Audirvana 3.1

[fbczar]

I find the sound quality of Tidal to be far below CD rips and high res downloads on Audirvana. In fact, sound quality from the Tidal app sounds bette to me than through Audirvana. Since most seem to speak highly of Tidal over Audirvana I wonder if there is a setting I could be missing. Any suggestions?

[AudioDoctor]

Take a screenshot of your settings and upload them and I will let you know if you're missing anything.

[mazuly]

I cannot tell my rips apart form Tidal version unless it is a diferent master.  Maybe you have not setup Tidal for HiFi and are streaming compressed files.

 

Check setting in streaming tab to make sure Tidal is set to HiFi/Master setting.

 

 

[fbczar]

1 hour ago, mazuly said:

I cannot tell my rips apart form Tidal version unless it is a diferent master.  Maybe you have not setup Tidal for HiFi and are streaming compressed files.

 

Check setting in streaming tab to make sure Tidal is set to HiFi/Master setting.

 

 

I have Tidal Set to lossless master HiFi. Thanks for the suggestion.

[fbczar]

1 hour ago, mazuly said:

I cannot tell my rips apart form Tidal version unless it is a diferent master.  Maybe you have not setup Tidal for HiFi and are streaming compressed files.

 

Check setting in streaming tab to make sure Tidal is set to HiFi/Master setting.

 

 

Which page should I send. I have Tidal set to lossless master and I am using the default SoX setting. I cannot find any other setting related specifically to Tidal. I have a 100MBPS internet connection so That is not a problem. Thanks for your help.

[mazuly]

When playing Tidal through A+ do you see Flac 16/44.1 kHz Stereo on the top right side corner of the screen?

 

Another is to make sure you have chosen the right DAC in the Audio System tab.

 

if you do then I am not sure what the issue is since you are getting Flac lossless file which should be the same as what you have on the computer hard drive.

[mazuly]

Here are my setting screen shots:

[AudioDoctor]

A couple quick ideas.  Have you tried integer mode 2?

have you tried upsampling to only power of 2 rather than DSD to see if there is a change, either good or bad?

 

Have you set your volume to DAC only and ensured it is up to 0.0db in Audirvana and all the way up on your Mac?

 

and if you have it enabled, disable replay volume normalization

 

what version of OSX are you on, or did you replace the kext file?

 

edit: Tidal took a huge leap up in sound quality for me with the release of Sox and 3.2.  I am on 10.13.3 beta version 2, no kext replacement.

[vicento]

14 hours ago, rruffin said:

Anyone using Audirvana with a DigiOne (Raspberry Pi) with Volumio? Having some trouble controlling the volume level with Audirvanna - Volumio keep taking over.

Hi, I use a Digione with DietPi operating system, no problem with the volume controler.

[vicento]

8 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

A couple quick ideas.  Have you tried integer mode 2?

have you tried upsampling to only power of 2 rather than DSD to see if there is a change, either good or bad?

 

Have you set your volume to DAC only and ensured it is up to 0.0db in Audirvana and all the way up on your Mac?

 

and if you have it enabled, disable replay volume normalization

 

what version of OSX are you on, or did you replace the kext file?

 

edit: Tidal took a huge leap up in sound quality for me with the release of Sox and 3.2.  I am on 10.13.3 beta version 2, no kext replacement.

Do you think SOX is the reason of this sound upgrade ?

[elcorso]

3 hours ago, vicento said:

Do you think SOX is the reason of this sound upgrade ?

 

I like Izotope more, I'm not in Tidal, etc., with a Mac Pro (where there may be less processor overload problems). But as always, everything is a matter of taste.

 

Roch

[mazuly]

13 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

A couple quick ideas.  Have you tried integer mode 2?

have you tried upsampling to only power of 2 rather than DSD to see if there is a change, either good or bad?

 

Have you set your volume to DAC only and ensured it is up to 0.0db in Audirvana and all the way up on your Mac?

 

and if you have it enabled, disable replay volume normalization

 

what version of OSX are you on, or did you replace the kext file?

 

edit: Tidal took a huge leap up in sound quality for me with the release of Sox and 3.2.  I am on 10.13.3 beta version 2, no kext replacement.

Hi AudioDoctor

My A+ sounds great with Tidal in my setting.

I sent the pictures for fbczar.

[JoeWhip]

I was wondering for those that have gone from some variant of 3.1, such as my current 3.1.4, to 3.2, what increase in SQ, if any, are you hearing. Thanks.

[Andrey]

6 hours ago, vicento said:

Do you think SOX is the reason of this sound upgrade ?

The main value to the Sox, built-in noise reduction filters.
Thus, bad recordings sound much better in SoX than in iZotope, while maintaining the same level of detail.
On very few recordings, I prefer the deliberate detail iZotope.

[fbczar]

15 hours ago, AudioDoctor said:

A couple quick ideas.  Have you tried integer mode 2?

have you tried upsampling to only power of 2 rather than DSD to see if there is a change, either good or bad?

