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HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

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Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#381898

Postby Infrasonic » January 29th, 2021, 1:14 pm

Itsallaguess wrote:Just a quick heads-up for anyone that might have been considering the Tidal music service - there's a 6-month free code available at the moment, so just entering 'LIDLMUSIC' on the following Tidal page will get you into the summer for free -

https://offer.tidal.com/voucher

Like most free periods for services like these, it'll need a payment method registering, and then active cancellation of the service nearer to the 6-month period end.

Cheers,

Itsallaguess


Thanks for that, just signed up.

I recently took advantage of Spotify Premium on a free six month trial so I'll be interested in any perceivable differences in quality.

Also I noted recently that I was getting adverts in SP, initially I though there was a glitch but upon investigation it turns out to be a deliberate policy change!
There's also known issues with the W10 app and W10 web access not playing all material (some podcasts are giving me issues), yesterdays update fixed nothing (Android/Chrome OS fine) - so I don't think I'll pursue SP at the end of the free trial.

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#381924

Postby Infrasonic » January 29th, 2021, 2:03 pm

I've just noticed if you want you can try out the higher quality tier (HiFi) in Tidal for three months with the voucher offers.
It would have to be demonstrably better for me to stump up £20 a month though (£15 would be more tempting...).

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#382324

Postby Infrasonic » January 30th, 2021, 8:57 pm

I've done some A/B listening with material I know very well that has been recorded by respected engineers, mixed and mastered properly and that I own on multiple formats (CD, vinyl, half speed masters et al) - on a few systems (HiFi, PC's, phone), using speakers, headphones etc.

My vote goes to Tidal.
It's close but when the dynamic level gets high and mixes get congested there's a fatigue element listening to Spotify Premium that implies the codec is not operating as well as Tidal's - which has more 'air' at the top end and is cleaner. At lower levels it is very close though. Both @ 320kbps.

I might try the HiFi Tidal option nearer the end of the free period, see if there is any real world discernible difference.

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#382568

Postby Infrasonic » January 31st, 2021, 9:01 pm

https://www.allconnect.com/streaming/tidal-review
Our TIDAL review for 2021: Is it worth it?

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#388949

Postby Infrasonic » February 22nd, 2021, 10:48 pm

https://www.whathifi.com/news/spotify-h ... -streaming

Spotify HiFi is official. Almost four years after it was first teased, a CD-quality tier is finally coming to the world's most popular streaming service, the green giant has revealed during its 'Stream On' online event today.

Spotify will join the likes of Tidal, Qobuz, Deezer and Amazon in offering lossless streaming "beginning later this year". Spotify is promising to share more details on Spotify HiFi soon, such as the all-important price, device compatibility, territories and launch dates.
Cont.

stevensfo
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#389980

Postby stevensfo » February 25th, 2021, 3:07 pm

Infrasonic wrote:https://www.whathifi.com/news/spotify-hi-fi-tier-finally-launching-to-offer-cd-quality-streaming

Spotify HiFi is official. Almost four years after it was first teased, a CD-quality tier is finally coming to the world's most popular streaming service, the green giant has revealed during its 'Stream On' online event today.

Spotify will join the likes of Tidal, Qobuz, Deezer and Amazon in offering lossless streaming "beginning later this year". Spotify is promising to share more details on Spotify HiFi soon, such as the all-important price, device compatibility, territories and launch dates.
Cont.


As the OP, I can't thank you all enough for the amazing advice about speakers and Spotify etc. But I'm also aware that our hobbies can make us so caught up in the details that we fail to appreciate what we have. This has happened to me with photography, when I finally realised that the composition was 90% of the quality, no matter what the megapixels. A camera costing 600 quid will still be Cr*p if you don't know how to use it. Same with playing music. A new barrel for my clarinet was a waste, cos I hadn't mastered the intricate art of breathing properly and jazz chords. Benny Goodman was famous in the 1950s, yet to read the blurb, you wonder how anyone could play without a modern mouthpiece!

My two Anker 30W speakers sound amazing, and for outdoors I will get the JBL Boombox 2. The quality from Spotify is amazing, and I don't really worry if it's 320kps or HiFi quality. There's more to life than worrying about these things.

Steve

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#396929

Postby Infrasonic » March 18th, 2021, 10:18 pm

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CfnXOlYiz8

Spoti-Pi: a beginner's guide to SPOTIFY on the RASPBERRY PI
0:00​ Intro
0:47​ Pi 3B+
1:49​ Volumio
4:30​ Pi 3B+ (analogue or USB?)
7:17​ DAC HATs
12:27​ Pi 4B w/ USB DACs
17:21​ One *other* thing: RaspDAC Mini
21:54​ Android streamers?
25:27​ Wrap

GrahamPlatt
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#396939

Postby GrahamPlatt » March 18th, 2021, 11:02 pm

Infrasonic wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CfnXOlYiz8


I really enjoyed that, but I couldn’t help thinking throughout “wow, first world problems!”

