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Apple lossless official announcement

Beershaun

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DavidS

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The fact that the DAC might handle 24/192 does not mean the USB interface can.

Regardless, the link above probably does not have up-to-date info. As far as I know, the DAC chip is custom. Also, the specs do not conform with the measurements of @amirm, which shows a 10 dB better SINAD than the Cirrus spec.

I tried Norah Jones Cold Cold Heart at 124/92kHz through the Apple Dongle and it sounded fine.
 

norcalscott

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I really don't see why people are so happy about this. If eventually it means the end of Qobuz, Tidal and Spotify it also means the end of streaming to platforms that are not from the big manufacturers. I don't think Apple are going to care about those who want to stream to Linux and Pi based players. Amazon and Google already don't care.

Once the small players are gone you'll be forced to buy Apple hardware and subscription prices will go back up.

I agree with this sentiment. While it is great that Apple is getting on the "high-res music" bandwagon finally, I do not think this bodes well for overall competition and technologies for audio consumption.

Many of the same folks who are part of the "MQA is the devil" club are more than happy to buy in wholly to the Apple walled garden ecosystem where one or two big companies stand to control nearly all digital music distribution. As mentioned in another post, none of the existing services are making much if any money, so having to lower prices to compete with two companies that have more money than God will likely eliminate any innovation that can come from these entities, or at worst do them in entirely. I don't think that is a good thing. Being able to use services like Tidal or Quboz on a wide range of hardware and software platforms is more important to me than anything I can get on a closed platform, at any price.

Meanwhile, the music industry is happy to sit back and watch competition dwindle - make no mistake, they would love to see limited distribution points to which they can dictate terms. Maybe Apple will be the good guy in this and force the labels to their terms, and keep prices low forever (if you have an Apple branded device). Maybe Amazon will be the savior and open up their platform to third part integrations? Maybe Dolby will save us all by open sourcing their proprietary CODECs? If you believe any of that then I have a bridge to sell you :)
 

voodooless

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I agree with this sentiment. While it is great that Apple is getting on the "high-res music" bandwagon finally, I do not think this bodes well for overall competition and technologies for audio consumption.

Sure, if you look at the immediate reaction of Amazon, we're heading towards a full-on audio streaming war.

As mentioned in another post, none of the existing services are making much if any money, so having to lower prices to compete with two companies that have more money than God will likely eliminate any innovation that can come from these entities, or at worst do them in entirely.

They've had all the time in the world to innovate. Spotify could have just released lossless audio instead of making promises. Now they are too late. I won't even start on the "innovation" called MQA. But I'm not even sure there is a lot to innovate really? Most of it takes place on the marketing front, with very little actual value for the users.

I don't think that is a good thing. Being able to use services like Tidal or Quboz on a wide range of hardware and software platforms is more important to me than anything I can get on a closed platform, at any price.

Seems to me that Apple Music already works just fine cross-platform with clients like these: https://github.com/cryptofyre/Apple-Music-Electron . Better than nothing I guess :facepalm:
 

wgb113

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This is great news for those of us that enjoy the walled off Apple garden. Everyone else can still vote with their wallet and pick the streaming service they want for the hardware they prefer.

I recently cancelled my Tidal Masters subscription because MQA has been exposed as a fraud. Not sure people like me are going to push Tidal into the ground.

I won’t be renewing my Roon subscription as a result of this announcement but I’d guess I’m in the minority there as well.

I see Apple entering the lossless and hi-res categories as a good thing for music lovers. Hopefully Spotify follows suit for all of their customers as well!
 

jensgk

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I recently cancelled my Tidal Masters subscription because MQA has been exposed as a fraud. Not sure people like me are going to push Tidal into the ground.
I won’t be renewing my Roon subscription as a result of this announcement but I’d guess I’m in the minority there as well.

I did the same thing, cancelled Tidal and Roon. I still have them installed and might take a one month subscription on occasion, if I feel like.

At the moment I have Spotify Family Premium (Spotify since 2011, Family since 2018), and also I am on my second month of Qobuz.

I see Apple entering the lossless and hi-res categories as a good thing for music lovers. Hopefully Spotify follows suit for all of their customers as well!

I hope so too.
 

DuxServit

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Not much to gain for Apple, Roon Labs, or you as the customer.

BTW Apple Music already uses AMG for its metadata.

