[speecher]

I pay for Tidal Hifi. I have the settings set for "Master". I use an IEM plugged into the iphone 11 with the $9 apple white dongle adapter.

Am i getting the actual Master/Hifi/MQA quality? or does the Iphone downgrade the quality due to the limitations of its cheap dac?

 

[rlw6534]

I pay for Tidal Hifi. I have the settings set for "Master". I use an IEM plugged into the iphone 11 with the $9 apple white dongle adapter.

Am i getting the actual Master/Hifi/MQA quality? or does the Iphone downgrade the quality due to the limitations of its cheap dac?

The iPhone dongle is capable of 24 bit 48 kHz audio and does not have MQA decoding, so you are not able to benefit from MQA which at a minimum is 88.2 kHz (first unfold) and higher (with an MQA DAC). The iPhone dongle is actually pretty good but not a good choice for MQA encoded audio. There are a few relatively inexpensive dongle DACs such as the Hiby FC3 that could bring the full MQA experience if you are interested. As for the debate about whether MQA is actually better or not, you can do your own research, but be prepared for widely varying opinions...