Tidal Connect

Hi David,

That’s not entirely correct.

To clarify:

The Naim App hides the product from Rooms until the product indicates that the update is complete, or for 10 minutes - whichever comes soonest.

You may have got the ‘15 minutes’ bit from the App itself, which explains that ‘when the update is complete the product will be shown in Rooms, which can take up to 15 minutes.’

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Actually I got the 15 mins from a discussion with your colleagues in the beta group, but of course it may well have changed since then, indeed I’m glad it has!

Best

David

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Are there any DSP changes in the 3.7 firmware? Should an ND555 user expect to hear any difference?

I ask as I was an NDS user who didn’t like the change from 4.4 to 4.6, so am a little cautious over just taking an update.

Updated my ND5 XS2 too… Indeed less than 10 min and it sounds quite good. Thanks Naim!

Well either way it’s a long time for the incurably impatient like me. But no matter, it was easy enough to add the device and thank you both for your responses.

BTW do I see some Chromecast fixes included in this update? Its relative inability to handle that - esp on apps like Soundcloud from iPhone - has been the only real negative against my Atom.

I’ll have a proper play later but it does seem to have improved.

Yes, there are a lot of other improvements and fixes in this release - including for Chromecast.

Full list in Richard’s post here:

Yes might be. One of the reasons Naim delayed the release.

Let’s quash that rumour straight away!

There’s a lot packed into Firmware 3.7, which is why it took a long time to test. And yes, that does include listening tests to ensure all sounds as it should.

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Rumour? Listening tests stretched the release somewhat you said and doing listening tests on this release prove it could change sound appearance otherwise no need to?:blush:

“Software code is a complex series of interactions; you don’t just ‘plug in’ the TIDAL Connect bit (wish it was that simple). Any changes can affect the whole, including sound quality. Therefore the final stage of every software release is ensuring everything sounds as it should, and making adjustments if it doesn’t.”

Listening tests add a week at most; tiny in the grand scheme of things. And their point is to ensure there is no change from the core sonic signature.

Sounding mighty fine on my Nova/Allae system, don’t need to turn the volume up as much, seems a lot louder.

Great news Clare. I installed it on my Nova.

Is it correct it does not support Master Quality? When I start the Tidal app from my iPhone and stream a Master Quality song, Tidal reports this as HiFi.

Hope to hear from you

Cheers,

Richard

Yes, we have not added MQA support.

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We aren’t allowed to talk about beta testing but perhaps I will be forgiven if I just say that the last couple of betas of 3.7 drew universal approval from the beta testers for sound quality, including from some notably picky ND555 owners. I don’t think anyone should worry about SQ of this firmware release.

Best

David

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I suppose the obvious question now is, is there any difference in sound quality in listening to Tidal via the Naim app or the Tidal app.

(I’m suspecting not, but I’ll ask the question.)

No. The apps are just remotes to the connect tech which is fed directly into the box, not via apps.

Yes, I am stuck trying to figure out the use case for Tidal Connect on a Naim player.
The Naim app already has a Tidal integration, for all the content.
So when would you want to use Tidal Connect?
Is the plan to drop the Tidal integration from the Naim app, in favour of Tidal Connect for playback of a Tidal stream?

Is driving the Tidal stream from the native Tidal app on a controller device, such as an iPad, going to be any different? Is the native Tidal app going to undertake the 1st unfold for Tidal Masters, and send the unfold stream directly to the Naim player over Tidal Connect?

Also, if you have Roon, you have an excellent integration with Tidal, with support for 1st unfold of Tidal Master, and able to direct the stream to current as well as legacy Naim players. Plus with Roon, the legacy platform can have Qobuz and Lossless Internet streaming overcoming the buffering limitations of the BridgeCo platform, while separating the stream management and processing from the player/render, potentially leading to better SQ.

It’s all about convenience. We’re giving people more choice- they can either stream TIDAL from the Naim App, or the TIDAL App - which does offer a richer experience, including some advance elements we don’t support natively in the Naim App.

And yes, Roon does a lot - but it’s not free, unlike this software update :slight_smile:

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Well that was painless :+1:

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There’s a number of features that are unavailable in the Naim app that are present in Tidal’s app, plus improvements to search & the general UI IMO. Things like this were discussed in a separate thread here:

Side note - picked a bad day to go to the office, after months of badgering on…

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