I was referring more to the UI/UX perspective and the delivery architecture (i.e. bridge, endpoints, etc.).
 

Descartes

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Now Apple just needs to release new headphones to support the uncompressed music!
 

norcalscott

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They've had all the time in the world to innovate. Spotify could have just released lossless audio instead of making promises. Now they are too late. I won't even start on the "innovation" called MQA. But I'm not even sure there is a lot to innovate really? Most of it takes place on the marketing front, with very little actual value for the users.
Agree with you here, especially for Spotify - they could have done much more to leverage their leadership position the past few years by innovating to offer better sound and more connectivity options. They have sat on their laurels and these Apple and Amazon announcements will likely hurt them more than anyone else.

For Tidal, leaving MQA aside, they have at least done Tidal Connect and not tried to stand in the way of third parties developing integrations. Them doing so probably forced Quboz's hand to do some of the same. I worry that if these services are fighting for their lives financially then they will cut off this openness, although I suppose it could have the opposite effect. Hard to say what Tidal's new ownership will do - they are not known for extreme openness, at least with the Twitter ecosystem.
 

oryan_dunn

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The fact that the DAC might handle 24/192 does not mean the USB interface can.

Regardless, the link above probably does not have up-to-date info. As far as I know, the DAC chip is custom. Also, the specs do not conform with the measurements of @amirm, which shows a 10 dB better SINAD than the Cirrus spec.
I didn't realize the adapter also had a USB chip. I'm not familiar with the inner workings of lightning, but does all digital communication on the lightning port happen via the USB protocol?
 

JustAnandaDourEyedDude

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So it appears Amir was right about the future prospects (or lack thereof) of MQA. Allow me to rephrase that. It appears Amir was so right about the future prospects of MQA. The big streaming services have completely ignored MQA when going lossless (yay!). Hopefully, Warner will now abandon their project of replacing all their marketed RBCDs with MQA-CDs.

The war among streaming services will continue, but it is unlikely to be on the basis of further price reductions. The music labels would probably resist the idea of further reductions. Hopefully, the competition would continue along the lines of improvements in UIs, music reco algorithms and hardware compatibility and flexibility.
 
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oryan_dunn

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I know it won't happen, but I wish Apple could use their weight to force a change in royalty distribution to a model similar/same to the proposed model by Deezer:
https://www.deezer.com/ucps
If I stream an unknown artists all month long, I don't think it's fair that nearly all (if not all due to rounding) would go to all the other popular artists on the platform and not the artists I streamed all month long.
 

Somafunk

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I know it won't happen, but I wish Apple could use their weight to force a change in royalty distribution to a model similar/same to the proposed model by Deezer:

I belive Square (Jack Dorsey/Twitter) with their recent acquisition to have control over tidal do have the ability to pay artists directly per stream, whether Jack/square will implement this payment method is another discussion though.
 

voodooless

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I didn't realize the adapter also had a USB chip. I'm not familiar with the inner workings of lightning, but does all digital communication on the lightning port happen via the USB protocol?

Yes, It's USB. I did make a booboo though. @amirm tested the USB-C Apple dongle, not the lightning version. They might not have the same electronics inside. Most of the argument still stands though.
 

Darwin

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Apple doesn't even support Apt-X HD or LDAC for bluetooth music streaming, in their opinion AAC is enough (or Airplay for lossless over Wifi).

Apple supports AptX from Macs but not iOS devices. I think it's up to 96khz but would have to check to be sure.
 

Darwin

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This is great news for those of us that enjoy the walled off Apple garden. Everyone else can still vote with their wallet and pick the streaming service they want for the hardware they prefer.
I recently cancelled my Tidal Masters subscription because MQA has been exposed as a fraud. Not sure people like me are going to push Tidal into the ground.
I won’t be renewing my Roon subscription as a result of this announcement but I’d guess I’m in the minority there as well.
I see Apple entering the lossless and hi-res categories as a good thing for music lovers. Hopefully Spotify follows suit for all of their customers as well!

I will dump Tidal for sure and sadly Roon too since they don't work with Apple Music. I will miss Roons information about what you are playing though. Spotify is crap as far as I am concerned (treat artists badly, lots of junk tracks, poor codec, no feature like iTunes Match) and I switched to Apple Music the day it came out. I also pay for Pandora because they still have the best radio stations.
Apple music does have a web client.
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207717
 
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