Tidal HiFi + Cambridge Audio 851N + Audirvana

Legacy versions Streaming Old Versions
1

Hi, All,
I have CA 851N streamer and Tidal subscription. When I plug in MacBook and CA using USB Audio port it plays MQA quality, because internal DAC of MacBook is used. When I stream music remotely from MacBook or iPhone without cable maximum quality is 16/44.1, because CA doesn’t support MQA. However, I was surprised when installing trial version of Audirvana, and streaming music remotely from MacBook the quality shown on CA 851 display was MQA. How comes? What’s a trick? Is it really so?

2

It’s normal, Audirvana does the first unfold (to 24/88.2 or 24/96) both over USB and UPnP.

3

thanks, so then Audirvana provides better quality on air?

4

How do you mean “on air”?

5

I mean using Laptop and playing tracks through wifi directly to CA, not through cable.

6

Yes, both over USB and over network/WiFi.

7

cool, thanks, surprisingly though. Why Tidal doesn’t update software to stream the same way, I wonder

8

They pursue a multi device strategy, where each device streams directly from the internet.

Some streamers implement full MQA decoding as standard.

9

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