Can you noticeably appreciate the difference between tidal and spotify?

Music Talk
41

I recently switched over to Tidal, since personally, I noticed quite a significant difference. It was like switching from a 60hz to 120hz display.

Regardless of the sound quality though, I prefer the recordings available on Tidal far more. Tidal tends to have the same songs, but with more breadth and pacing, likely sourced from CDs(?). Spotify, in comparison, has what you’d typically hear on the radio or Youtube. Of course, this may not be the same for everyone depending on what you listen to. Also, the Lyric feature is pretty cool.

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42

In the end I have made the decision to keep Spotify premium.
I’ve realised that fuck…not so long ago, 6 years ago you had to buy albums one by one. Now we have millions of songs in the palm of our hand. You have to value that more.

-Quality theme
I still haven’t figured out who wins. Sometimes one platform sounds better to me, sometimes another. Spotify in maximum quality without normalising vs. tidal in hifi without normalising sound so similar to me, if not the same when listening critically, that I can’t even imagine what they will sound like if I play music just to leave it in the background.

-Quantity
More than enough. For my varied tastes I have everything I’m looking for on Spotify and tidal. I haven’t seen any on qobuz.

-Interface
I like tidal and Spotify more here. Qobuz I don’t find so attractive.

-Music Radar
This is perhaps one of the reasons I chose to stay on Spotify. I find more specific playlists created, I find it easier to find songs and I find it more convenient.

-Extras
Tidal and Spotify with their podcasts and content back on top.

-Price.
Tidal and Spotify come at a special discount for €5 per month. 10 if I want tidal plus. Quboz is more expensive.

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43

Qobuz is $11 per month if you pay for a year or $13 per month paying monthly. You’re getting Apple Music for $4 or $6 per month? Please steer me to that deal!

45

@pk500 not really sure if you’re being passive aggressive or not but from my knowledge it’s $16.99 monthly compared to $9.99 for Apple Music.

46

So, giving accurate information is passive-aggressive? We live in a strange world …

47

No no, I was referring to the end of your comment.

It’s difficult to understand tone and what not through text on the internet. If you weren’t that’s understandable.

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48

I was as serious as a quadruple bypass. If you were getting Apple Music that cheap, I wanted in on the deal!

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49

@pk500 I get you brother, my bad On the assuming! Honestly I’m so used to the rest of the internet that I’m still getting adjusted to the genuine nature of these forums :sweat_smile:

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50

No problem, man. I’m always direct in my communication and can be a snarky SOB, so I don’t blame your interpretation of my comments. :slight_smile:

51

I have extensive experience with many audio / video streaming apps on a few different hardware systems.

Spotify customer since 2011 (just canceled).
Tidal customer since 2018(volume normalization OFF, or it will mess with your experience.)
Pandora customer since err 2006?
I dont do youtube audio, or amazon, and I dont use Apple but have tried iTunes hires.
I host my own 24bit/192khz/etc hires files, as well as stream & play SACDs on my Marantz.

I rarely use a laptop or PC for any of this, other than hosting.
I use the iFi hip-dac2 for mobile devices and I only stream with USB Audio Player Pro, which is a front-end + engine for streaming apps, local files, etc, and displays details about what sort of file is being played. UAP Pro has very robust user configuration options for tweaking android hires drivers, verifying bit-perfect mode, verifying DAC playback, etc.

For non-mobile, I use the DAC (MMM) in my Marantz SACD 30n to playback files and streams. The built-in HEOS system hosts the streaming apps and accesses network file shares.

I use Klipsch rp-8000f speakers driven by a Marantz model 30 amp.
I use Beyerdynamic dt1990 headphones, my wife’s dt770s, Klipsch x10i earbuds, and soon my MiM Dark Magician IEM (when they arrive.)
I also stream in my car via bluetooth, which has a basic stock stereo/speakers.

Ive spent 10,000s of hours playing music(often the same music) in Spotify, Pandora, etc, and before that Foobar2000 and Winamp for local high bitrate (320k or better) compressed audio, and immediately Tidal is louder and clearer than Spotify - VOLUME NORMALIZATION OFF. Not much difference between Tidal & FLAC files or uncompressed WAV files in loudness or anything else. And this happens on all systems, from lofi to hifi.

