Amazon Music appalling sound quality

[dmac6419]

Am i reading your post correctly? Amazon only charges you a monthly $2 surcharge over your prime membership? I have prime and they still want (now as of today) an additional $7.99/mo not $2. WTF, do you have pictures of Bezos with a small furry animal in a compromising position or something

Amazon just dropped the price it's $7.99 and Amazon Music HD is available for free to Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers

 

[Robin L]

Same with youtube music. Much of it is really crap sound quality. Low bitrate mp3. But there are some songs on it that have good sound so they must vary the audio file format maybe according to how many hits the song gets. If I listen to obscure songs with few views the sq is horrible.
But big hits have better sq. like this one with over a billion views;

I think the variable is the majors now distributing via YouTube, so the sources are getting better. There's still a lot of amateur needledrops representing songs on YouTube, but their sound is getting better. I've got Amazon HD. What's really weird are some back catalog classical items with horrid wow and flutter. If I back up and start over, it often fixes itself. It's analogous to a YouTube going blurry for a bit.

 

[Astrozombie]

I know I've noticed sometimes using prime video that the picture quality was lacking, wouldn't be surprised. Vudu is also notorious for this (owned by Walmart) sometimes being glitchy.

 

[escksu]

My ears are telling me that's precisely what they've done.

It's very annoying, a decent lossy codec would be absolutely fine.

OK, since this is ASR, I have to ask if you have any evidence to back your claims. How do you know if its not due to placebo effects?

 

[Ismapics]

Looking at this thread, has anyone noticed the change with Amazon Music. They just upgraded the stream to 16/44.1K Lossless. That is just ok for me.

 

[asr1837373829w936q9]

Yeah, previously I had to pay for HD subscription and now lossless quality is included for free with Unlimited. Competition with Apple drives the prices down ;-)

 

[Ismapics]

Yeah, previously I had to pay for HD subscription and now lossless quality is included for free with Unlimited. Competition with Apple drives the prices down ;-)

Yes a good thing. That screenshot is not unlimited, that is Prime Music. One step under.

 

[Ismapics]

Just got better jumping from 16/44.1 to 24/96. "Great Success"

 

[Rottmannash]

I posted about this a year or so ago--on certain albums I found the regular "free" version (with a Prime membership) had major and obvious issues. I upgraded to Amazon Music HD and found that ALL of the issues I had previously disappeared. This had nothing at all to do with bitrate, I could stream on my phone, laptop, change the bitrate my computer sent to my DAC, and the problem was just solved.

What does this say about the regular "free" Amazon music service? I don't know.

I've listened on the Prime "free" version and think the sound quality is atrocious.

 

[Ismapics]

I've listened on the Prime "free" version and think the sound quality is atrocious.

Well for my 53 year old ears and gear I am using and listening as I write, for me is mighty fine. I am near field while working on my computer. Nothing to complain about. Again, this is Amazon Prime (included with Prime) Music. For critical listening I have my main system, but the right now here its just fine.

 

[Rottmannash]

Yes a good thing. That screenshot is not unlimited, that is Prime Music. One step under.

So there's the limited selection if one has Prime membership, then an Unlimited plan and a HD Plan?

 

[Ismapics]

So there's the limited selection if one has Prime membership, then an Unlimited plan and a HD Plan?

Yes that is correct, about 2M songs vs 70M for unlimited. I am ok with it. There is plenty to discover.

 

[fun]

Looking at this thread, has anyone noticed the change with Amazon Music. They just upgraded the stream to 16/44.1K Lossless. That is just ok for me.

View attachment 137388

May I know where we can get to this screen? I can't find it on my Amazon apps on iPhone and MacBook.

 

[DimitryZ]

Amazon just dropped the price it's $7.99 and Amazon Music HD is available for free to Amazon Music Unlimited subscribers

That's what I had to do when I found out recently that my HD subscription became an Unlimited subscription - to subscribe to a free HD upgrade. Seems like an ugly hack - but SQ is excellent in my experience.

 

[Ismapics]

May I know where we can get to this screen? I can't find it on my Amazon apps on iPhone and MacBook.

Hello: I am using the Apple Amazon Prime Music App that I downloaded from: https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=16962657011

There is an Icon that reads HD, you click it and gives you the details. Running it on an M1 Mac Mini

Cheers, iml

 

[fun]

Hello: I am using the Apple Amazon Prime Music App that I downloaded from: https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=16962657011

There is an Icon that reads HD, you click it and gives you the details. Running it on an M1 Mac Mini

Cheers, iml
View attachment 137402View attachment 137403

Thank you. That makes sense. Since I only use Prime Music (no HD), I don't see the 'HD' icon. Next time when they have the 4-month free trial like recently, I may try it out . Agree with few comments here regarding the quality of Prime Music, which is mostly unlistenable, except on my workout bluetooth earbud.

 

[Slayer]

So there's the limited selection if one has Prime membership, then an Unlimited plan and a HD Plan?

The unlimited plan and HD plan are now the same thing.
Only two plans available, Basic prime and unlimited Hd plan.

 

[Ismapics]

Thank you. That makes sense. Since I only use Prime Music (no HD), I don't see the 'HD' icon. Next time when they have the 4-month free trial like recently, I may try it out . Agree with few comments here regarding the quality of Prime Music, which is mostly unlistenable, except on my workout bluetooth earbud.

FYI, I am not an HD Music subscriber, just Prime and get the Icon just the same.

 

[Ismapics]

FYI, I am not an HD Music subscriber, just Prime and get the Icon just the same.

Just made me realize that I apparently ordered the HD service on my phone and had not realized. uhh will test it then and think if I keep it.

 

[dmac6419]

That's what I had to do when I found out recently that my HD subscription became an Unlimited subscription - to subscribe to a free HD upgrade. Seems like an ugly hack - but SQ is excellent in my experience.

Um I already had HD,they just drop the price I didn't have to do anything.