Good to know Rene, thanks
As of the last ROCK update youâll get DSD512 as well â if youâre into that kind of thing.
New to the forum, this is a very interesting thread and apologies in advance for noobish questions. I have a Yamaha A-S2100 with no digital input only analog, interested in streaming TIDAL MQA at the highest quality.
Thinking on this setup
QNAP NAS connected via network to NUC running ROON ROCK connected via USB to Pro-Ject Prebox S2 digital which will be connected to the Yamaha via analog connection (not optical as the yamaha doesnât have optical input)
is this a valid configuration? will I be able to take advantage of the MQA coming from Roon ROCK over to the Project box and then to the amp?
I cannot use the Nuc running ROCK as a streamer correct? I need an additional streamer?
Thank you in advance for the support
The NUC/ROCK will be a streamer without a DAC, and the S2 will be the DAC. From the DAC to the amplifier you have to connect analog (there is no digital left in the chain), so just use normal RCA signal cables.
MQA and everything should work as far as I can tell.
Thank you, so Tidal will run on the ROCK or the ROCK knows how to access Tidal and basically sends a stream to the DAC without actually running Tidal? I am asking as Tidal mentions their MQA feature only works on the Windows App and the ROCK is basically a custom Linux distro
Yes, Roon will access the MQA stream without having to run the TIDAL app. Roon wonât decode MQA but your S2 DAC will. TIDAL app is only needed to decode MQA if the DAC canât do it.
Awesome, I get it now, so just a redirect of the Tidal stream over to the DAC with pass through.
Ok that part is clear.
Having a NAS with music in different formats, ROON will parse this and will stream the files encoded in different formats to the DAC?
From what Iâm seeing this system works flawless.
Any other DAC recommended in the same price range for the task?
Magnus what external power supply you would recommend for the S2 here in the US? found a few threads in which you are discussing the input power.
Thanks again
The iFi iPower 5V works very well and is cheap, personally I use a chinese no-name linear power for about $90, but top be honest the iFi iPower gives similar advantage but is smaller and cheaper.
Thank you
I will update once I get the system running
Happy Easter everyone
Couple of points here:
1- Full MQA decoding requires to steps:
a- First unfold - can be done in software by TIDAL app and Audirvana+
b- Rendering (aka upsampling with MQA-specified filters)
2- Roon will pass on MQA untouched to any DAC that is able to fully decode (ie steps a & b). Nothing special here other than bit-perfect playback
3- Some DACs require step a to be done by the player (Dragonfly, iFi, possibly a few others). Roon will NOT (at this time) provide step a for these DACs. The only way to do this at this point in time is with the TIDAL desktop app (Win & mac) and with Audirvana+ (mac). There might be another app/plugin on Windows, not sure.
4- PS Audio DACs only do step a , they forego step b altogether. Just a design decision. They will work with Roon, but step b will never happen.
I thought their transports did b, not the DACs. Or did that change?
Not sure how this fits in your step a and/or step b but PS Audio DirectStreams (their network card/interface, not the FPGA) decode MQA up to 192kHz. Thatâs beyond the first unfold (your step a?)
My understanding is that PS Audio specifically does not do step b - this is the part that in principle would have to be coded into the FPGA code. This is exactly how dCS implemented it: step a is done in the network card, step b is coded in the FPGA and selected only when an MQA stream is present.
Ok, small subtlety, and again this is my understanding: PS Audio, similarly to dCS, does the first unfold in the network card (this is why only streamers do it, by the way). The code for the first unfold is universal and provided by MQA Ltd and as you say takes you to 2x the rate. I donât know the details, but my understanding of what PS Audio is doing is simply upsampling the unfold output, probably with a filter that looks like an MQA filter, in the network card itself. But this is not step b - and frankly I am very surprised MQA Ltd allowed this.
I would appreciate someone with deeper knowledge to correct the above if incorrect.
My mistake. You are right, they do step a. But my point is they donât do that in their DACs, only their streamers. Or did that change?
Correct. Only streamers as it is done in the network card.
I could use a quote from Luke Skywalker, but perhaps itâs better to link here:
@miguelito thanks for clarifying, I hope the Pro-Ject S2 DAC specifically can do both step 1 and 2 (or A and B) (decoding to 192 and rendering further). The PS DAC needs the BRIDGE that is clear.
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The S2 does full decoding in hardware: step a gets you to 2x the fileâs sample rate, step b applies the upsampling filter specified in the unfolded MQA stream from step a.
The âtarget of 192â is another topic - the upsampling is almost always to the max rate of the DAC chip. What MQA does is select a filter of the set of possible MQA-specified filters and that selection depends on the âtarget sample rateâ.
One thing to look out for is whether the S2 uses standard filters for non-MQA content and only switches to MQA filters when decoding MQA. Some relatively high end DACs (Mytek, Aurender) do NOT switch off the MQA filters, which is shocking. Having said this, for the price of the S2 youâre getting a lot.
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Agreed with everything you said