MQA no longer detected after upgrade to Catalina

Connection with external Audio Devices USB DAC
1

I am a fairly new user of Audirvana. I use a NAD 3045 USB based dac/amp/pre-amp, which supports MQA. It used to be able to detect that MQA was fully supported - and could provide details on both what quality the recording from TIDAL had, while also showing the output quality. The amp would also state it was MQA.

After I upgraded to Catalina, this stopped working. It can play MQA songs, but output is only 24/88.2 or a bit higher, but not at the quality of the songs. If I then force it to use the amp as a MQA decoder, if it cannot detect MQA, it does do the playback at 24/48 - where the song is actually 24/192 (e.g. Lorde, Heione album).

I recently tried updating to the latest version, but this did not change anything.

Output in the TIDAL app works like previously - but it doesn’t show the same level of details on song quality and output quality…

2

Just updated to the latest version - My NAD 3045 is still not detected as MQA device. This used to work prior to my upgrade to Catalina. Any tips on how to get this resolved?

3

Yet another update. But my amp is still not detected as being MQA capable, which was the case prior to upgrading to Catalina. Guess there is no way to report this?

4

Check if the volume control is disabled in Audirvana.

5

Hello @larsfalch,

Can you send me a copy of the “Debug Info” while your NAD 3045 is connected to your DAC? You can get it in Audirvana Settings>General>Debug Info

Note: By clicking on the Debug Info Audirvana button automatically copies all its content, all you have to do is paste it in response to this message

6

Software volume control is disabled. And the debug info is PM’ed to you.

7

Hello @larsfalch,

We checked you debug info and we don’t see any problem regarding your MQA setup. As you said earlier Audirvana detected your MQA capability before Catalina, you should probably ask NAD if they have a firmware update for your DAC since they maybe have a compatibility issue with Catalina.

8

I’ll try that. Thanks.

9

This is the feedback from NAD - I have shared your reply above back to them. Guess this makes me pretty much stuck:

Thank you for contacting the NAD Electronics Support Center regarding your D3045 and Audirvana app that has stopped working with MacOS Catalina.
As the Audirvana app stopped working with MacOS Catalina, Audirvana’s developer needs to work with Apple on a fix.
I am copying our development team in case there is something we can do to resolve this issue, but it’s likely in Audirvana’s court.

10

My MQA isn’t even recognized with Mojave for library items ripped from MQA CDs. The same files are recognized with other software programs such as Decibel and MC25. Only MQA download or streamed files are recognized with Audirvana 3.5.

11

Hello @hankaberle,

If MQA is not recognized you can change the extension of your file in .mq or change in the metadata of your file that the encoder start with MQAEncode.

12

This is quite different from my original issue here. My challenge is with the amp no longer being detected as being MQA capable. It does seem to play MQA streams though.

13

Just to follow-up on my own issue here. With the latest version of Audirvana (3.5.34) this is now solved. My device is fully detected as being MQA capable and details on actual output is shown again.

1 Like