After using the pretty terrible MusicLife app, I’m now experimenting with Chromecast and it’s working fine off phone and an iMac.
But how can I determine I’m streaming at the highest resolution?
I can’t see anything on the Arcam display other than “Casting” and volume level and “Qobuz V1.” When I use the “info” button on the remote I simply get “Chromecast built in.” The iMac indicates high resolution but I want to see proof on the amp.
Thanks for any help.
Hi Arcamdc, welcome to the forum!
Please note as outlined here hi res audio is limited to 96KHz/24-bit on Chromecast. As far as I know once you’re streaming audio through Chromecast the SA30 front displays the static text casting Chromecast, nothing more.
It should be possible to hear the difference between a standard CD quality recording and a hi res recording. Try to buy two equal tracks of your favourite album, one track in 16 bit 44k1 and the same track in hi res. Play these tracks sequentially on the SA30.
What is wrong with the MusicLife app? Are you missing some functionality or does the app not work for you?
You can use the Webclient to check resolution
edit: if you use upnp
Appreciate the replies.
I’ve found the MusicLife app pretty buggy and often non responsive. Yesterday it suddenly logged me out of Qobuz and I couldn’t log back in – until this morning. So I decided to try Chromecast, which I realize is limited to 96/24. It would just be nice to have confirmation the amp is streaming at the highest resolution.
I do hope Arcam can improve MusicLife and the streaming functions at large. I’ve been frustrated with the crunchy/static noise we’ve all experienced.
What’s the latest on a firmware update? I just keep hearing one is being worked on.
You’ll discover the new firmware availability date and the fixes once it is available.
Arcam does not unfortunately recognise the issues neither shares the priorities they are working on. This is to me one of the most important part of the frustration and lost of trust / commitment towards the product and brand
I keep getting logged out of MusicLife (Qobuz to be exact) and it won’t recognize my password when I try again. Ultra frustrating.
Hi Arcamdc, I’m able to play a mp3 track from Qobuz on my SA30 through MusicLife. If you don’t mind then could you please elaborate on your issue (steps executed, used hardware+software and actual result)?
The problem with the app is pretty well established, no? Slow to react to commands, etc, and lately I keep getting logged out. When it works, it’s fine, just not polished. It obviously needs work – just like the SA30 firmware.
The Android Music Life app a is pretty transparent front end to the barebones web client. You click through an http folder structure, with all the limits to usability that entails. It didn’t work at all until September last year, so things have improved, I do concede.
In comparison with any other modern music app with a menu UI, advanced search, artwork, metadata etc though it’s very lacking. Maybe the iPhone version is better?
My personal experience is the MusicLife on iOS app has drastically improved over the last year, e.g. basic track navigation and queue management weren’t flawless back in May 2020. I’m not saying it is bug free. If you spot a bug then there is a possibility to have Arcam fix it for you. The most important step in solving bugs is trying to get the issue reproducible. If the issue is reproducible then the engineer knows what to fix, how to test the fix and confirm it is properly solved. If the cause of the issue originates in the app then there is a possibility to get a fix which can be delivered quicker (through the MusicLife iOS beta track) compared to an issue which affects the SA30 firmware. I’m trying to say if you encounter a bug and you’re willing to contribute than please describe the issue. The following information is a basic need: what steps are executed, the used hardware (iOS or Android) software version (of MusicLife and SA30) and actual result. If you’re not willing or able to contribute then that’s no problem. In the latter case you have to wait until your issue got reported by someone and got fixed. I’m inviting you to create an new issue in the issue section.
I’m interested in this as well. I read all over the place people putting down the app but I love it. I only tend to play albums in completeness though, I’m old school. I don’t do playlists though so maybe that’s it’s issues. The best upgrade was gapless playback as prior to that any album that had tracks running into each other I had to store as a single album file. I also use it to stream multichannel FLAC files to my OPPO as well.
They recognise the distortion issue because I have spoken to one of their field engineers.