This post will be simply about the SQ of Tidal's Master streams. Other considerations (music library available, usability, etc.,...) will follow in future posts . A quick bit of backgroud: I use a Windows 10 PC with a nice Xonar Essence STX soubdcard. Using this setup, usually with JRiver Media Centre, I have long been of the opinion that music sounds best using ASIO (the audio protocol that bi-passes Windows).
Immediately after Tidal's desktop app installation, and with things unfiddled, things sounded OK. The hi-res "Hifi/Master" stream (96/24) sounded better than the standard "High" stream (44.1/16) (one can switch between the two in Tidal's settings).
However, on my machine, using the Tidal desktop app playing its music inside Windows 10, there is some of the splashy-mushiness that can annoy me about "sub-optimal" digital replay. To my ears, and on my system, using ASIO for higher res generally eliminates or greatly reduces this. On my usual player, JRiver MC, one is able to use the JRiver settings to get an ASIO path from the player direct to the soundcard. The Tidal app's settings are far more rudimentary. One cannot switch between driver protocols (ASIO, WASAPI, etc.,...). However, one can switch between different audio devices (e.g. between the soundcard and the HDMI output on the PC).
So, I resorted to the freely downloadable "Hifi-cable and ASIO-bridge" combined apps to get an ASIO feed going from TIDAL to the soundcard. Once installed, the "Hifi-cable" app presents itself as an audio device in Windows' sound settings options (including those in the Tidal settings). Once selected, the "Hifi-cable" uses the "ASIO bridge" to send an ASIO feed direct to the soundcard. Getting things to work smoothly (without stuttering or drop-outs) took some fiddling (mainly of the soundcard's ASIO settings), but now things are nearly going nicely.
The resulting sound is exceeding my expectations. I shall have to listen more to see how the hi-res streams on Tidal compare with the 96/24 files that I have downloaded from Quobuz. First thoughts are that they are certainly in the same ball-park. Hopefully, Tidal may have some of the same ones, and I shall be able to make direct comparisons. I haven't looked properly through the Tidal Masters catalogue yet.
That's a shame Tidal cannot select ASIO directly though you seem to have found a good work around. I must try someday...
You could use Wasapi though?
Yeah. Shame. I've been a bit spoiled by JRiver's comprehensive settings options! To be honest, I'm not sure how all of this works. I don't really understand to what extent the sound card determines what's happening and to what extent does the media player. Not sure about WASAPI. How would this be selected? Would it need to be? Is it the default for Windows apps? In JRiver, WASAPI sounds good, but I still believe that I prefer ASIO.
I was thinking on the basis that Wasapi straight to the PCIe card might be better than ASIO via the extra virtual hifi cable and asio bridge.
I too prefer ASIO with my DAC.
I'd be very willing to try. There's a logic to what you say. But there's no way I can see in the Tidal app of selecting protocols. (Only sound devices.) I read some stuff on the internet about doing it (both WASAPI and ASIO) but i couldn't square what they were writing (about "shared" and "exclusive" modes) with what I was seeing on my machine. Maybe those posters were streaming Tidal from a browser, or had a particular sound card, or something...
It's been ages since I played with jriver as I only use foobar. However, if you have ASIO etc set up on your PC then you should be able select the device with appropriate suffixes, e.g. Asus stx/ASIO, Asus stx/wasapi etc. With foobar these are set up via foobar itself. I'm not back on the PC until Monday evening so can't show you what I mean until then.
It's been ages since I played with jriver as I only use foobar. However, if you have ASIO etc set up on your PC then you should be able select the device with appropriate suffixes, e.g. Asus stx/ASIO, Asus stx/wasapi etc. With foobar these are set up via foobar.
Yeah. This is kind of what I was alluding to above (that the protocol is bound up with the audio device). Maybe I messed up when listening initially. :-D Chances are, there was an ASIO option on the device menu already! I'll take a look again in the AM.
...Nope. I don't think so. I wasn't as stupid as I feared!
