So I’ve read that those 16/44 MQA files are supposed to be worse than CD quality so that bothered me.
As far as number of hires, I looked at the focus results in roon for basically the same catalog between Tidal and Qobuz and saw that Qobuz has about twice as many 192/24 albums than Tidal for same collection. I don’t remember the results of 96/24 albums. Overall Tidal has replaced most of their MQA above 44/16 with true hires. It’s just doesn’t seem like they’ve touched any of the 44/16 MQA yet. Mostly older Warner Bros albums, which I have a lot in my library.
So I think I’ll switch back to Tidal once they’ve fully purged all their MQA. I was also getting tired of waiting for Naim to make their update, so all my listening was thru roon anyway. Tidal does have a better app than Qobuz. The Dolby Atmos and 360 is kind of cool but more of a gimmick. Trading lossless for usually bad surround sound. However, Dolby Atmos works great when I watch a movie on Apple TV with AirPod Pros because it’s sounds real and like it’s really coming from the tv. Most of the music in this format gives me a headache. But the fact that it’s free with Tidal is a plus. The videos on Tidal are also nice feature.
In the Naim app it’s true that you get a jumbled mess. Search for albums by an artist and you get a random mixture of albums, singles, EPs and compilations.
The Qobuz app used to be just as bad, but now has sensible lists of albums not padded out with other stuff. They really need to sort out the api they release to third parties to reflect this.
In the meantime I find it’s easy enough to browse and search in the Qobuz app, save anything you want to listen to, and go to the Naim app to play it.
The 16/44 MQA tracks sound just as good as 16/44 FLAC on my system, so no problem there unless you cant process MQA of course, which a lot of people cant, so I understand why it would be best to wait until all the MQA gets replaced, but that might take some time.
I dont bother too much with the ATMOS stuff as I much prefer stereo to surround sound for music.
The music videos and concerts I watch a lot which is the main reason I went Tidal rather than Qobuz when I got into streaming about 5 years ago, which also made me get a MQA compatible streamer/dac for the Hi-Res which I also wanted.
Ive been very happy with Tidal, I think its excellent and now we have Hi-Res FLAC and significantly reduced monthly payments.
The Hi-Res catalogue on Tidal will keep getting bigger so all good for the future as it sounds like they have some catch up to do against Qobuz in this area.
Finally made the effort yesterday to migrate all my likes and playlists from Qobuz to Tidal and to unsubscribe from Qobuz. Been using Tidal almost exclusively these days.
As an owner of a CD5si and an XS3, my next logical Naim purchase would be an ND5 XS2. I would use it as a DAC and to stream Tidal - I have the top tier. I currently use a newish Dell laptop as streaming transport via USB into my Arcam D33. The advantage of this combo is that the Tidal desktop app is regularly updated and has become more stable in terms of set-up settings over time. Yes I have to get out of seat to change an album but my DAC has transport controls through the remote that enable me to play, pause, skip etc. As an added bonus, as Arcam and Naim share many remote codes, I can control the XS3’s volume from the same remote.
Ultimately and unfortunately, until Naim sort this out for their current generation streamers, they are not an option for me personally.
“Currently, Niam streaming products cannot play Tidal’s highest resolution streaming files because these are exclusive to their Tidal Max tier. Even if you have Tidal Max, unfortunately, it’s not yet integrated into the Focal Naim app. We’re still waiting for the Tidal Max API details from Tidal themselves, but we expect to receive them by the end of summer. Once we have them, we can code and integrate Tidal Max support into our app”
First, why aren’t Naim pushing this news out to all current streamer owners coupled with an apology for not getting on top of this much, much sooner? Are they a serious high end hifi manufacturer or not?
Secondly, if they sre not going to start work any time soon (end of the summer) the working solution is clearly months away. Late 2024 or early 2025?
This is a PR disaster for Naim and it is difficult to understand how they have handled it so very, very badly.
That’s not what Steve said yesterday. I believe marketing and support is not aligned with R&D on this. The API has been available for long since they are at final stage for 3rd parties to approve.
"The R&D team are super keen to push Tidal Hi-Res out for everyone to enjoy. It is currently with 3rd parties to approve, then there’s code migration to integrate into the release branch of code etc…
The original quote suggests it is the app that is the issue, so no firmware update required. Which is it? I thought the app merely told the streamer where to find what to play.
If different bits of Naim cannot sing with one voice on spmething like this, that speaks volumes.
The lack of and then confused messaging exacerbates the apparent ineptitude at getting this resolved.
This ongoing shambles is really tainting the Naim brand for me, having first purchased only a few years ago. I’m almost tempted to post the quote above on every Naim social media post designed to achieve sales of streaming products to warn others that, for Tidal purposes, Naim is currently an inferiror product.
Perhaps you should stop being a keyboard warrior and take a deep breath. Posting vitriol on social media would be a really nasty thing to do. A firmware update is required in order to allow high res Tidal, and it’s something Naim are working on. It’s not as simple a thing as many seem to think.
, and there is not a Max tier from some time.