Hi-res audio streaming

I too can hear a difference but like you I’m not sure if it’s because I want to. I’ve gone back to Spotify as most of my listening is now on the commute to work on crap car speakers over Bluetooth.

Definite difference streaming the same song on Tidal via LDAC vs Spotify for me. I prefer the user experience of Tidal over Qobuz

Yeah I think I'll try Tidal as well, Qobuz is definitely a little bit more clunky than Spotify. And I'll kinda miss Google Home integration, but if it means MiniMonkey can't ask Google to play Barbie Girl any more I think I'm gonna call that a win.

I have Spotify and Amazon HD and CDs. The quality is in reverse order.  However I like Spotify for its diverse library.

I haven't yet heard headphones that were better than floor standing speakers but YMMV.

Nah the headphones won't replace the speakers, that's not the plan at all! But I do listen a lot on headphones, so I want to make that experience as nice as possible. I can do that wired in to the stereo with CDs/vinyl which is great, but it's nice to have decent quality when I'm working (from home in another room) or the Mrs is watching Call the Midwife and I'm writing on the laptop and listening in the same room like what we're doing now.

Tidal have this week tweaked their subscription levels, so now you get full-fat flac (assuming one is available on a track by track basis) on their standard tier. No brainer I reckon.

Don't think that hi-res works over most BT earphones tho, but if you're wired should be dandy.

Stream to my analogue amp w a Chromecast audio which can cope w flac datarates.

I use Spotify for parties/get togethers - the group playlist where multiple people can queue songs is a good feature, or in the car or gym etc. Then Tidal for when I want to settle down and listen to something properly

I've been using Qobuz Studio for a couple of years and am very pleased with it. Sound quality is excellent via a Wiim Pro streamer and a Chord dac

Nah, hi res is useful if you’re in the studio and working with compression/eq on stems and mixing but for myself I’m perfectly happy with cd quality from Tidal/Apple music. Good mastering of content is far more beneficial

Tidal is great for streaming quality and better artist remuneration. Prices have dropped so bin Spotify.

Don’t think that hi-res works over most BT earphones tho, but if you’re wired should be dandy.

It doesn’t, and yes, you would. There’s some new wireless technology for audio that should handle lossless, but the headphones I’ve seen reviewed were £1400. Stuff that. I use Apple Music, because it’s a continuity with iTunes, and I’ve been using Apple kit for years. All my headphones and earphones are wired, my overear headphones are Røde NTH-100’s, Australian studio spec ‘phones that are as good as you could want, and you can pick them up from Amazon for around £130 or thereabouts.
I love them, they’re closed back, you can lock the earcups in place once they’re adjusted to your liking, and the cables can be plugged and locked in place on either earpiece.
I’m sure there are golden eared souls who would be able to find fault with them, I can hear a slight difference between 230kps and lossless, subtle, but definitely an improvement worth having.

Spotify can go do one. I hate their business practices and how they see the music industry. 🖕🏼

I use:

Family Spotify for commuting, gym, work and podcasts.
My own Qobuz for Hifi and serious listening sessions.

Qobuz 100% sounds better but takes more data and kills your battery faster if out and about. If you are on iOS you can't EQ and won't get the benefit over Bluetooth. That said, I picked up a pair of 7Hz x Crinacle Zero:2 off Amazon for less than a set of AirPod Pro replacement tips; they sound amazing after burn in. Great for hi res users on a budget.

I decided to ditch Spotify and trialled Tidal and Apple Music before settling on the latter. Massive quality difference on both and Tidal just had the edge but the reason I went with Apple is the integration with Apple CarPlay. Also, SongShift is a great free app which transfers playlists between music streaming platforms.

I listen to a mix of YouTube, Amazon Music & Tidal depending on the device - I'm no audiophile but there's quite a few tracks even I can tell the difference (with Tidal being better), although I'm actually rarely in a quiet situation focusing on the music so it's not that big of a deal to me.

Apple music, works great and will suggest lots of music and playlists that you will like.

One major benefit if you use it mobile when you download music it puts it in a download section where you can still select by artist etc.

I've used Tidal, Qobuz, and Apple Music but have settled on Amazon HD. Mainly because it plays nice with Echo devices in the house. Use Bluetooth earbuds or headphones now. No, they won't do lossless, but the bitrates are higher than what Spotify supports I think, so there is a noticeable benefit. Atmos too, which is interesting sometimes.

Now Tidal has dropped its prices might revisit that. The main downside with Amazon is it's my account, but the family use it all the time, so all the recently/most listened and recommendation algorithms are pointless.

My highly subjective opinion is that Tidal is not as good as their marketing says - or I just can't hear it, even through my mid-life-crisis headphones.  Qobuz is marginally better than all I've tried.  Deezer is not bad either, but a better app than Qobuz.

And while not a streaming service, Bandcamp sound quality can be very good (depending on the recording).  Which is fun for head-to-head comparisons with streamed music, when you have nothing better to do.