Selecting the Asus sound card in Tidal settings does not appear to deliver ASIO (in the way that it does in JRiver). I reach this conclusion by virtue of the facts that: 1. When the ASIO protocol is in operation, the settings in the sound card's ASIO control panel are greyed out. With the ASUS sound card selected in Tidal, the card's ASIO settings remain adjustable. 2. With ASUS sound card selected in Tidal, changing levels for the sound card in Windows sound settings has an effect on the sound. With ASIO operating, it does not (as would be expected).
I haven't been able listen properly at this early hour, but I think even at low levels and through my porridge munching, Tidal sounded better through the ASIO bridge. I'll be able to check this later.
CJ, which protocol do you think Tidal uses with sound card selected? WASAPI? Direct sound?
I suspect it would default to kernel streaming if not changed in a setting somewhere. Can you not select ASIO in Jriver as output and Tidal as input (or Jriver as playback within Tidal).
At present I have no need for Tidal as I'm happy with Spotify free. I only use it the same way as youtube to search for new things or try out recommendations. If I had "premium" I would be able to copy the URLs from Spotify playlists, albums, tracks or even first 20 results of a search and drop them in them in as a new location for foobar to play from. Maybe this is possible for Tidal and Jriver?
I suspect it would default to kernel streaming if not changed in a setting somewhere. Can you not select ASIO in Jriver as output and Tidal as input (or Jriver as playback within Tidal).
At present I have no need for Tidal as I'm happy with Spotify free. I only use it the same way as youtube to search for new things or try out recommendations. If I had "premium" I would be able to copy the URLs from Spotify playlists, albums, tracks or even first 20 results of a search and drop them in them in as a new location for foobar to play from. Maybe this is possible for Tidal and Jriver?
I think you may be onto something there. Yesterday I read elsewhere about going through JRiver, but couldn't immediately understand it, so went for the ASIO bridge version. Your explanation is more understandable to me than anything I've read about it elsewhere. I'll give it a go over the next couple of days. Thank you. There may be CPU issues for my ageing media PC with both Tidal and JRiver running (see next post...). We'll see.
OK. So SQ is up to scratch with the ASIO bridge running (will try CJ's JRiver solution soon). Next thing to work out was how to eliminate the regular (about once a track) trop outs (for a few seconds). Very important to stress that this is not an issue with Tidal itself. It is my ageing mother board, or more specifically the CPU, that is (alomst) underpowered. And I suspected this from the off. My PC sounds lovely, but in recent years has begun to sometimes struggle with coplicated / recent software (though it hasn't struggled this much before). Sure enough Task Manager revealed the CPU to be banging up against 100% most of the time with Tidal streaming. On inspection, there are about 5 or 6 separate Tidal processing running. A couple of them soak up about 25% CPU each! (The "Tidal player" itself is more like 8%), but (it seemed) they all need to run to keep things ticking along. Interestingly when the Tidal app is minimised all but the Tidal Player processes disappear to 0 CPU use, bringing the overall usage right down. A possible work around I thought? Apparently not, as when minimised, Tidal stops playing at the end of the current track. Fortunately I noticed another process, further down the list, "Windows Module Installer Worker" (something to do with Windows update, I think) running constantly and taking up 20% of the CPU. I think there must have been something wrong, as after running various autmoatic remedial checks, the troublesome process disappeared from the process list. This brought things down to sustainable levels. I also tried to alter CPU Priorities for relevant processes (Tidal and ASIO bridge thingie) in the Task Manager (e.g. making "Tidal Player" a "High priority"). This helped further, but unfortunately the altered priority values are lost and return to defaults when the app is restarted or the PC shut down. A very useful little programme called Prio adds a "Save" function to priorities in Task Manager, and this excited me momentarily, BUT despite Prio "installing", it turned out to be not compatible with Windows 10. Grrrr. Fortunately, even without this, the CPU is coping with priorities returned to defaults. No drop outs. So, we continue to progress...
I might even start talking about the music in a bit... :-D And, stop laughing, Apple users.
I installed Kodi, and the Tidal audiophile add-on, but it simply won't log on to my Tidal account. Which is odd, as in the standard Kodi Tidal add-on, it does.
