Audirvana Plus 3
Can a simple app really take you to audio nirvana?
$74 Developer Audirvana, audirvana.com Requirements OS X 10.9 or later
Audirvana is designed for playing high-res audio, which is music recorded at a much higher sampling rate than CD. High-res audio usually comes as AIFF, ALAC, or FLAC files, and the app supports the controversial MQA high-res streaming format that’s used by many premium music streaming sites, too.
MQA – Master Quality Authenticated – is essentially a way of squeezing (and digitally fingerprinting) lossless formats such as FLAC, and while it enables higher-than-CD quality in relatively small file sizes, it does so by throwing out some of the key musical detail. You’d need seriously expensive gear to notice the difference, but then high-res audio is aimed at precisely the kind of people who do have seriously expensive audio equipment.
If you already have high-res audio, you can bring it into Audirvana by pointing the app at specific folders for it to monitor, or you can sync with your iTunes library. That means resyncing every time you add new music, which isn’t ideal. (Note that lower quality audio files also work with the app.)
Alternatively, you can stream: Audirvana can connect to Qobuz, Tidal, or Highresaudio VirtualVault. You get a free month of Qobuz and three free months of Tidal with the app. As for the app itself, remember iTunes before it got flabby? That’s Audirvana. The main window shows the song or album art, there’s a sidebar for playlists and sources down the left side, a right sidebar for album data, and there are transport controls at the top. As music’s playing you’ll see its format and sound quality at the top right of the app, and the DAC (Digital Analog Converter) output quality at the top left.
Audirvana sounds fantastic. With plain 320Kbps MP3s it’s noticeably clearer than iTunes, but when you head into high-res audio territory it’s like moving from black and white to Technicolor. Much of the difference will depend on your headphones or speakers, of course, but tracks such as Radiohead’s “Burn The Witch” or “Identikit” in 24-bit, 96KHz breathe in a way MP3s don’t.
You can adjust the audio engine properties, force upsampling of lower quality tracks, and bring in Audio Unit plugins, but even without messing around it’s rather like having your ears squeegeed. Basically, if you love music you’ll love this app.
THE BOTTOM LINE. Got high-res audio hardware or headphones? This app brings out their magic.