Ok so ive subscribed to all the main music streaming services: Qobuz, Tidal, Amazon Ultra HD Music and i’ll include Spotify even though it doesn’t have CD quality just cause its the most popular. For obvious reasons I wont touch Apple Music. I had it before and it was horrible. Unfortunately they are not all equal. I use Windows 10 and Android LG V20.
PHONE APP
So i set out today in my car, had full network reception. I loaded Qobuz and tried ABC’s greatest hits and wow! the sound was fantastic! “The Look of Love” never sounded better. Lively and exciting. Tried Spotify, dull and lifeless. Tried Tidal and Amazon and they were good but surprisingly below the quality of Qobuz. They supposedly had the same CD quality. Not sure why Qobuz sounded the best. The reception was best on Spotify and Amazon. Had cutouts on Qobuz and Tidal unfortunately.
INTERFACE
The interface is best on Spotify, then Amazon with Tidal and Qobuz trailing behind. I usually like to move songs up and down on my playlist. I can do this on all but Qobuz. When i create a playlist from a album i like, all will fill in the title for me except Tidal. Spotify is best when it comes to being introduced to new music and artists with Amazon coming in 2nd place and Tidal and Qobuz trailing behind.
AVAILABILITY
One of my favorite albums from ABC is “How to be a Zillionaire” It was a popular album back in the day. all services had it but Qobuz. The number of songs these services have vary. Here are the numbers: Spotify 35 million, Amazon 50 million, Tidal 60 Million and Qobuz 50 Million. But this can be deceptive. I found that most of the time Spotify has the songs i’m looking for. But the sound quality is terribad.
SOUND QUALITY
In regards to sound quality there’s CD quality which sounds awesome, and higher quality bitrate and frequency, usually dubbed HD, Ultra HD or Masters. Ive heard tracks at this quality and I can tell the difference. And Qobuz seems to beat the rest at this. It uses exclusive mode and displays its various modes, Aiso and Wasapi, in its source selection screen. which impressed me. No problems there.
Tidal offers higher than CD quality but requires you to use the MQA format, which is lossy. And also requires a DAC to support this. Not sure about Cell phones. Amazon leaves you guessing. It offers higher than CD quality but does not offer exclusive mode. I had to go to the sound control panel and choose a higher frequency for it to play it. i thought i heard a difference but some say Windows is just up-scaling the sound and we’re not really hearing the better quality.
I must say the best quality ive heard are CD’s ive ripped to my computer and better than CD quality ive downloaded from HDtracks.com. Maybe its placebo but i’m pretty sure it was best.
OTHER SERVICES
Apple Music, Google play music and Youtube music are other popular services. but unfortunately they dont have even CD quality sound. Idagio and Primephonic has high quality audio but is for classical music only.