I can speak for Tidal, actually you can choose to listen to lossy streams, just to save some internet data. It has 3 profiles : Master (flac & mqa), Hifi (320kbs MP3) and Normal (I don't know, never used it)
Hifi profile is perfectly fine, because you don't use it at home with your main Hifi setup. And don't we forget that not the whole Tidal catalogue is in "Master" profile, some album has only Hifi or even Normal profile.
Just my 2 cents...
edit: sorry, for sure I made some confusion with the profile names & bitrate correspondence. but the main topic is still there
Sorry, but yes, you made some errors ;-)
Tidal app has 4 profils :
- Low : AAC 96kbps VBR
- High : AAC 320kbps VBR
- HiFi (only with HiFi subscription) : FLAC 16/44.1 or 48 (from about 700 to about 900kbps)
- Master (only with HiFi subscription) : all MQA tracks, being FLAC from 16/44.1 to 24/48 with additionnal MQA data added (from 700 for 16/44.1 to a bit less than 2000kbps for 24/48). Once decoded (first unfold, which can be done in Tidal app or software like Roon, Audirvana, UAPP...) you get the same bit depth but twice the sample rate. If you have a MQA renderer DAC, you get more upsampling (rendering), and if you have a MQA decoder+renderer, it can do all decoding+rendering.
Have deezer exlusive mode?
No, the only option in Deezer app is Volume normalization.
Spotify app (Premium or not) : same as Deezer. It uses your default device output.
Amazon Music app (HD or not) has exclusive mode but not Bit Perfect (only Amazon Music app can use the selected device, but not Bit Perfect)
Tidal app has exclusive mode and Bit Perfect, and the choice of decoding MQA (only first unfold) or sending it unprocessed
Qobuz app is like Tidal app, but add ASIO support
The only way to get ASIO support for Tidal is to use other soaftware like Roon or other, or for all app to use something like VBA HiFi Cable from the app output and it will send it to ASIO device.
@trl,
@RayDunzl
I am planning to use a dedicated network streamer with digital outs like Yamaha WXC-50 or blue sound node 2i to be fed into Genelecs via SPDIF and AES/ebu. I will use minidsp for sub correction. currently I tend to go for WXC-50 as they are cheaper but blue sound can be an option as well if there are good reasons.
Coming to the main question.
Spotify & Apple has largest collection of Indian music compared to Tidal or Qobuz. So in my case, the best will be to go for a combination of both Spotify or Apple Music (Indian) and Tidal or Qobuz (non-Indian). The service will then have to work with new Yamaha WXC-50 I assume the WXC-50 with digital out for Spotify and Tidal or Qobuz will sound much better than the current Apple Music via Apple 4K TV to AVR Yamaha 775 via analogue output. I do not have any CD or FLAC collection though. On the other hand music cast does not work with MQA for Tidal.
Question is which streaming service Apple Music Vs Spotify Vs Tidal Vs Qobuz at the end will be optimal for my case. From looking at this thread, all of them are quite decent and one cannot differentiate much from each other. Is my understanding correct?
If your streamer will host the app, then even Tidal Master can work : the app will decode it up to 24/88.2 or 96, which can then be send through SPDIF.
At this moment, I would say that Qobuz, Tidal HiFi, Amazon HD and Deezer Hifi have the best sound as they can at least play FLAC 16/44.1. I didn't test Apple Music. Spotify (until they start their FLAC offer), Tidal Premium or Deezer Premium (their basic offer) will be limited to 320kbps, and the difference can be heard, even if not huge and depending on the music style/production choice.