Tidal Max is here

Music
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Tidal Max replaces the Tidal Hifi tier.

What file types are included in Max quality?

You’re getting the best quality version of any song on TIDAL by selecting Max quality. The source file you receive depends on the format(s) delivered to us by the artist, label, or distributor. The hierarchy of availability is HiRes FLAC, then MQA (Master Quality Authenticated), then FLAC, then AAC (compressed audio), meaning that, if we don’t have the file available in HiRes FLAC, the source file will be the MQA version and so on.

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While Tidal Max is indeed here, it appears (at time of writing) that there are still some caveats. “Max” quality may be EITHER Hi-Res Flac OR MQA, with priority given to the Flac if it exists. Tidal won’t directly show which version is playing, but your DAC and Mosaic will show the MQA logo if it is that.

What confused me for a while - hence the reason for posting - is that Tidal Max only presently applies to playback through their own app, and not yet to Tidal Connect or third-party apps, including Mosaic.

So for example: if I connect one of my DACs via USB cable to my PC, I can use their desktop app to play a particular “max” track that displays on the DAC front panel as “24/96”; yet the ‘same’ track played over Tidal Connect (even from the same app), or found in Mosaic (or ROON, for that matter) will display as “24/48, MQA.”. This isn’t something we have control over at dCS: Mosaic can only play what Tidal makes available to it.

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This is the official statement from Roon:

This is the crucial part:

Later this year, TIDAL plans to make those streams available to their partners

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In Hong Kong, I still see reference to HiFi and HiFi Plus only. No Max mentioned. Tried VPNing into various countries but their location detection is not trivial and I can’t circumvent it easily. I don’t mind subscribing at a higher cost if I get corresponding value. For reference HiFi Plus in Hong Kong per month is HKD96 = USD12.50 = EUR11.30 = GBP9.70.

Does anyone know if the Max offering will be rolled out globally in stages? Any idea how the HiFi Plus may map to the Max offering (or not)? Maybe it’s just still early days and more to come. Thanks.

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In my recently updated Tidal app it says:

in Settings > under the Account tab: > Info : current subscription > TIDAL HiFi Plus

under the > Streaming tab: > Audio quality: choose Low - High - MAX

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Thank you! Let me re-subscribe and test. Had dropped Tidal in favour of Qobuz a year+ ago.

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I (still) have both Tidal and Qobuz. Since the high res files on Tidal seem to be the same as on Qobuz, it might be that I drop Tidal later.

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Thanks John, good to know. Seems to be a bit of a cluster-f… :laughing:

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I still find stuff on Tidal that is not on Qobuz. For example, there are no Chesky releases on Qobuz.

Is Mosaic working correctly with Tidal hi res FLAC?

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I still have them both, just to be sure :wink:

I never use Mosaic to play files, only Roon.

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I use Roon most of the time. But I think Mosaic playing the same exact files (served over upnp by Minimserver) sounds slightly better.

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