Well @rvpiano, now you can rest assured you made the right choice to begin with. I have the Node 2 and didn’t detect much (if any) burn-n so I doubt it’s much of a factor. It’s a nice streamer, no question, but it’s certainly not the end-all. FWIW as much as I enjoy high-res my focus has changed over the years. My goal is to get Redbook ’right’. Besides the fact there’s far more music available at 16/44.1, I’ve found there’s an awful lot of goodness to be had from well-mastered CDs. Best.
Hi-res streaming on Qobuz
Although hi-res titles on Qobuz indicate streaming at 96kHz or192kHz, I’m not sure my system is reproducing those levels. Both my Arcam Rplay streamer and Schiit Gungnir multibit manuals indicate they accept up to 192kHz. But I can’t hear a difference in quality comparing hi-res to non hi-res files. Even if I do an A B comparison using the exact same titles with Qobuz hi-res and Idagio CD quality resolution, I hear no difference. There are no indicators to tell what’s happening, so I’m wondering if I’m indeed hearing in high resolution.
Is there any way I can be sure?
Is there any way I can be sure?
Showing 5 responses by melvinjames
@rvpiano .. Chris Connaker wrote an article about DTS Play-Fi a few years ago which you might find interesting: https://audiophilestyle.com/ca/bits-and-bytes/dts-play-fi-has-major-design-flaws/ Basically, his issue is the stream goes through the device your app resides on, which may not support higher res streams. Are you using iOS? Android? |
I have my suspicions about the genuineness of the Qubuz hi res tracks. I have bought quite a few and they do not sound right compared with those native tracks upsampled by my DCS Vivaldi upsampler/streamer. If all they are doing is selling "processed" upsampled versions (which I suspect they are) I prefer to do it with better equipment as they could do better!! There's been a great deal of online chatter about this over the years and not just with Qobuz. (HDTracks was lambasted early on for selling upsampled Redbook as high-res.) Qobuz states they only stream (or sell) what the labels provide them and, if memory serves, they analyze what they're given to make sure high-res is indeed high-res. My streaming and purchasing experience with them has been stellar thus far, but then again, I don't play in the DCS levels of audio gear. |