As already commented above, if your music goes through bluetooth before it reaches your ears, then almost certainly none of this matters.

 if your music goes through bluetooth before it reaches your ears, then almost certainly none of this matters.

Is this true when comparing 320kbps Spotify streams with 850kbps+ streams from the others? Accept that middle-aged ears may struggle 🙂

, if your music goes through bluetooth before it reaches your ears, then almost certainly none of this matters.

So Sony have developed LDAC and Qualcomm have developed aptX for nothing?

It makes a difference

I’m sold on lossless. I’ve been using tidal for about a year and the UI is fine but I definitely find it frequently buggy or crashing. The windows desktop app is particularly poor. Using tidal connect is even less reliable again.

I’ll probably try Apple Music next.

[So Sony have developed LDAC and Qualcomm have developed aptX for nothing?]

Lots if different standards out there it seems, and multiple flavors of  AptX. Whether you can get LDAC and AptX HD depends on the kit you have - phone and ears. Lots of kit doesn't seem to do the hi-res AptX versions despite it being around for a while. But while they are hi-res both codecs compress and uncompress on the journey so not proper lossless. So I guess you still need a wired connection to get the best quality. I think my ears can tell the difference, but that might be confirmation bias.....

https://www.whathifi.com/advice/aptx-hd-bluetooth-what-it-how-can-you-get-it

The only way you can get Hi-Res (i.e lossless) over bluetooth is to use a snapdragon certified phone like Asus or Sony. Iphones can't do bluetooth hi res neither can samsung or 99% of smartphones. Even then is basically doesn't work very well as the codec is adaptive and keeps resetting to lower bit rates as soon as the wavelength gets crowded which is quite often. Check out Darko Audio if you fancy a complicated and quite boring rabbit hole on the subject.

The good news is that a well mastered track doesn't need to be lossless to sound good.

Spotify always sounds pretty bad though - I use Deezer and Apple music and both clearly sound better through a cheap £150 DAC

I'm pretty sure that Qobuz sounds clearer to my ears over LDAC (Pixel 7 and Sony XM4s) than over standard Bluetooth, and it definitely sounds better than Spotify on the same connection.

Appreciate it's not lossless, but I'd say it's better.

Yet to try through the stereo (Chromecast Audio into an old Audiolab amp and Q Audio speakers so decent but not exactly high end) so it'll be interesting how that sounds.

I've never been happy listening to MP3s or Spotify, so IMO it's worth getting something nearer CD quality, even on Bluetooth headphones. It's the high frequencies for some reason, it sounds harsh and shrill to me, strings, high vocals (Bee Gees!)

It's the next step in quality to wired headphones, lossless and external DACs I'm less convinced I can notice a difference. Convenience won out for me and I stick with wireless headphones over LDAC/SSC and the phone/tablet.

Currently listening to apple classical in Hi-Res lossless (24/192) from my iPhone at work through an old version 1 iFi Hip Dac (£100) into some KZ ATE wired IEMs (£20) and it sounds absolutely fantastic.

I'm not sure I could be arsed to mess around with hi res bluetooth until it gets a lot less finnicky. I do have some bluetooth earbuds with LDAC but apple doesn't support that codec so they just revert to AAC which is a bit of a pain.

I'm on Android rather than Apple and my phone and headphones both support LDAC so that works for me. I feel through luck rather than judgement, to be fair.

There's definitely a balance between quality and convenience for me. Hi Res streaming and CDs and vinyl when I can feel like about the right sweet spot for me.

I used Qobuz for ages (until maybe 5-6 years ago). It had a geat jazz collection but I didn’t get on with the UI and stability.

I use Apple Music currently, which now has lossless available even on their PC client.

That said I’m happy with 256 AAC. Last time I did an A/B test I had to focus to look for differences, and that was through a decent monitoring system.

Based on this I'm currently on a free trial of tidal. Have Wiim pros, so tidal connect and decent outputs connected through optical leads. Q acoustics M20s in the kitchen, Yamaha AV amp and Dali floorstanders in the lounge. Maybe it's my ears, or I'm doing it wrong, but I'm not sure I hear the difference over Spotify, I am about to try a back to back comparison now though. Perhaps the gigs I've been to really did do more damage than I'd realised!

Briefly entertained a 3 month trial of Tidal. It did sound "better" but not as much as it would justify switching from my Spotify family account.

It's looking like their "hifi" tier isn't too far away. I saw a Redditor commenting...

"[Updated April 11, 2024] Then, in April 2024, the same Spotify user found code in more recent versions of the Spotify app hinting that that the (never unveiled) Supremium tier “is dead.” In its place: a “Music Pro” add-on that would offer up to 24-bit/44.1kHz lossless playback plus a headphone “enhancement/optimization” feature. Music Pro could also include “advanced mixing” tools similar to those detailed in this Wall Street Journal article, the Reddit user said. No word on pricing, however."

I'll stick with Spotto as I like the front end more than any others, got heaps of maintained playlists etc. Works for me.

