• WANTED: Happy members who like to discuss audio and other topics related to our interest. Desire to learn and share knowledge of science required. There are many reviews of audio hardware and expert members to help answer your questions. Click here to have your audio equipment measured for free!

Is TIDAL on Apple TV a decent source?

ripmixburn

Active Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 1, 2019
Messages
220
Likes
104
Location
Toronto, Canada
I love the visual interface, and the convenience… but I have no idea if the TIDAL (or any music app) on my Apple TV is providing a good audio signal via HDMI to my receiver. A cursory search has not returned any measurements. Has this been done? Would love to know.
 

Blumlein 88

Grand Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Feb 23, 2016
Messages
20,522
Likes
37,053
Unless it has high jitter, which some HDMI has, it likely is good. But measuring is the best way to know for sure.
 
OP
ripmixburn

ripmixburn

Active Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 1, 2019
Messages
220
Likes
104
Location
Toronto, Canada
This seems to confirm 48khz for everything.

Thank you! I remember hearing this but forgot about it.

I wonder if it has something to do with the processing power it lacks to play different sound qualities simultaneously. I know whenever I play music that Siri or system navigation clicks are overlaid on top.

The VLC app will pass thru DTS WAV files in 5.1 but only when sound is dedicated. I’ll double check this later.
 

AdamG

Proving your point makes it “Science”.
Moderator
Forum Donor
Joined
Jan 3, 2021
Messages
4,636
Likes
14,918
Location
Reality
The real question is can we tell the difference? I listen to tidal via Apple tv4k device to Denon AVR and it sounds very good to me. Is it max quality, no. Would I be able to tell the difference, doubt it!
 

Jimbob54

Grand Contributor
Forum Donor
Joined
Oct 25, 2019
Messages
11,066
Likes
14,697
The real question is can we tell the difference? I listen to tidal via Apple tv4k device to Denon AVR and it sounds very good to me. Is it max quality, no. Would I be able to tell the difference, doubt it!
Yup.

If the OP is happy with the set up, it's unlikely there is much if anything to be gained from finding a bit perfect way to get the tidal stream into the receiver. A couple of years ago, a chromecast audio optical out would have been a cost effective way of taking the TV out of the equation. But discontinued
 
OP
ripmixburn

ripmixburn

Active Member
Forum Donor
Joined
Dec 1, 2019
Messages
220
Likes
104
Location
Toronto, Canada
I actually had a Pi/Khadas tone board rig here for a few days, but never did a proper comparison. Both sound great to me, but would be nice to know if Apple did a good job engineering the audio output.
 
Top Bottom