Well, latest episode in my soap opera is that it appears that something about ASIO Bridge (even when it wan't running) was causing JRiver to crash immediately after opening. So, I've uninstalled ASIO Bridge and now everything's running fine again...
(Listening to JRiver now after a few days break is telling me that playing files on it from the hard disk sounds better than streaming on Tidal Masters (both using ASIO). There's just a greater solidity, smoothness and crispness to things.)
The ASIO thing actually makes perfect sense. You haven't mentioned it anywhere so I'll point it out, just in case like guv....Do you play your music from RAM? It's an option within many players like JRiver which gives a smidgen more aural delight. You can play with the buffer size so as not to go beyond the computer's capability. If you do that already then I think you have reached the pinnacle!
I'm not surprised that local files are outperforming the Tidal stream. Myself and an internet friend have tried sending very high quality rips back and forth over the net and they definitely degrade on each pass. It has to be well recorded and well ripped to really notice though.
Now enjoy your music with tech helping instead of hindering >- (meant to be victory smily)
CJ, thanks for your instruction to get back to the music. I haven't had to do any PC fiddling for ages, and had forgotten how easily I get sucked into trying to make things work. I can usually get there with the help of Google and kind folks like you, but it takes me time, and seems to suck me dry.
I'm frustrated that I haven't found a sustainable / acceptable (to me) way of getting Tidal running in ASIO on my machine. I was impressed with it overall. I'll take a break from the IT work, and have another go next week.
I am very pleased with the system running from JRiver. As I say, I'll but the Tidal project on hold and return when I've rebuilt some resilience!
Interesting to read of your internet pass research. It's amazing how removing just the last few iotas of sparkle effects my enjoyment.
Also I'm intrigued by your "playing from RAM idea". I'd be grateful to you if you could write a little more about this, as I'm not sure how I'd go about it.
You enable or disable memory playback in Options > Audio > Play files from memory instead of disk. It is off by default.
It basically supplies fully decoded data (by way of a buffer) instead of decoding "on the fly" directly from the hdd. It's definitely audible in foobar although I note the folks at Jriver say they are unable to measure any difference within Jriver. However, users are keen on the whole. I guess it's a try for yourself thang.
You enable or disable memory playback in Options > Audio > Play files from memory instead of disk. It is off by default.
It basically supplies fully decoded data (by way of a buffer) instead of decoding "on the fly" directly from the hdd. It's definitely audible in foobar although I note the folks at Jriver say they are unable to measure any difference within Jriver. However, users are keen on the whole. I guess it's a try for yourself thang.
I'm amazed that TIDAL has released something so far away from plug and play, requiring so much messing about and causing so much confusion amongst users - eg 'do I need an MQA DAC?'. Answers vary from Yes to No.
Me? I'm on the sidelines, as I'm no longer using a Mac for playback and there isn't a way of running the stream on the RPi. And other reasons.
I'm amazed that TIDAL has released something so far away from plug and play, requiring so much messing about and causing so much confusion amongst users - eg 'do I need an MQA DAC?'. Answers vary from Yes to No.
In a way (though a decidedly non-audiophile way), it is plug and play. On my Windows PC, the Tidal App works. And in simple plug and play mode, there is an audible difference between the masters stream and the normal ("hifi") stream.
BUT it seems a waste of such potential to have what is probably one of the best quality music data streams available squirted through Windows OS in the Kernel(?) protocol.
When I was sending the stream in ASIO direct to the soundcard, the sound sparkled. But as you say, this is an off-the-TIDAL-menu option. It requires effort and initiative on the part of the user. With this work put in, I would be seriously considering continuing subscription. I have the additional issue of my PC being a bit old and underpowered, but in any circumstances maximising the performance of TIDAL Masters requires more than the app can provide on its own.
It has made me appreciate JRiver Media Centre all the more. The designers of MC are clearly IT wizards, but they also understand that the hifi enthusiast cares deeply about feeling that he or she has got the sound as absolutely right as is possible.
I imagine that TIDAL is aimed at a different (more main-stream(?)) market. Hence, the TIDAL app is understandably / necessarily simpler in set-up, settings, options and tweakability. But accordlngly on its own, it also sounds and feels very unsophisticated. A "B-" for attainment, but perhaps only a "C" for effort from this audiophile marker.
