Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion MQA - Related technology, products and music Tidal dumping MQA files

It's interesting because today, just now, I tried The Pineapple Thief, ‘It leads to this’ (48k/24bit) again and it plays fine. The G65 now says it's PCM and not AC3 like it did earlier. The Norah Jones album is now showing as unavailable for me... hmmm
I'm wondering if the music is sometimes packaged incorrectly somewhere along the way (Tidal or more likely Roon).

I sent in a support request to Roon for this issue and while they responded initially they have now ignored me for a month.
I will not be renewing.
They have completely lost the plot.

You do realise that it is changes that Tidal have made don't you ?

While I'm dropping Tidal in favor of Qobuz I'll be continuing my annual subscription to Roon.

I was referring to the technical playback issue I described in earlier posts in this thread.
So not sure what I'm supposed to realise?

Cynical Retrospective Comment

The involved evolving market providers have had your money but can no longer support your originally promoted choice .

We Meridian owners and invested users of MQA/Roon/Tidal are and never have been very important in the now retrograde evolutionary grand scheme of the future.

Our enjoyment was great while it lasted but hey ho that's life in all respects.

Hector

I found MQA to sound much better than FLAC on my SE system.
Too bad, it was good while it lasted. Thanks, Tidal.

I noticed it when I was listening to something that didn't sound right, I saw the 218 was downsampling a 192 FLAC file.

Same here, I'm really bummed about it.
I wrote to Tidal but haven't heard anything yet.
Unfortunately we will have to live with it….

This my general impression too, and I am not aware of any available method to make a meaningful comparison. For instance is it possible to purchase The Beatles Red and Blue albums MQA versions?

Some people claim that Qobuz files are better quality than those files from Tidal. That’s not my experience on recently subscribing to both. So, we are stuck between choosing one or the other, without the MQA differentiation.

Has anyone else noticed that the resolution documentation on albums Tidal => Roon => Meridian are frequently incorrect? I.e., an album labeled MQA in Roon on our tablet shows as PCM on our 818 when played (often at 44 or 48 kHz sample rate). Worse are the albums accurately labeled as mixed format where one track may play as high resolution PCM and others as MQA. Each transition causes a relay in the 818 to open/close causing an audible click. Very distracting.

John

If you aren't using the Analogue outputs from the 818v3 at all (So no headphone amp connected for example) you can set the relays to remain in their Analogue Output Muted state.
Under the flap on the 818 use < and > to navigate to 'Relay Mute Normal'
Then use v and ^ to select 'Relay Mute Silent'
This will stop the relay clicking, and disable the analogue outputs.
Rick