Comments on Profile Post by ChaChaRealSmooth

I tried Tidal long ago and thought my own rip of the same album was better.

@joch Right? I bothered to even find the same mastering. The CD still sounds noticeably better. Reminds me of those blind online tests between a FLAC and a lossy file

I don’t remember where I read that Qobuz has a slightly better sounding files than Tidal, something to do with how the music catalogs are ripped by each services’ methods. Anyway, I just stopped with the streaming, because I don’t need more nervosa. It’s like a cup of coffee…if you just need the caffeine, go to to a *bucks; if you want to savor it on a weekend, you gotta grind your own.

I truly can't tell between Qubuz and a burned CD. I now listen to 99 percent Qubuz. But, maybe I'll try again this weekend.

Where it’s the same master and Qobuz doesn’t provide more than 44.1/16, I can’t tell a difference between Qobuz and a CD rip.

(Since I use HQPlayer, I sometimes think that 44.1/48 material upsampled sounds better than HiRes content provided by Qobuz. Not all music, but some cases. Didn’t bother to really dive into that rabbit hole yet.)

Maybe but I don’t focus on it too much. I try to focus on good music.

Yes, my theory is its the playback software. Same reason Roon does not sound as good as JRiver on my setup. Nor my long used Foobar. @joch - Yes for me Quobuz was a tiny bit better than Tidal.

I think Apple Music has some kind of filter/EQ fuckery going on

My ripped CDs on Roon sound better than any of the tidal equivalents with Roon like 19/20 times.

An acceptable inconvenience

@JK47 we had a thread here with a video of a mastering engineer explaining or hinting all streaming services use compressors to color their sound.

Qobuz in my car sounds better than Apple Music, but Apple Music have better Carplay interface because Apple.

I'm not sure. A lot of my CD rips are very old, but I'm finding that I often prefer older CD's to modern remasters. I disliked the latest remastered A Charlie Brown Christmas on Qobuz. Give me back the tape hiss!

I mainly keep my local library for specific rips, like my Hysteria MFSL, that sound waaaay better than the current masters available on streaming.

Tidal can sound like ass sometimes but I’m stuck with it at the moment. I will say that the newer “Max” FLAC quality does seem like a noticeable improvement over High/HiFi quality (and definitely over MQA - rest in piss).

@Northwest you absolutely have to grab the vinyl of the 2022 remaster. It's a stunner.