I do feel disappointed that the hi-res MQA streams simply cannot be heard to their full potential within the stand-alone TIDAL app. Unless I'm missing something... Very happy to be corrected!
To play from Ram...
You enable or disable memory playback in Options > Audio > Play files from memory instead of disk. It is off by default.
It basically supplies fully decoded data (by way of a buffer) instead of decoding "on the fly" directly from the hdd. It's definitely audible in foobar although I note the folks at Jriver say they are unable to measure any difference within Jriver. However, users are keen on the whole. I guess it's a try for yourself thang.
Top tip CJ, thanks!
Will try later.
Tried and succeeded!
I want to experiment / listen more to the differences between playing from the RAM and the SSD before making any comment.
I'm amazed that TIDAL has released something so far away from plug and play, requiring so much messing about and causing so much confusion amongst users - eg 'do I need an MQA DAC?'. Answers vary from Yes to No.
In a way (though a decidedly non-audiophile way), it is plug and play. On my Windows PC, the Tidal App works. And in simple plug and play mode, there is an audible difference between the masters stream and the normal ("hifi") stream.
BUT it seems a waste of such potential to have what is probably one of the best quality music data streams available squirted through Windows OS in the Kernel(?) protocol.
When I was sending the stream in ASIO direct to the soundcard, the sound sparkled. But as you say, this is an off-the-TIDAL-menu option. It requires effort and initiative on the part of the user. With this work put in, I would be seriously considering continuing subscription. I have the additional issue of my PC being a bit old and underpowered, but in any circumstances maximising the performance of TIDAL Masters requires more than the app can provide on its own.
It has made me appreciate JRiver Media Centre all the more. The designers of MC are clearly IT wizards, but they also understand that the hifi enthusiast cares deeply about feeling that he or she has got the sound as absolutely right as is possible.
I imagine that TIDAL is aimed at a different (more main-stream(?)) market. Hence, the TIDAL app is understandably / necessarily simpler in set-up, settings, options and tweakability. But accordlngly on its own, it also sounds and feels very unsophisticated. A "B-" for attainment, but perhaps only a "C" for effort from this audiophile marker.
I do feel disappointed that the hi-res MQA streams simply cannot be heard to their full potential within the stand-alone TIDAL app. Unless I'm missing something... Very happy to be corrected!
It's fascinating because it's all unknown Windoze Malarkey to me!
It's not plug and play because it looks to me as if there are (at least) three levels of complexity here (3 for highest SQ):
1) Just use the app as it is (incidentally, on the Mac, the Hi-Fi and Masters streams are one and the same)
2) Mess about with ASIO, Wasabi and peanut kernels
3) Find the right kind of DAC
Sounds like months of riveting tweakery for the audiofool. I hope they sort it out and some kind person works out how to take the stream through the RPI. I doubt if even a Masters stream through a Mac or a PC will beat a hi-fi stream through the RPi, but it's one thing I might have to try, just to satisfy myself.
Just had a thought. I imagine Roon will soon do its thing with Masters. Then RPi could be used as a Roon endpoint, or whatever they call it.
It's not plug and play because it looks to me as if there are (at least) three levels of complexity here ...
May be I'm misusing the term "plug and play". In my head "play" was chosen to mean "install", and "play" was chosen to mean "immediately produce music". That app does do those things. My issue is that the app itself appears incapable of making the most of the available music SQ in the hi-res MQA stream. And making the most of the available musical SQ is what hifi is all about for audiophiles (like me).
This is something that the PC seems to have managed on its own. When journeying through Task Manager this week I noticed an MQA sub-programme of the Asus soundcard's driver while I had TIDAL running in ASIO mode. I'm not sure how or when that arrived in the system. And tbh I'm not 100% clear in my own mind about exactly how the chain from TIDAL towers to my speakers links together.
It's not plug and play because it looks to me as if there are (at least) three levels of complexity here ...