I'm on Tidal (hifi). The kids use Spotify in the kitchen. Back-to-back on a decent system the difference between 320kps vs 16bit/44.1 is noticeable (or should be). Whether it matters to you will depend on how you tend to listen to music/ your ears/ your system, and is your call. In the kitchen/workshop it doesn't matter much either way to me. On the 'good' system it does though.

Hi-res isn't a big deal for me. I quite liked MQA but my latest DAC doesn't do MQA so it's not relevant now.

[quite liked MQA but my latest DAC doesn’t do MQA so it’s not relevant now]

Isn't it also the case that the MQA consortium went west, so no need to worry about MQA compatibility anymore. Also the reason tidal dropped MQA and went FLAC etc

Use Spotify for convenience, the UI and family so my daughter has her own access. Have had Qobuz and Tidal before, now settling back into Tidal for proper listening. For me it definitely sounds better than Spotify but I don't really like the UI.

So Sony have developed LDAC

LDAC needs a really good clear connection otherwise it's rate drops a fair bit to cope. That 990 is at best and you'll find more often than not it's streaming at much lower than 990. Maybe as low as 320.

That being said, sounds fine to me using my s23 Ultra and my wh-xm4's

I've just switched to TIDAL but can only play on my audio system via BT. My network streamer supports Spotify Connect but not TIDAL Connect.

For full quality, do I need to get a WiiM Mini or other TConnect enabled device?

TiA

I wouldn't use the WiiM mini in my system, get the WiiM pro as it has a much more capable dac

The output from the WiiM Minin would go through a Topping D50s before the amp.

So I'm finding LDAC on the Pixel a pain. You have to enable it in developer settings which is fine, the HD audio toggle stays set. But every time you reconnect the Bluetooth it loses the settings (to get decent performance you have to drop it to 24 bit from 32 and up the quality to 660 or 990). Which is a faff.

Going to try wired next, but of course the old USB-C to 3.5mm jack adapter I have doesn't work, because the Huawei phone it came with had a built in DAC and the Pixel doesn't.

So now I need a roofer with a DAC in it.

Why is nothing flipping simple?

The output from the WiiM Minin would go through a Topping D50s before the amp.
Posted 15 minutes ago

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The Wim pro/plus also does chromecast and is Roon ready, up to you to decide - The D50 is a cracking wee dac

So...would a WiiM mini be a reasonably option for TIDAL Connect?

Is an answer  coming?

Yes. I have both the Mini and Pro and they are exactly the same.

What was said above about different DACS is wrong, as they share the same one.

The Pro Plus has a different AKM DAC.

I settled on the Pro via coaxial digital out for my main system just because really, I can't tell the difference in real terms between digital outs, on the headphone system or main hifi.

I also use Amazon HD and as said a few times, the actual mastering quality seems to make the biggest difference once a digital CD quality file level is reached.

the actual mastering quality seems to make the biggest difference once a digital CD quality file level is reached.

Dat’s true, dat! As I’ve said before, back in the days of vinyl, the quality of a vinyl release could change over the course of the first year of release; for example Dire Straits ‘Love Over Gold’ was mastered by Bob Ludwig at Masterdisk, and the first pressings were made from stampers from Masterdisk, but over time damage and wear happens, so replacements need to be sourced, and it’s not feasible to get them from Masterdisk, so stereo copies of the original studio master tapes were sent out, and new masters were cut by local mastering studios, so already there’s a copy of a copy being used, so degradation is taking place, before you even take into account the mastering engineer may well not be as good as Ludwig was.
CD’s were worse, they were originally mastered from stereo master tapes EQ’d from vinyl, which has a completely different dynamic range, before you get into the whole shitfest that’s known as ‘the Loudness Wars’, where the record companies mantra was literally ‘everything louder than everything else’, Oasis’ ‘What’s The Story (Morning Glory)’, and Metallica’s ‘Death Magnetic’ being almost the definition of the process.

https://www.soundonsound.com/sound-advice/dynamic-range-loudness-war

Then I won't be putting my D50s betwixt the WiiM and my amp as, derrrrr, the output from the WiiM is analogue.

I need to check my spare inputs on the amp and go from there with my choice.

Thanks.

Not quite sure I follow Mr Starship.

The WiiM devices all put out analogue and digital but, the sound through digital with a good external DAC, like your D50 is a fair bit better than the WiiMs' internal DAC.

Not sure if it is as big a difference with the WiiM Pro plus, but the other two for sure sound better with external.

These days the best thing you can do if you have an older Hifi system is buy a Wiim mini or pro and run it into one of the many many budget pre-amp dacs on the market using optical. the pre-amp then acts as your digital source selector and you can also plug in your phone and computer. For instance my amp only has 2 sets of analogue inputs and no digital ones but thats no problem as I only use one of them coming straight from my SMSL M300SE Dac, Preamp. Plugged into that are 3 separate sources (WIIM , CD Transport, Computer or phone). The spare analogue input on my amp can then be used for a turntable if needed.

  but there are loads of them out there that do similar