Digital volume or hardware volume knobs must be turned down about 10-15% when I play Tidal, vs Spotify, on the car system, headphone amp on the Marantz, hip-dac2 on my mobile devices, and the poor quality DAC (Focusrite 8i6 gen3) on my PC. This is of course just loudness, but on top of loudness my ears can clearly hear a better upper frequency response, tighter overall, and those more “ringing” highs. Im not talking about Tidal MQA/masters, just in general with FLAC

I honestly cannot detect a huge difference between Tidal FLAC and Tidal MQA, and I do understand the state of the controversy with MQA, etc. I also understand how a good number of those ‘Tidal Masters’ are unique recordings - masters - and WILL sound different than other hires versions of the same songs. I dont assume “Tidal Master” means super high fi. I understand it means 1) highest res audio that Tidal can offer and 2) original recordings will sometimes not sound the way you expect, bitrates and sample frequencies aside.

I mainly just use Tidal for FLAC, and it caused me to drop Spotify, on top of the other nonsense with Spotify. Playing Tidal through UAP Pro on android is a good experience. I have not heard Qobuz, and Qobuz just vanished from the list of supported apps inside HEOS…

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Ik one time I was listening to a song I’ve listen too about 100 times. I was listening on YouTube music app and I legit thought it was a cover cause I was so used to hearing it on tidal hifi and it blew my mind that it wasn’t a cover and it was the same song same person… I really think that it just depends on the recording to really pick out the differences if the hifi version is actually a good recording u will hear a difference but if its a mediocre recording it won’t make much of a different at all if its FLAC or not.

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53

With Spotify Audio Quality set to Normal, there’s a huge difference in SQ between Tidal and Spotify. Qobuz sounds best to me. But I still use Spotify more, it has the best interface.

2 Likes
54

There is absolutely no audible difference on my sysyem between Spotify & a CD playing the same song simultaneously while toggling back & forth between them on my preamp’s input switch. Given that, I feel no need to upgrade to any HD streaming service.

I only began Spotify about 2 months ago. I’m using Aptx Classic out of an old Samsung View, into an iFi Zen Blue V2, balanced into a Singxer SA1, balanced into an Avantone CLA 200, powering Tannoy XT8F through Anticable 3.1 speaker wire & matching jumpers. My CD player is a Pioneer LD/CD player from the late 80s or early 90s, but it sounds great, using World’s Best RCA cables into the Singxer preamp.

I had just bought some Telarc CDs maybe a week or two before I tried Spotify. Since starting on Spotify & doing a direct comparison to CD, I haven’t listened to any of my CDs, but I’ll keep them in case the internet is shut down.

Prior to all this I wanted to get a nice record player, but the expense of all the extra crap to keep records playing proper, I just can’t justify it, when Spotify is so easy & sounds so good & just $10 a month.

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55

“There is absolutely no audible difference on my system between Spotify & a CD”

Then there’s something wrong with your system. On my system, the difference isn’t night and day, it’s like being in a completely different solar system.

As far as Tidal goes, it’s really unfortunate. I think the majority of people expect it to be plug-and-play and instant superior lossless quality. Whereas in fact you have to really know a lot to set it up to get the full best quality from it.

First, you have to turn Loudness Normalization OFF. It defaults to ON. FAQ 1: Why? Because when it’s on DSP is the method its using for volume control and it’s degrading the lossless signal.

Second, you have to turn FORCE VOLUME to ON.

Third, the “Passhtrough MQA” setting is confusing because it’s worded as a double-negative.

Better sound quality…,…You have a: …result
OFF…non-MQA DAC…MQA level 1
OFF…MQA render DAC…best MQA quality
ON…MQA decoder DAC…best MQA quality

56

Or better yet, avoid the snake oil of MQA and use Qobuz, Deezer, Apple Music or Amazon Music. MQA isn’t necessary at all with lossless and high-res files.

Welcome to the forum, by the way! :slight_smile: