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Is Pretty Good Good Enough? Listening Habits In The World Of Streaming Services.

I'm a recent subscriber to Tidal and Amazon Unlimited.  The sound quality of the cd quality music is surprisingly good.  I find myself listening to more music because of it.

I've also found myself in a situation when I come across a very familiar recording that I find it missing some of the inner details of the recording that I'm very familiar with....overall, the recording is good, but I noticed the missing elements.  Though I found it not as good as it sounds on my cd player, it was good enough that I didn't stop the song and went and got my cd and played it.  In other words, I settled for pretty good.  Interestingly, as I moved up the chain in the world of audio, it was always in pursuit of better equipment to extract better sound from the recording.  I was always looking for better than 'good enough'.  Well, 'good enough' has gotten a lot better than it used to be...and much more convenient.

Sadly, my critical listening time with my cd player and turntable is a lot less these days because of the streaming services.  I've just started to fiddle around with burning wav files of my cd's to a hard drive to make copies of those recordings where nothing but the original file will do. 

How have your listening habits changed since the higher resolution services have arrived?

mitch4t

Showing 3 responses by jjss49

jjss49's avatar
jjss49
6,612 posts
 

I have never streamed.  Not once. Vinyl is high end enough. I can’t imagine any streaming service being able to match the dynamics of vinyl. 

good for the chuckle of the day... 🙄

jjss49's avatar
jjss49
6,612 posts
 

If your streaming only good enough, you have a ways to go. Streaming need not be any kind of compromise, except for digital haters. I prefer my streaming setup by quite a margin, and my analog setup is not merely an afterthought.

there have been lively, well discussed threads in the past couple years with folks noting the comparative quality and cost of analog, digital-cdp/local files, digital-streamed front ends

those interested should use the search bar above to locate them, its easy peasy

i would say, regarding this

-- if your streamed digital isn’t as good as your local, cdp-derived digital, you haven’t done streaming right

-- if you’re used to analog and it sounds right to you in a way that no digital can, then that’s great, stick with analog - why suffer in a pursuit that should bring only joy?

-- to get an analog front end to be comparable to well done digital, the analog rig would be 3-4x the cost... including phono stage, cart, all the rest of it --- then, there is the obligatory record collection...

 

 

jjss49's avatar
jjss49
6,612 posts
 

it takes a decent amount work and knowledge to accomplish it, but to me, in my system, streamed music is equal to cd’s played on my cdp (modwright modded sony sacd player with tube rectification/output) - some even better if the hi-res feed is well recorded

took me a solid year and numerous equipment changes to get here though - and not just audio gear... networking, modems, switches, and so on too...

but it definitely can be done

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