Sorry for such a newbie question. Have had my NDS for a few weeks now. Had tidal running and then it started dropping like much others have talked about on this forum. Super annoying. Installed Audirvana on my macbook pro. Connects wirelessly to the NDS just fine and plays nicely with Quboz. Yes!
Just so I’m clear on using this moving forward. I don’t control anything through an app on my phone, just on my computer?
Audirvāna have a free of charge smartphone app where you can control everything. Your MacBook need to run though.
Got it. Just in case you want to leave your computer somewhere else I suppose? All this is wirelessly too, correct? I haven’t connected it with wires to my NDS or via ethernet.
Wired worked better for me but wireless works too.
Audirvāna on your computer is the server software so to say and the smartphone app is your remote. So software on the computer must run for the remote app to work. You don’t have to use an app on your smartphone if you don’t like to. When I used Audirvāna I had an old Mac mini without screen running and did everything from a MacBook or smartphone and by doing so Audirvāna was always on so to say. Roon work in a similar way.
I’ve used a Mac mini headless like this for a decade.
The SQ of Audirvāna studio and Qobuz run this way is quite superb (222 in my case).
How did you guys connect your mac minis to your NDS? USB?
you dont need to, just wire it to your network and control it with a phone or tablet. works a treat and sounds superb!
Advantage of the MM is you can keep it out of sight, and use the remote app to control Audirvana. When you need to access the main app, you can connect to the MM via screen share on the Macbook.
Plus a possible slight uplift in SQ using the MM as a dedicated server, with all non-essential processing disabled.
Audirvāna runs on the Mac mini anywhere on your home network. You use the phone/tablet app to control it. Audirvāna will find any upnp end point on the network so you can select to play via that. Naim streamers are upnp endpoints. I use a NSC222 on the main system and a Atom HE in the office. I can select which to play on. It’s better quality sound than using the Naim app alone as a lot of the heavy lifting is done on the Mac.
Same experience here 
So if I purchase a mac mini i can use the screen on my macbook pro to access the mac mini and load audrivan onto it? Then connect it to my network via a ethernet cable on the router and have an ethernet cable from that same router run to my NDS?
Man i feel old with these questions! Thanks for the help!
Yes, but easier to use the free Audirvāna app to control the Audirvāna application on the Mac mini. The app has versions for iPhone and android so if you have any smartphone or tablet it works. You can of course share screen but it’s a bit more fiddle reconnecting.
I was just thinking of how to install Audrivana onto the Mac Mini if I don’t have a monitor to connect it to. I’m guessing that would be the easiest way? Then I would use the app to control it once it’s installed.
You only need a monitor to set up OSX. Any screen with an HDMI will work (Tv etc) . You can install Audirvāna etc screen sharing.
Thanks!
Well I sat and tried listening tonight wirelessly from my computer to the NDS and it drops all the time, way worse than tidal. Must have to be hardwired to use effectively. I was playing high-res files and it just would not work. Bummer.
Where you sreaming hi-res files thru Tidal? When streaming just CD quality 16/44.1 files thru Tidal, I absolutely never had a signal drop and of course local CD or hi-res works fine.
@ChrisSU said that the Legacy buffers won’t support constant higher-res streaming, but 16/44.1 shouldn’t be a problem, so Tidal was probably sending you the highest res version it could which I believe is the Tidal default.
Just wondering …
I believe your wireless setup is the issue. Check your router.
Hi, I had similar problems with Tidal dropping (see my thread). In the end it was because I was connected to my router through a wired connection via a switch.
I changed by wireless router with more Ethernet ports so I could connect the NDS directly into the router and I haven’t had any problems since.
Hope that helps