Article: The TIDAL HIFI Revolution Starts Today

[sjohnson]

Has anyone tried Tidal through Pure Music 2's Playthrough feature?

 

I tried PM 1.89 but need to do some more troubleshooting. Got it working but am experiencing intermittent pops etc. Went back to using the Tidal mac client with no issues there for me. I tried it on a Yosemite partition so may try Mavericks that is relatively clean still. Don't know if 2.0 would change the results but maybe will try a demo version.

 

Also tried Amarra sQ but that has never worked for me and Sonic Studio has not responded to my support request on that which does not do anything to lessen my growing frustration with them. The issue is sQ intermittently screeches. Amarra and other uses of my Metric Halo DAC do not have issues during playback once you get playback going ie the ongoing problems with loading files into the playlist from my SDXC card file source.

 

Anyway, my initial impression so far (including with PM Playthrough) is that Tidal music sounds good but not on par with playing my ripped files via my sw players. More discussion and digging is needed to see if and how the playback sound quality can be optimized further. Am glad to see from Chris's post that it's showing bit perfect. Really like the selection ie catalog so I'm planning on continuing my subscription.

 

Best,

 

Steve

[sjohnson]

I tried PM 1.89 but need to do some more troubleshooting. Got it working but am experiencing intermittent pops etc. Went back to using the Tidal mac client with no issues there for me. I tried it on a Yosemite partition so may try Mavericks that is relatively clean still. Don't know if 2.0 would change the results but maybe will try a demo version.

 

Also tried Amarra sQ but that has never worked for me and Sonic Studio has not responded to my support request on that which does not do anything to lessen my growing frustration with them. The issue is sQ intermittently screeches. Amarra and other uses of my Metric Halo DAC do not have issues during playback once you get playback going ie the ongoing problems with loading files into the playlist from my SDXC card file source.

 

Anyway, my initial impression so far (including with PM Playthrough) is that Tidal music sounds good but not on par with playing my ripped files via my sw players. More discussion and digging is needed to see if and how the playback sound quality can be optimized further. Am glad to see from Chris's post that it's showing bit perfect. Really like the selection ie catalog so I'm planning on continuing my subscription.

 

Best,

 

Steve

 

 

After getting things more stable with playing through Amarra sQ I found sQ to elevate the sound quality noticeably over the Tidal mac client. I put the sQ player on a fresh Yosemite install and updated DAC drivers to get better stability. Now any infrequent dropouts seem to have been on Tidal's end or with my cable provider. I can't say it sounds quite as good as my own rips played via Amarra Symphony in playlist mode but it's close enough to really enjoy it. That in mind it was really cool to listen to new artists, tracks, and albums with great sound while just hanging out. I'm sure as I find albums I really like I'll occasionally buy the CD so don't see totally giving up on my music collection either.

 

And for now the network connection is via ethernet directly off the cable modem. The old airport extreme's wifi is not up to it.