)
I could not reproduce this problem at all with the Explorer2 and either app. I saw it in the other 4 configurations well within 10mins of looping the track, but not at all with the Explorer2. To an extent, only positive results are conclusive in this sort of test, so this is interesting as a clue but not proof of anything.
I feel pretty secure concluding that this is not a Roon issue given that it also reproduces with the TIDAL app when the DAC is in the same mode.
Iām not the right person to tell you whether this is a source material problem, or a bug with those 2 DACs. There is definitely an opportunity for that sort of bug since both companies would have received the same materials
If it reproduced on the Explorer2, Iād have been pretty conclusively in the source material camp. Ultimately, someone at MQA should be making that distinction, since they would have certified all of the devices + provided resources to the studio doing the production work.
Cheers for the investigation, I think the Brooklyn DAC also has the XMOS USB interface, which is likely where the MQA library does its magic (as in the S2), so maybe this is a MQA problem and not a DAC problem? That tune was just one of the tunes where I heard the glitch, so it seems unlikely its an error in the source.
Either that, or this is one of those rare cases where different HW/SW produce the same bug.
I tried the test with some other songs and didnāt get it. Could be something specific to the mastering of that song that triggers the bug. Not sure. I doubt itās two independently implemented bugs that are totally unrelatedāthese devices have too much in common for that.
I was not implying that this is the only affected material, just that material seems to be a factor.
I canāt make it 10 minutes playing that song without hitting the bug, but Iāve listened to whole albums of other stuff without encountering it. Thatās why I am thinking the content plays into it somehow.
I tried the same track last night. At various times the audio drops volume and the MQA light goes out. About 2 seconds later it comes back. At no stage do I lose audio. Today playing straight jacket by theory of a dead man same thing happened.
This seems to be fixed in the latest release of Roon, beside the small issue with MQA (which I donāt use anyway), the DAC seems to work perfectly with Roon now from an SQ standpoint. And with the iFi iPower I just bought, it sounds awesome.
I seem to recall John saying that the DAC supports native DSD, which I canāt select in Roon, and DSD512 is unavailable. These are probably driver issues though, and not a big deal anyway.
No, but āleft channelā on the pink forum has them up somewhere, send him a message to get the download link. Eventually I guess they will be available on the DAC pro-ject page as well.
James_I
(The truth is out there but not necessarily here)
138
Thanks Slim! That is a bummer but the ebay units are not unreasonably priced. My concern is that I would not want to get one of the āearly unitsā that carry the rumor of not having all the parts that were specified by the engineer, or any of the problematic firmware that has been causing the noise/pops issue. I havenāt followed that closely but my assumption was that purchasing through an authorized dealer in the US would have less of a chance of that happening, versus some dude in Germany or Italy where I cannot verify what versions they haveā¦
James_I
(The truth is out there but not necessarily here)
142
Pardon me. Wasnāt intended to indicate lack of trust in Italians or Germans, more that I am distant enough from the US that my remedies would be limited if I was sent a lemon, and there was some thought in my mind that the first of these units were lemons. That is apparently not the case!
I actually love Italy and Italians. Indeed I spent 2 months with my two young children in Italy this summer, and at some point I would like to do the same in Germany.
