So when I play Tidal CD versions it display the Purple light next to the song title. If I play a Tidal Master I get the Blue light next to the song title with the “MQA Full Decoder” appearing after the E2 in the signal path. So far so good.
But, when I switch to a CD that I ripped on my local drive Roon displays the CD correctly as a FLAC 16/44 in the Signal Path but then after the E2 is still displays “MQA Full Decoder” and gives me the Blue Enhanced light!!! I should not get that with a CD file that I ripped.I should be seeing the Purple light. Why am i seeing MQA in the path of a non MQA file?
What am I doing wrong? Is it because I’m not letting the song finish and switching midway through the song? I This never happened before the 1.5 update. All devices have the latest update installed and DSP is not being used.
I’ve tried everything but it seem like the MQA signal display is stuck. This is very frustrating, HELP!
Additional info: The lights on the Explorer2 seem to be working correctly. It’s only the signal path and lights in the Roon software that are getting stuck on MQA studio.
Something is not right and I’m starting to lose patience with this as I’ve spent a couple of nights messing around with this to try and figure out what’s going on. Up until now I’ve been happy with Roon but this is unacceptable and does not inspire confidence that I am getting the proper signal/output. Someone please tell me what changed in version 1.5 that is causing this. How can I get it working properly again?
The E2 is the only MQA capable DAC I have so it is the only one where this issue occurs. The other DAC is non-MQA and it looks like that is working fine. It defaulted to “No MQA Support” and the software now seems to decode MQA files because I can see the songs play at a higher bit rate (according to a light on my non MQA device).
So again, my problem is when the E2 decodes and renders an MQA file, “Enhanced” & “MQA Full Decoder” seem to get stuck regardless of what file type I play afterwards.
I’m using a Mac and the firmware on the E2 seems to be current, it’s version v1717 V1.2. Looks like Meridian hasn’t made a change since 2016.
Here’s an interesting thing I noticed. If I play another MQA file the Roon light next to the track title briefly switches back to Purple and then to Blue to denote the Enhanced path. But if I play a non-MQA file whether it’s a ripped CD or a Tidal FLAC the Roon light never turns Purple (not even briefly), it remains Blue at all times.
Let me know what I can try next. This is really bugging me.
I can replicate this behaviour with either an Explorer 2 and a Prime connected to my MacBook Pro.
I think it is cosmetic, as MQA decoding is obviously not taking place in the DAC when playing regular FLAC. Looks like the Meridian DACs getting stuck reporting MQA over USB HID.
Update: I can also replicate this on a Sparky/USBridge (with libusb-1.0 installed, so the entire path is visible):
Thank you for the detailed reports. I’m going to forward this information to the Dev team, I’ll be sure to update this thread when I get some feedback.
The development team was able to reproduce this behavior in house. They are currently investigating the cause of the issue. We don’t have a timeline for a fix just yet. I’ll be sure to keep you updated.
