Spotify to launch 'Hi-Fi' CD Quality Tier.

[sergeauckland]

That's not surprising since the overwhelming majority of people don't have decent speakers attached to their TV's. You can't really base any conclusions on the BBC seeing no benefits in going lossless.

(which doesn't necessarily mean the opposite either ofcourse)

This was streaming the Proms live or Listen Again on radio, not TV, so poor TV loudspeakers didn't come into it. It was also advertised as a trial, heavily covered by the HiFi magazines and on-line, so if anything, I would have expected the Golden Ears brigade to have enthusiastically endorsed it. It's possible, of course, that their feedback came mostly from people listening on Sonus boxes and Echo Dots, but my sample of one, listening on 'proper' equipment and really wanting to hear an improvement, I couldn't.

S.

 

[litemotiv]

Didn't know it was on radio, thanks for the clarification

 

[Willem]

And explicitly intended for discerning listeners.

 

[FrantzM]

Tidal sounds much better than lossless Apple music, so lossless alone doesn't guarantee sound quality.
Also lossy spotify sounds much worse than Deezer so I assume that even if they'd have lossless quality it won't be so good anyways

!!!!
Based on ??
Sighted?
You know that we have to be careful stating things like these, her on ASR?
Knowing that under blind conditions many (if not most) of us can't tell 256 Kb/s mp3 from lossless... I beg for clarifications, explanations, proofs.

 

[Pearljam5000]

!!!!
Based on ??
Sighted?
You know that we have to be careful stating things like these, her on ASR?
Knowing that under blind conditions many (if not most) of us can't tell 256 Kb/s mp3 from lossless... I beg for clarifications, explanations, proofs.

Obviously it's nothing scientific but my ears + my Focal speakers are all I need to come this conclusion, obviously it could be a software problem on Android, compatability issues etc etc
But Tidal sounded the best to me , then Deezer and only then Apple music and the worst was Spotify, even a cousin of mine it sounded like crap compared to Deezer and he's no audiophile
Oh and I can definitely hear a difference between lossy and lossless

 

[Willem]

Under controlled conditions?

 

[PierreV]

Obviously it's nothing scientific but my ears + my Focal speakers are all I need to come this conclusion, obviously it could be a software problem on Android, compatability issues etc etc
But Tidal sounded the best to me , then Deezer and only then Apple music and the worst was Spotify, even a cousin of mine it sounded like crap compared to Deezer and he's no audiophile
Oh and I can definitely hear a difference between lossy and lossless

That has to be some kind of technical issue indeed. I had Tidal/Qobuz/Spotify & Roon subscriptions at the same time, in some cases of attentive critical listening, I thought I could hear differences. Spotify might be slightly inferior, but there's no way I would describe it as sounding as "crap". In fact, I am only subscribing to Spotify these days. Dropped Qobuz first because of constant bugs in the player. Dropped Tidal because it would constantly push music I didn't want to listen to. Kept Spotify. Definitely not crap sounding on my 83 kgs Focal Utopias.

 

[SKBubba]

I think Tidal puts a little smiley eq on their streams. No proof, just observation.

 

[bluefuzz]

There is a downside to lossless streaming and it is the energy consumption.

While the energy consumption of streaming is obviously not trivial with hundreds of millions of users, it's not as bad as has often been reported: https://www.carbonbrief.org/factcheck-what-is-the-carbon-footprint-of-streaming-video-on-netflix

 

[gvl]

AAC at 320kbps

Spotify uses OGG Vorbis at 320kBps at its highest quality setting or 256kbps AAC on streaming devices, both of which are lossier than 320kBps AAC. Still sounds reasonably good, but I do find Qobuz streams sounding a bit more “defined".

 

[sergeauckland]

Spotify uses OGG Vorbis at 320kBps at its highest quality setting or 256kbps AAC on streaming devices, both of which are lossier than 320kBps AAC. Still sounds reasonably good, but I do find Qobuz streams sounding a bit more “defined".

I play Spotify on my Squeezebox Touch, and it reports Ogg Vorbis at 320kbps. LMS transcodes the Ogg to FLAC to send to the SBT itself.
BBC Radio 3 streams at 320kbps AAC-LC, so theoretically, BBC streams should be better quality, but if even if it is, I think that by the time one gets to 320kbps, I would expect any modern codec to be transparent for speech and music.

S.

 

[gvl]

I use Spotify and Qobuz on Daphile which is another LMS distro, Qobuz tends to sound cleaner but not by much, I’m generally satisfied with Spotify quality but if I can get lossless for about the same money I won’t complain.

 

[Soniclife]

I think Tidal puts a little smiley eq on their streams. No proof, just observation.

When I did a delta wave comparison I could get deep nulls, which is proof.

 

[FrantzM]

When I did a delta wave comparison I could get deep nulls, which is proof.

Care to explain? Be more explicit?

 

[Jimbob54]

Care to explain? Be more explicit?

I was wondering the same. Proof of eq on tidal or the opposite.

 

[Soniclife]

Care to explain? Be more explicit?

I compared a cd to a tidal version, sometimes there was a deep null between the versions, meaning they were the same, and could not be different data. I also found different recordings where there was a watermark was on the tidal version, which was what I was trying to prove. There is a thread on the forum about it.

 

[DanielT]

Obviously it's nothing scientific but my ears + my Focal speakers are all I need to come this conclusion, obviously it could be a software problem on Android, compatability issues etc etc
But Tidal sounded the best to me , then Deezer and only then Apple music and the worst was Spotify, even a cousin of mine it sounded like crap compared to Deezer and he's no audiophile
Oh and I can definitely hear a difference between lossy and lossless

Music from the same recording when you listened? Wondering if Tidal, on what you were listening to, pushed it through that rubbish M..Q something, or whatever it is called that they use?

The same listening volume? How do you know that?

What songs did you listen to?

 

[abdo123]

I compared a cd to a tidal version, sometimes there was a deep null between the versions, meaning they were the same, and could not be different data. I also found different recordings where there was a watermark was on the tidal version, which was what I was trying to prove. There is a thread on the forum about it.

how is this proof about the smiley EQ?

 

[Soniclife]

how is this proof about the smiley EQ?

Are you familiar with Delta wave?

 

[abdo123]

Are you familiar with Delta wave?

Yes but you said you had 'proof' of the smiley EQ but you also said that all you found was a watermark?