Music Streaming Services

Discussion in 'Computer Audiophile: Software, Configs, Tools' started by rott, Feb 22, 2017.

  1. Riotvan

    Riotvan Snoofer in the Woofer

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    Got asio to work with the stock player, seems for 192khz to work i need to max out the buffer setting. Probably due to my weird setup; i run win10 inside a VM under linux with a Digigram VX-222e passed through to it. Lower sample rates usually don't cause problems, go 192khz and it seems fucked. Maybe i shouldn't blame the player for this one but it has had other quirks which i've seen when running natively under win10 as well.

    I mean i tweaked the shit out of this VM, if i pass through a gfx card i can play games at same performance as native.
     
  2. psuKinger

    psuKinger Facebook Friend

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    Yes the web browser goes through the audio mixer. I found the qobuz web browser works rock-solid for me when I'm at work (on a Linux machine)... and I don't have any options available to install a desktop player, and that's just the best I can do.

    At home I rely on Roon to access both Tidal and Qobuz... and I *really* like it. The only good reason I can think of not to do, the reason I didn't do it for a couple of years after learning of it, is/was cost... otherwise it's just about perfect, IMO. If only they'd figure out a way for me to be able to use it when I'm not at home, I think it would be...
     
  3. Riotvan

    Riotvan Snoofer in the Woofer

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    Well getting Qobuz to work under linux is pretty much impossible now if you want native apps anyway. They revoked api keys for both Kodi and Strawberry. That's why i'm running it all inside a VM, problem seem to be mostly fixed anyway, just the random oh the skip bar stops working randomly bug remains.
    Am actually looking at a streamer and might as well get some Dirac while i'm at it.
     
  4. psuKinger

    psuKinger Facebook Friend

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    I'm not sure what you're thinking in terms of streamers, but I saw a video review from John Darko a couple weeks ago about a Primare Prisma np5 and I filed it away mentally as a "that could be a good option if/when I need it".... *FYI*. I'm sure you've already got a plan/something in mind, but I personally had never heard of it/them before that popped up on my youtube recommended videos, FWIW. If/when they get to be "Roon Ready" I'm probably gonna pick one up to see what I think...
     
  5. Riotvan

    Riotvan Snoofer in the Woofer

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    Well it's more like i want a digital crossover and Dirac and the miniDSP Studio comes with a streamer :)
    That Primare looks interesting none the less but probably not for me at that price. Assuming it only does streaming ofc.
     
  6. allegro

    allegro Friend

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    Anyone already upgraded from Win 10 1809 to 1909 build? I postpone these upgrades for a few months to make sure bugs are gone. There is a report on another forum that the latest version of Amazon Music HD is able to autoswitch sample rates on the 1909 build due to changes in Windows mixer.
     
  7. Riotvan

    Riotvan Snoofer in the Woofer

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    Have it running on my system and it works fine with Games and Qobuz, also works great inside a vm with Qobuz. It was a relatively small update. I guess they can't take any risks since they replaced all the beta testers with regular users.
     
  8. Riotvan

    Riotvan Snoofer in the Woofer

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    Anyone using Volumio with Qobuz? It's a bit of a nightmare. Constant skipping during the middle of a song, sometimes it happens not too much but today it's f'ing bullshit. In about an hour i've had over 15 songs that were skipped mid playback.

    Streamer is a Minidsp SHD Studio. Not sure if it's the streamer, volumio or Qobuz. It happens with both ethernet and wifi.
     
  9. Metro

    Metro Friend

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    I was about to post this in the Tidal discussion thread, but I thought this would be a better place.

    I subscribe to no less than 4 services: Google, Spotify, Tidal, and Qobuz.

    We have Google and Spotify on family plan. I don't use Google music (the family does) but it includes ad-free YouTube which I would hate to give up. Spotify's Discover Weekly has been incredibly good at introducing me to unfamiliar music and musicians that I find interesting and often following up on.

    I've had Tidal a few years. Although Tidal HiFi is lossless, I was very frustrated that many albums from Universal Music Group (huge conglomerate that owns many music labels) nevertheless had their audible watermark which destroys sound quality. The watermark was also on Spotify but I never heard it on Qobuz. When Tidal introduced MQA, I found that Masters albums weren't watermarked, so this was a real side benefit of MQA (nothing to do with supposed advantages of MQA encoding). Lately UMG has been replacing albums with non watermarked versions (link) and this is now much less of a problem.