May be I'm misusing the term "plug and play". In my head "play" was chosen to mean "install", and "play" was chosen to mean "immediately produce music". That app does do those things. My issue is that the app itself appears incapable of making the most of the available music SQ in the hi-res MQA stream. And making the most of the available musical SQ is what hifi is all about for audiophiles (like me).
Plug and play means one doesn't have to piss around setting it up. It 'just works'.
This is something that the PC seems to have managed on its own. When journeying through Task Manager this week I noticed an MQA sub-programme of the Asus soundcard's driver while I had TIDAL running in ASIO mode. I'm not sure how or when that arrived in the system. And tbh I'm not 100% clear in my own mind about exactly how the chain from TIDAL towers to my speakers links together.
I was talking in general, for the person who has a DAC. It seems to me that they'd need an MQA DAC to squeeze everything from Masters.
Plug and play means one doesn't have to piss around setting it up. It 'just works'.
Righto. Pretty much as I thought. I can see your concerns about the DAC situation. If borne out, then yes that would be annoying. In my setup tho, it was essentially plug and play, just not to the optimised level that I want. To achieve that does take additional pissing around!
Comments
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A quick bit of backgroud: I use a Windows 10 PC with a nice Xonar Essence STX soubdcard. Using this setup, usually with JRiver Media Centre, I have long been of the opinion that music sounds best using ASIO (the audio protocol that bi-passes Windows).
Immediately after Tidal's desktop app installation, and with things unfiddled, things sounded OK.
The hi-res "Hifi/Master" stream (96/24) sounded better than the standard "High" stream (44.1/16) (one can switch between the two in Tidal's settings).
However, on my machine, using the Tidal desktop app playing its music inside Windows 10, there is some of the splashy-mushiness that can annoy me about "sub-optimal" digital replay. To my ears, and on my system, using ASIO for higher res generally eliminates or greatly reduces this.
On my usual player, JRiver MC, one is able to use the JRiver settings to get an ASIO path from the player direct to the soundcard. The Tidal app's settings are far more rudimentary. One cannot switch between driver protocols (ASIO, WASAPI, etc.,...). However, one can switch between different audio devices (e.g. between the soundcard and the HDMI output on the PC).
So, I resorted to the freely downloadable "Hifi-cable and ASIO-bridge" combined apps to get an ASIO feed going from TIDAL to the soundcard. Once installed, the "Hifi-cable" app presents itself as an audio device in Windows' sound settings options (including those in the Tidal settings). Once selected, the "Hifi-cable" uses the "ASIO bridge" to send an ASIO feed direct to the soundcard. Getting things to work smoothly (without stuttering or drop-outs) took some fiddling (mainly of the soundcard's ASIO settings), but now things are nearly going nicely.
The resulting sound is exceeding my expectations. I shall have to listen more to see how the hi-res streams on Tidal compare with the 96/24 files that I have downloaded from Quobuz. First thoughts are that they are certainly in the same ball-park. Hopefully, Tidal may have some of the same ones, and I shall be able to make direct comparisons. I haven't looked properly through the Tidal Masters catalogue yet.
You could use Wasapi though?
http://www.head-fi.org/t/790382/guide-properly-setting-up-tidal-for-best-sound-quality-when-using-a-usb-dac
I've been a bit spoiled by JRiver's comprehensive settings options! To be honest, I'm not sure how all of this works. I don't really understand to what extent the sound card determines what's happening and to what extent does the media player.
Not sure about WASAPI. How would this be selected? Would it need to be? Is it the default for Windows apps? In JRiver, WASAPI sounds good, but I still believe that I prefer ASIO.
I too prefer ASIO with my DAC.
I read some stuff on the internet about doing it (both WASAPI and ASIO) but i couldn't square what they were writing (about "shared" and "exclusive" modes) with what I was seeing on my machine. Maybe those posters were streaming Tidal from a browser, or had a particular sound card, or something...
Selecting the Asus sound card in Tidal settings does not appear to deliver ASIO (in the way that it does in JRiver). I reach this conclusion by virtue of the facts that:
1. When the ASIO protocol is in operation, the settings in the sound card's ASIO control panel are greyed out. With the ASUS sound card selected in Tidal, the card's ASIO settings remain adjustable.