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#396985

Postby Infrasonic » March 19th, 2021, 8:47 am

GrahamPlatt wrote:
Infrasonic wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CfnXOlYiz8


I really enjoyed that, but I couldn’t help thinking throughout “wow, first world problems!”


DACs entertainment...

servodude
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397006

Postby servodude » March 19th, 2021, 9:32 am

Infrasonic wrote:
GrahamPlatt wrote:
Infrasonic wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CfnXOlYiz8


I really enjoyed that, but I couldn’t help thinking throughout “wow, first world problems!”


DACs entertainment...


Have a rec! But understand that's almost too cheesy... almost ;)
-sd

jaizan
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397264

Postby jaizan » March 19th, 2021, 11:35 pm

Gerry557 wrote:Have a look at something like the £250 Denon dm 41. A mini hi fi and well regarded in your what hi fi magazine. You can just buy the box and choose you own speakers.


These Denon systems are nice until they fail. In my case, the DAB packed in after 2 years & Denon did not offer anything as reasonable as fixed price repairs. A quick google search shows others have had the same problem with several different generations of these units. Quality is not what it once was.

Meanwhile, all of the separates I bought 30 years ago work fine -Pioneer, Technics, Sony.

Gerry557
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397273

Postby Gerry557 » March 20th, 2021, 6:53 am

I wasn't aware of the denon mini hifi issues, maybe I need to try a Google. Still you can buy with a 6 year warranty for less than thirty quid and get that money back if unused. That's less than a fiver a year for some peace of mind.

I suppose like anything you buy that fails just out of warranty its disappointing. I had a washing machine fail that worked out more cost effective to replace than fix, gretta won't be happy.

There is another thread about this sort of issue, maybe add my tuppence.

staffordian
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397352

Postby staffordian » March 20th, 2021, 11:02 am

Gerry557 wrote:Still you can buy with a 6 year warranty for less than thirty quid and get that money back if unused. That's less than a fiver a year for some peace of mind.

The only time I bought an extended warranty was when a similar offer was made.

Snag is, the company went bust before the five years was up :twisted:

Infrasonic
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397423

Postby Infrasonic » March 20th, 2021, 2:22 pm

jaizan wrote:
Gerry557 wrote:Have a look at something like the £250 Denon dm 41. A mini hi fi and well regarded in your what hi fi magazine. You can just buy the box and choose you own speakers.


These Denon systems are nice until they fail. In my case, the DAB packed in after 2 years & Denon did not offer anything as reasonable as fixed price repairs. A quick google search shows others have had the same problem with several different generations of these units. Quality is not what it once was.

Meanwhile, all of the separates I bought 30 years ago work fine -Pioneer, Technics, Sony.


That's a shame, Denon back in the eighties was rock solid.
We used to use them by default for a chain of record/CD stores, hammered all day every day, never any problems. The error correction on the CD players was ridiculously good, would play a CD with no skipping no matter how physically messed up it was. It wasn't cheap kit back then either, you had to make a conscious decision to pay for the quality over the cheaper stuff with endurance issues.

XFool
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#397469

Postby XFool » March 20th, 2021, 5:12 pm

jaizan wrote:These Denon systems are nice until they fail. In my case, the DAB packed in after 2 years & Denon did not offer anything as reasonable as fixed price repairs. A quick google search shows others have had the same problem with several different generations of these units. Quality is not what it once was.

Meanwhile, all of the separates I bought 30 years ago work fine -Pioneer, Technics, Sony.

One begins to suspect that is precisely because they are analogue!

My impression is that some modern digital devices - with firmware in flash RAM - may blow out after a few years, or start to slowly die from what I have come to call "firmware rot". There may simply be no user provision for replacing/updating the firmware. I have also seen on some data sheets for software radio chips alarming comments such as "If the timing of these pulses is incorrect it may corrupt the device".

Add in the surface mount component construction and the simple fact is: It breaks, you chuck it.

jaizan
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#399637

Postby jaizan » March 27th, 2021, 9:05 pm

XFool wrote:One begins to suspect that is precisely because they are analogue!

The 30 year old Technics CD player is definitely digital, but I suspect you're right about the rest of it.

Also, since Denon have not fixed the DAB problem after various generations of this product, clearly they don't care about quality like they used to.

Itsallaguess
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#407274

Postby Itsallaguess » April 27th, 2021, 5:59 am

Itsallaguess wrote:
I've never been one for subscribing to any of these fee-based content providers, but I'm beginning to think that I'll get so much good use out of Spotify, and the HEOS 'Spotify Connect' source-quality really is that good, that I might well have to treat myself a little during this very strange period that we're living in at the moment, where personal comforts seem to mean much more right now than they might have done in previous times in my life.