    I previously had a trial subscription to Qobuz UK and joined when they launched in the US (beginning of 2019). Qobuz has now become my primary music service but it took over a year to get there. It has taken that long for their US catalog to catch up to their European catalog and for their player to become reasonably reliable (you may have still complaints about the Qobuz app, but it was much much worse before).

    I'm now in a position where I listen mostly on Qobuz and I can drop Tidal, but the Best Buy one-year plan is low enough that I don't mind keeping it. The thing is that I occasionally come across gaps in the catalog. For example Tidal and Qobuz both have Sony Classical and you'd expect them to have the same albums, right? Well, mostly but not quite. Every once in a while I may come across a random Sony Classical album that's on Tidal but not Qobuz, or vice versa. Makes no sense at all and frustrating that I can't just pick one service.
     
  10. Jigitz

    Jigitz New

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    That Tidal HiFi deal from BestBuy looks like a great deal but you need to create a new account to use it. That stinks!
     
  11. Metro

    Metro Friend

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  12. Jigitz

    Jigitz New

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    Yea, I saw that after posting. I am doing that. Thanks for the heads up.
     
  13. Gallealonso

    Gallealonso New

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    There are a large number of cool services with music, each of which has its advantages and disadvantages! I'm also looking for a cool music service!
     
  14. elwappo99

    elwappo99 Friend

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    Bumping an old thread with info I stumbled on:

    Qobuz is offering a further discount if you pay annually: $149.99 annually which is equivalent to $12.49/month versus the $14.99 current rate.

    https://www.qobuz.com/us-en/music/streaming/offers

    I think more people have Tidal, but I have both Tidal and Qobuz, and do enjoy Qobuz quite a bit.
     
  15. Metro

    Metro Friend

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  16. psuKinger

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    I must expect/demand too much from Music Streaming Services, because I find myself paying for (way) too many of them...

    Qobuz - is my personal favorite (Roon integration for home, Sound Quality, web player presentation when at work). My overall preference for how it sounds, how it presents information to me, and how it *default* works (listening to whole albums or playlists as-built rather than "shuffle" as a default).
    Tidal - Roon integration, and Qobuz library occassionally lacking; Tidal has some more "mainstream" features like Artist Radio that seem to either be weaker or more lacking than Qobuz (and Roon radio has taken a step back, for me at least, over the last year or so).
    Spotify - Neither Tidal or Qobuz will 1) Integrate with Google Home (mostly for my kids) or my car (Tesla; mostly for me).
    Youtube Music - Almost no value; carry-over from Google Play Music days, but "for free" with Premium Youtube now, which we use extensively. *BUT* Spotify does only allow one of myself or my two kids to play a song at a time via Google Assistant, and Youtube Music does allow for us all to have something going at once, which is nice...
     
  17. imackler

    imackler Key Lime Pie Infected Aberdeen Wings Spy

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    Do you all think it is likely that Apple or Spotify buy into MQA? I sure hope not...
     
  18. Merrick

    Merrick A lidless ear

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    I doubt it. Apple already tried a proprietary file format (ALAC) and ultimately dropped all the proprietary aspects of it, so it’s now free to use for all.
     
  19. bixby

    bixby Friend

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    Not to mention Apples "master'd for itunes"

    I suspect people really buy into these sprinkles they put on plain donuts.

    Doing my own Master vs non comparisons on Tidal. I have a sighted opinion based on a few albums but cannot pick them apart in an abx, yet!

    Is playing a Master via the high fidelity setting like playing a Dolby B cassette without the decoding on? In other words effed up. And no I am not going to google it, I will just play non adulterated stuff on Tidal and may ultimately switch to Qobuz.
     
    Last edited: Oct 4, 2021
  20. rhythmdevils

    rhythmdevils MOT: rhythmdevils audio

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    These streaming services seriously need to add a way to tag artists/albums with a genre or category wherever you want and then view only artists in a specific genre. My list of artists is so unmanageable I wind up listening to way less variety because I just cannot find stuff in a random list that jumps from rock to folk to jazz to reggae to classic rock to metal etc. I don’t understand why none of them understand the importance of this. I’d switch immediately if any of them implemented this. Except if it was Qobuz because the library is lacking.
     

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