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Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

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Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#11

Post by nr2x »

izacus wrote: post #9
gruez wrote: post #4

AFAIK spotify premium uses 320kb/s vorbis for audio compression. I understand why you'd want lossless for archival purposes, but does it make a difference for playback? ie. can you tell the difference between 320kb/s vorbis and lossless in a ABX test?

Usually it's not just the bitrate, but also the compression in mastering process that's different (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression for context). The "HiFi" versions are less compressed and on my highend audio system the difference between Tidal HiFi masters and Spotify is pretty stark and obviously noticable. (The difference obviously has nothing to do with compression format.) I hope Spot…

Exactly, it's literally a different sound file - not just format/delivery/etc.

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#12

Post by jmann99999 »

I’m not a Spotify user, but I have upgraded to the HD Music option on Amazon. Amazon provides music at SD (320KB), HD (850KB) and Ultra HD (up to 3700KB) — when available.

I’m not an audiophile but it sounds amazing on my AirPods and great on my Echos and in the car. My wife even said she doesn’t want to go back.

If Spotify provides bitrates near that, you will want it.

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#13

Post by websites2323 »

gruez wrote: post #4

AFAIK spotify premium uses 320kb/s vorbis for audio compression. I understand why you'd want lossless for archival purposes, but does it make a difference for playback? ie. can you tell the difference between 320kb/s vorbis and lossless in a ABX test?

The difference will not be audible to most people because of the equipment and environment. Besides, audio has been mastered for 128kbps MP3, which most people prefer. So unless they are going to change the mastering, this is double worthless.

But I’m not in the habit of telling people how to spend their money. If they enjoy the music more because they paid more for it, no objections here. I’ve got plenty of wasteful hobbies myself.

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#16

Post by CarelessExpert »

gruez wrote: post #4

AFAIK spotify premium uses 320kb/s vorbis for audio compression. I understand why you'd want lossless for archival purposes, but does it make a difference for playback? ie. can you tell the difference between 320kb/s vorbis and lossless in a ABX test?

Almost certainly not, but the audiophile community is a profitable one... :)

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#18

Post by CarelessExpert »

izacus wrote: post #9
gruez wrote: post #4

AFAIK spotify premium uses 320kb/s vorbis for audio compression. I understand why you'd want lossless for archival purposes, but does it make a difference for playback? ie. can you tell the difference between 320kb/s vorbis and lossless in a ABX test?

Usually it's not just the bitrate, but also the compression in mastering process that's different (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_range_compression for context). The "HiFi" versions are less compressed and on my highend audio system the difference between Tidal HiFi masters and Spotify is pretty stark and obviously noticable. (The difference obviously has nothing to do with compression format.) I hope Spot…

Where is the evidence that Tidal is actually using masters that exclude DRC for their HiFi mixes?

I can't find anything that suggests this is actually true.

The only thing I can find indicates that their HiFi versions are based on MQA-supplied 24-bit masters, but that doesn't tell you whether or not DRC was applied to the source mix that MQA used.

And given that an uncompressed mix would require remastering by the artist/studio (DRC is not just a byproduct of conversion to a 16-bit format), you'll forgive me if I'm incredibly skeptical of this claim.

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#19

Post by upbeat_general »

Bluestein wrote: post #2

Great. More internet bandwidth wasted, for their profit. They should be penalized, taxed, burdened, or forced to build "Netflix-like" own infrastructure ... ... in direct proportion to the delta in bandwidth between their "lossless" codec and state-of-the art compression with comparable sound quality.-

I can’t tell if this is a joke or not

Re: Spotify announces HiFi, a lossless streaming tier coming later this year

#20

Post by eggsby »

nominated1 wrote: post #14

Purely marketing for the “more is better” pseudo audiophile. ABX testing blew the “lossless sounds better” mantra out of the window nearly 2 decade ago [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codec_listening_test

There is a cut and dry relationship between bitrate and audio fidelity. You simply cannot encode higher frequency audio in lower bitrate samples.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampli...

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