2. With ASUS sound card selected in Tidal, changing levels for the sound card in Windows sound settings has an effect on the sound. With ASIO operating, it does not (as would be expected).
I haven't been able listen properly at this early hour, but I think even at low levels and through my porridge munching, Tidal sounded better through the ASIO bridge. I'll be able to check this later.
CJ, which protocol do you think Tidal uses with sound card selected? WASAPI? Direct sound?
Can you not select ASIO in Jriver as output and Tidal as input (or Jriver as playback within Tidal).
At present I have no need for Tidal as I'm happy with Spotify free. I only use it the same way as youtube to search for new things or try out recommendations. If I had "premium" I would be able to copy the URLs from Spotify playlists, albums, tracks or even first 20 results of a search and drop them in them in as a new location for foobar to play from.
Maybe this is possible for Tidal and Jriver?
There may be CPU issues for my ageing media PC with both Tidal and JRiver running (see next post...). We'll see.
Next thing to work out was how to eliminate the regular (about once a track) trop outs (for a few seconds).
Very important to stress that this is not an issue with Tidal itself. It is my ageing mother board, or more specifically the CPU, that is (alomst) underpowered. And I suspected this from the off. My PC sounds lovely, but in recent years has begun to sometimes struggle with coplicated / recent software (though it hasn't struggled this much before). Sure enough Task Manager revealed the CPU to be banging up against 100% most of the time with Tidal streaming.
On inspection, there are about 5 or 6 separate Tidal processing running. A couple of them soak up about 25% CPU each! (The "Tidal player" itself is more like 8%), but (it seemed) they all need to run to keep things ticking along.
Interestingly when the Tidal app is minimised all but the Tidal Player processes disappear to 0 CPU use, bringing the overall usage right down. A possible work around I thought? Apparently not, as when minimised, Tidal stops playing at the end of the current track.
Fortunately I noticed another process, further down the list, "Windows Module Installer Worker" (something to do with Windows update, I think) running constantly and taking up 20% of the CPU. I think there must have been something wrong, as after running various autmoatic remedial checks, the troublesome process disappeared from the process list. This brought things down to sustainable levels.
I also tried to alter CPU Priorities for relevant processes (Tidal and ASIO bridge thingie) in the Task Manager (e.g. making "Tidal Player" a "High priority"). This helped further, but unfortunately the altered priority values are lost and return to defaults when the app is restarted or the PC shut down. A very useful little programme called Prio adds a "Save" function to priorities in Task Manager, and this excited me momentarily, BUT despite Prio "installing", it turned out to be not compatible with Windows 10. Grrrr.
Fortunately, even without this, the CPU is coping with priorities returned to defaults. No drop outs.
So, we continue to progress...
I might even start talking about the music in a bit... :-D
And, stop laughing, Apple users.
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f11-software/tidal-and-wimp-through-your-software-player-choice-23987/
You haven't mentioned it anywhere so I'll point it out, just in case like guv....Do you play your music from RAM? It's an option within many players like JRiver which gives a smidgen more aural delight. You can play with the buffer size so as not to go beyond the computer's capability.
If you do that already then I think you have reached the pinnacle!
I'm not surprised that local files are outperforming the Tidal stream. Myself and an internet friend have tried sending very high quality rips back and forth over the net and they definitely degrade on each pass. It has to be well recorded and well ripped to really notice though.
Now enjoy your music with tech helping instead of hindering
You enable or disable memory playback in Options > Audio > Play files from memory instead of disk. It is off by default.
It basically supplies fully decoded data (by way of a buffer) instead of decoding "on the fly" directly from the hdd. It's definitely audible in foobar although I note the folks at Jriver say they are unable to measure any difference within Jriver. However, users are keen on the whole. I guess it's a try for yourself thang.
Will try later.
Dear boy, dear boy, I didn't get where I am today wearing underpants covered in Beethoven.
We're not one of those dreadful firms forums that (fill in your own experience here).
I too find it strange that Tidal, especially with MQA, cannot talk directly via ASIO enabled sound cards.