With that in mind, and given that we can all get a free 'trial month' of the advert-free Spotify Premium accounts anyway, I've also found this morning that PayPal offer a '12-months for the price of 10' Premium account voucher for Spotify too, which means that I could treat myself to 13 months of Spotify Premium for just £99 -

With the 12 Months Spotify Gift Card, get 12 months for the price of 10 months (and save £20) -

https://www.paypal.com/uk/gifts/brands/spotify-uk-99

I note that the above page says that this discounted offer only applies to personal, single Spotify accounts, and cannot be applied to Family or Student plans, but as I've no need for those types of accounts at the moment, and a discounted Spotify personal account would be a great personal treat for me, then I'm beginning to think I've got something good to put on my Christmas List already...


Just as a quick update to the above - I've found myself using my free Spotify account so much over the subsequent months since this thread originated, that I've now given myself a treat and used the PayPal offer above to gain access to the Spotify Premium service for 12 months at a cost of £99 (normally around £120).

The main driver for the move was to rid myself of the really quite intrusive adverts (why so loud!! - I know, I know....), but I don't think I was aware of the additional 'download' benefits of the Premium service too much, which allows 10,000 songs per device, up to a limit of 50,000 songs across five personal devices, to be able to be downloaded locally for those periods where a data-connection can't be maintained or might be too costly to do so - there's going to be quite a few occasions over the coming year where this will apply to me, so that's another big plus for the Premium service that I will definitely benefit from...

When I considered how much I've been using the free service over the past 6 months or so, and especially now that we're getting out into the garden over the coming summer, then the above benefits along with the availability of the 'Very High' streaming quality (for internal hi-fi benefit only, really - the normal 'High' quality of the free account is absolutely brilliant for any bluetooth or out-door use to be quite honest...), I thought it was a worthwhile offer for a service that I find myself using more and more of in recent months, and discovering (and re-discovering!) music that I would simply never have found using my other normal music-channels...

I'm absolutely rubbish at treating myself with things like this, so it feels like a great present from someone really close to me - me!

£2 per week - Here's to a great summer of music for us all -

Cheers,

Itsallaguess

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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#407277

Postby servodude » April 27th, 2021, 6:27 am

Itsallaguess wrote:The main driver for the move was to rid myself of the really quite intrusive adverts (why so loud!! - I know, I know....), but I don't think I was aware of the additional 'download' benefits of the Premium service too much, which allows 10,000 songs per device, up to a limit of 50,000 songs across five personal devices, to be able to be downloaded locally for those periods where a data-connection can't be maintained or might be too costly to do so - there's going to be quite a few occasions over the coming year where this will apply to me, so that's another big plus for the Premium service that I will definitely benefit from...


It's a great thing indeed

We've been on the family programme for 4 years now; took a two month trial around my elder daughter's 13th birthday so we could create and download a playlist for it - and never looked back!

It's turned my old MotoG3 from landfill in to a party jukebox (just add a couple of bluetooth speakers ;) )
We've got a tablet in permanent service in the kitchen for when the radio is terrible.

The download thing has also saved us on several long car trips outwith cell coverage.

I do wish they'd make it easier to use an SD Card in android as it seems to use up an awkward amount device space in normal streaming
- and I would really like them to use my subs to pay the artists I listen to

But it really is superbly convenient

- sd

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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#414463

Postby bluedonkey » May 23rd, 2021, 7:21 pm

I'm continuing this thread to raise my own query, as the previous posts may have touched upon it, not sure.

Recently was staying away and had the use of a BOSE Wave. I have a very cheap hifi and the BOSE was by contrast (to my dull ears anyway) very impressive. I don't listen to music enough to spend loads and I don't want to get up to speed on lots of tech, so I'm thinking of buying the BOSE Wave. It would be used mainly to play CDs, and secondarily to listen to the radio.

Given my £500 budget (the price of the BOSE Wave), can anyone come up with any negatives that might be a reason not to buy it?

Thanks.

Howard
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Re: HiFi buffs? A small but good HiFi system?

#414485

Postby Howard » May 23rd, 2021, 9:44 pm

bluedonkey wrote:I'm continuing this thread to raise my own query, as the previous posts may have touched upon it, not sure.

Recently was staying away and had the use of a BOSE Wave. I have a very cheap hifi and the BOSE was by contrast (to my dull ears anyway) very impressive. I don't listen to music enough to spend loads and I don't want to get up to speed on lots of tech, so I'm thinking of buying the BOSE Wave. It would be used mainly to play CDs, and secondarily to listen to the radio.

Given my £500 budget (the price of the BOSE Wave), can anyone come up with any negatives that might be a reason not to buy it?

Thanks.


I bought a Bose Wave CD player and radio about 15 years ago and was pleased with it so bought another about 5 years ago. Both are in quite large rooms and produce a very satisfactory sound to my ears.

regards

Howard


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