 

Have you set your volume to DAC only and ensured it is up to 0.0db in Audirvana and all the way up on your Mac?

 

and if you have it enabled, disable replay volume normalization

 

what version of OSX are you on, or did you replace the kext file?

 

edit: Tidal took a huge leap up in sound quality for me with the release of Sox and 3.2.  I am on 10.13.3 beta version 2, no kext replacement.

I use El Capitan 10.11.5. I always have used power of 2 rather than DSD. Volume is set to DAC only. High Res files and CD rips sound incredible. TIdal is anemic in comparison. The sound is much more recessed less dynamic. And the noise floor is clearly higher in Tidal. I have the problem in SoX and IZotope. I really appreciate the advice. 

[fbczar]

1 hour ago, JoeWhip said:

I was wondering for those that have gone from some variant of 3.1, such as my current 3.1.4, to 3.2, what increase in SQ, if any, are you hearing. Thanks.

On my system midrange/ vocals sound cleaner in SoX, but the soundstage is not as wide and does not have as much depth. However, I have not attempted to tweak the SoX default settings.

[mazuly]

1 hour ago, fbczar said:

I use El Capitan 10.11.5. I always have used power of 2 rather than DSD. Volume is set to DAC only. High Res files and CD rips sound incredible. TIdal is anemic in comparison. The sound is much more recessed less dynamic. And the noise floor is clearly higher in Tidal. I have the problem in SoX and IZotope. I really appreciate the advice. 

Are you streaming through lan or WiFi?

Maybe change the internet connection (say from lan to WiFi) to see if anything changes.

 

 

[fbczar]

17 minutes ago, mazuly said:

Are you streaming through lan or WiFi?

Maybe change the internet connection (say from lan to WiFi) to see if anything changes.

 

 

I use an Ethernet connection from Apple Extreme router to Netgear switch to my iMac. I plan to switch from CAT 5e to CAT 7 this week. CAT 7 has better  shielding so it can't hurt. Tidal just sounds hazy compared to my other sources over my main system. 

[AudioDoctor]

9 hours ago, vicento said:

Do you think SOX is the reason of this sound upgrade ?

 

 

I have no idea, that's way beyond my area of understanding and expertise.

[AudioDoctor]

3 hours ago, fbczar said:

I use El Capitan 10.11.5. I always have used power of 2 rather than DSD. Volume is set to DAC only. High Res files and CD rips sound incredible. TIdal is anemic in comparison. The sound is much more recessed less dynamic. And the noise floor is clearly higher in Tidal. I have the problem in SoX and IZotope. I really appreciate the advice. 

 

In that case, all I am left with is your connection to the internet and perhaps El Capitan.  I really have no idea.

[rruffin]

On 12/24/2017 at 2:40 AM, vicento said:

Hi, I use a Digione with DietPi operating system, no problem with the volume controler.

Thanks. Guess I will have some DietPi on my plate sometime soon...

[watercourse]

Haven’t done any tweaking of SoX, but using default settings, SoX trails pretty significantly behind iZotope in terms of resolution and soundstage depth.

Also, one of the tracks I listened to yesterday (from Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack) distorted at peaks - during the children’s chorus sections. This track has never distorted before with any playback method on computer.

[watercourse]

36 minutes ago, watercourse said:

Haven’t done any tweaking of SoX, but using default settings, SoX trails pretty significantly behind iZotope in terms of resolution and soundstage depth.

Also, one of the tracks I listened to yesterday (from Charlie Brown Christmas soundtrack) distorted at peaks - during the children’s chorus sections. This track has never distorted before with any playback method on computer.

 

OK, let me backtrack a little. I just read about the default settings a few posts back, and noticed that the SoX "bandwidth" setting is initially set using the "steepness" setting from iZotope - if you did what I did and simply switch to SoX filtering. Once I set bandwidth to 99.5, they are a bit closer. One other bug: SoX on my system crashes when I choose max upsampling, I have to reduce to power of two, then play, then stop playback, and then I can change to max upsampling and not have an error.

 

I need to do some listening now, but both sound pretty good, although iZotope seems more stable.

[Andrey]

1 hour ago, watercourse said:

SoX trails pretty significantly behind iZotope in terms of resolution and soundstage depth.

Sox may be somewhat inferior in width to the scene, but the resolution is definitely not.

Spurious harmonics create the false impression of greater detail, and figures in iZotope.

At Sox the sound is clear, seamless and analog. The details are all in place.

[RunHomeSlow]

1 hour ago, watercourse said:

SoX on my system crashes when I choose max upsampling, I have to reduce to power of two, then play, then stop playback, and then I can change to max upsampling and not have an error.

 

I'm not an expert on that, but Max Upsampling should not be choosen i think... You don't want to play 44.1 at 96 or 192 whatever your DAC can, 44.1 should be upsample at 88.2 or 176 for best results and less calculations or funny results. Power of 2 is best i think to get to your max DAC resolution or the manual max you give to each sample rates in A+ prefs