We were able to replicate the problem playing the same track. At the same time we were doing a demo of the Rossini Apex and did not have that issue with the same track. It appears now the issue is within the Bartok MQA circuit itself. Good news is I am upgrading after waiting delivery, the problem should be solved. The Bartok is going back to be upgraded to the Apex and then the dealer will keep as his Bartok demo in his shop. The system I have has the Bartok as the weakest link and it sounds amazing, the Rossini Apex just had more dynamics going for it, surprisingly I also tried the clock module and so far I could not hear a difference though when the Rossini gets here I will borrow a clock module for a few days and see if I can hear a difference worth the additional cost of shelf and clock.
OK thereās some interesting āstuffā in there.
Great ā¦ lets park that for a moment.
Right ā¦ this is where Iām going to put on a quizzical look as I totally get why youāre coming to that conclusion given what you are seeing but there is no āMQA circuitā in either the Bartok or Rossini ā¦ itās a decode function built into the FPGA code that runs on both the Bartok and Rossini rather than being something separate and āswitchableā in or out of circuit (like - for example - the Dolby noise reduction on a cassette deck).
I definitely get that in a Bartok-v-Rossini sparring session then the Rossini will be the better sounding unit ā¦ Iām totally with you on that and if the Rossini is within your reach then Iād completely agree with making that choice.
That doesnāt however give us a cause for issues with MQA playback on the Bartok ā¦ it really doesnāt sound like an FPGA ācode corruptionā issue (FPGAās arenāt like CPUs in that they donāt run ācodeā - theyāre massively capable programmable logic and donāt behave like youād expect something running code to do processing would) so if you can tell your dealer about this conversation and that Iād like to continue to look into this with them so to give me a shout at [email protected] once they have it back and Iād really like to get to the bottom of it with them then Iād be really appreciativeā¦
Interesting what was explained to me by the person that came out from Wilson Audio to set up my speakers was where I was coming from. He was a big fan of MQA I had my doubts for no other reason then having watched a few YouTube rants a while ago. His statement lead me to believe the Bartok actually had hardwired circuitry along with software to decode MQA, and that when people get less than great results from MQA it is because their DAC choice was not a good one for MQA.
Not trying to open a can of worms, if MQA sounds great, I am in. For the first month there was zero issue with MQA files maybe three weeks ago this problem started and now it is becoming literally every MQA file in 16 or 24 bit. At first it was only 16. Not sure what the clue is there if any. DCS will have the unit back shortly after the new Rossini arrives, meanwhile I will keep listening and build a playlist of example files that skip and click.
Well, that is ABSOLUTELY PERFECT! I couldnāt ask for more thereā¦!
That will give us something to work with to try to find whatās going on.
Do you have the Bartok there still as there is one thing I would like to try if you do? If you do still have it there could you try connecting the Ethernet feed to the āloopā RJ45 rather than the āmainā RJ45 and see if the issue remains?
If not then no worries but it would be nice just to check that and exclude that within your setup where we know that this issue occurs.
Yes Bartok still here will keep using till the Rossini arrives.
Likely a month.
I will try what you asked about and see if it helps, this will wait on the installer, he is due back Friday or early next week as there is some other stuff he is working on for me.
Posting an update.
The plot thickens, I tried the alternative connection you suggested, and am now running the Rossini Apex. I have been using Roon and creating a group with the speakers downstairs which have Blusound Nodes doing their conversion. The DCS DACs should have nothing to do with the other speakers so it is confusing.
As soon as I ungroup the glitches on the 2 channel system stop. Still it is glitching MQA only and all tracks in that format.
Todd, seems like you might have Roon packet synchronisation problems causing packet drop-outs when Zone Grouping.
It could happen if you have an underpowered Roon Core (what machine is your Roon Core?), or if one of your Zones has a significantly higher latency in its connection to the Roon Core compared to the other Zone (are you Bluesound Nodes/Speakers connected over WiFi?).
In any case, you might want to try configuring in a 50ms delay into the Zone grouping delay setting in the Bartok/Roonās [Device setup] [Advanced Settings] configuration under Roon, and see if that helps solve the problem.
Little about the concept for the space.
The building is my studio, upstairs is about music listening, making music, and painting, downstairs is a fabrication shop and sculpture area. Music is beneficial to my work process on both floors. Hence the desire to have music playing on both floors. The need for perfection as close as I can get to my preferences for listening is more valuable upstairs, as painting does not make noise. A shop however is a different use case and the need for good sound plays more of a background role in my process.
Roon is running on a Roon dedicated machine connected by wire to Verizon as is the Blusound nodes and the DCS DAC.
It does seem as though thanks to the help here I am getting closer to the issue, and now after trial and error and perhaps ruling out the DAC itself as the culprit it appears the signal arriving at the DAC from the Roon appliance is possibly where the glitches are coming from heard during upstairs MQA playback.
Just tried the delay suggested, and unfortunately the issue still persists.
Does the issue with glitching audio occur when you are playing MQA with just the Bartok as a playback device? I am now using Rossini Apex, and no when I do not group the glitches are gone.
Does the issue with glitching audio occur when you are playing MQA with multiple devices playing as a group? Yes
Does the issue with glitching audio occur when you are playing MQA with multiple devices that arenāt grouped? Have not tried that as it makes no sense the two floors are open to each other. I can test that though if it would help to know the answer.
Does the issue with glitching audio occur just generally during playback or only when adding / removing devices from the playback group. Once grouped the issue is on every MQA track.
OK - After discussion with the exceptionally large intellects that we keep locked in the cellar we believe this is a Roon issue caused by the way that Roon synchronises multiple disparate devices and applies synchronising āadjustmentā to whichever device requires adjustment to bring it back into step with whichever device in the group Roon has allocated to be its notional āmasterā deviceā¦
Generally this is done by dropping or repeating samples (something that isnāt audible given the minute duration of a sample) but in this case a repeated sample causes the MQA decoder to stutter for a moment ā¦ as a test you could set the āMQA Capabilitiesā to āRenderer Onlyā or āNo MQA Supportā and see whether that helpsā¦
