A question for those in the know about streaming FM/Music sound quality

would like to know more about streaming and especially if it can be a high end audiophile source.

have you not taken the time to read one of the many threads that are on here where members no longer use a cd player and use a streamer of some kind for their source ???

the question to ask you is how much do you want to spend on a streamer ?

As far as streaming stations (ala FM) the quality goes from 64kbps to lossless flac. Some with godawful commercials.
Orange Squeeze is the only player OS I have that reports the bandwidth if each feed. Radio Paradise is listener supported and has 4 different programs in 5 different stream rates up to lossless.
As far as on demand music, it'll cost you $10 to $20 per month. Quality and libraries vary but all have free trials.

Try Qobuz.  Try the classical streaming service Primephonic, too.  In addition to classical, Primephonic also offers a limited but finely-curated selection of jazz and pop.  More often than not, I get superlative fidelity from both these guys.

A question for those in the know about streaming FM/Music sound quality

I used to be into high end FM tuners, all I’ve found with internet streaming is compression. If you have DAB or DAB+ (digital audio broadcast) transmission, it to me now is the best quality, especially if you take the digital output if it has one from your DAB tuner to your own dac, almost as good as CD replay on a good transport/dac.


Cheers George

You can get hi res streaming from Tidal and a few others for a fee.  There is high resolution streaming from some radio stations too.
A lot depends on your system.  Do you want a "streamer" to program and work as a pre-amp/DAC or will you use a computer.
Personally, I use a PC running through a nice DAC and use the AUX inputs on my pre.  I don't mind doing this because it's work and I'm in front of the PC all day.  I can log onto any site I want or use Tidal.  If you don't want to rely on a computer you should look into a streamer such as Bluesound.
I will say that hi res Tidal or good radio streaming will sound as good as most red book cd's in my system.  A great DAC makes a world of differnce.

...just my 2 cents.

“would like to know more about streaming and especially if it can be a high end audiophile source.”

Absolutely! It would be helpful for the community to know,

1) What is your budget? 
2) Do you prefer a streamer with built in DAC or
3) Prefer a separate DAC and a streamer

If you want high quality streaming setup, Bluesound Node 2i (which is a budget streamer with a average DAC) won’t cut it.

If it is of high sound quality, I can do whatever actually does the job.  As with the CJ ART pre...price is always a consideration, but not always the dog that shakes the tail.