Tidal SQ and your music collection.

nc42acc

nc42acc

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I did an impromptu comparison last night of a very well known track in my music collection to the identical track on Tidal. There was a noticable difference in the two with the one based on my HDD being the better of the two. It was not a strain to hear difference but very noticable. I am using the HiFi version and have a very fast interenet service. Has anyone else had a similar comparison and if so what were your findings?

On another note I read about many audiophiles who use Tidal as their sole music collection for listening. My question is if something were to happen to Tidal how would you gain access to the music library you have become acustomed to having at your finger tips? Also what if you lose internet access and you wanted to have a serious sit down listening session? I am a big proponent of buying the material on CD and ripping to HDD. With the decline of CD sales this option may come to an end in my lifetime. Thank goodness for Amazon Prime!!!
 
My experience is different than yours. I find the quality of the Tidal music to be equal/similar to that of my ripped CDs. Tidal also has the advantage that it often has remastered versions of my older music.

I use Roon. My library consists of my own ripped music plus music from Tidal that I added to my library. If Tidal goes away, I always have my own music. But I also hope that Roon finds a suitable music provider and have similar integration as they currently have with Tidal. Then all I have to do is add the music from the music service provider to my library (again) which is an inconvenience but not the end of the world.
 
I also find streamed CD quality Tidal doesn't sound as good as CD's played on a good CD player. That changes when I play MQA files through Tidal. I usually prefer the MQA file over the CD. I hardly ever listen to CD quality Tidal. I have been spoiled by MQA and HiRes files.
 
I think for me it depends on the music on Tidal vs my LP's, CD and downloads. Sometimes I find the Tidal versions are better, other times my music is better. But it also depends to on what your listening to the music on. My tidal music streamed via the Lumin fits my music taste, a little analog and some smooth characteristics vs the more natural and detailed playback of my separate dac. And then again my TT and the records vs both, it all depends. A lot depends on the music, the recording and the equipment used.
 
I am past worrying about whether one or the other infinitesimally better than the other. I have read two reviews where they have indicated that they obtained better SQ from my Rossini's player than from stored files etc. I haven't even taken the time to play one disc. I am more than happy with the SQ and flexibility I have with my Roon content or what I stream from Tidal (MQA or not).
 
nicoff said:
... If Tidal goes away, I always have my own music. But I also hope that Roon finds a suitable music provider and have similar integration as they currently have with Tidal. Then all I have to do is add the music from the music service provider to my library (again) which is an inconvenience but not the end of the world.
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If the time comes when you'd like to transfer your favorites and playlists between music streaming platforms, Soundiiz transfer software is quite helpful and can save a lot of time! :happy:
 
audio.bill said:
If the time comes when you'd like to transfer your favorites and playlists between music streaming platforms, Soundiiz transfer software is quite helpful and can save a lot of time! :happy:
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Any Tidal content I tag for Roon playback I also add to my Music Collector app as either Tidal or Tidal MQA. If Tidal were to disappear I could easily sort for those releases and tag them in whatever Roon decides to go with. I keep track of every CD-LP-Digital File and Tidal album I have.
 
I'm in the camp where it depends on the album. Disc is typically somebetter but unless I compare A/B I wouldn't notice, Tidal High Fidelity is good.

I do have a large collection of physical Cd/LP, so I wouldn't go dark if Tidal shut down. I'd miss it though. :)
 
nc42acc said:
I did an impromptu comparison last night of a very well known track in my music collection to the identical track on Tidal. There was a noticable difference in the two with the one based on my HDD being the better of the two.
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It was hit and miss with me. Some better, some worse, exactly as expected with remastering/added aliasing distortion.
http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/MQA/origami/ThereAndBack.html
http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=19396
Perhaps you could try some MQA Koolaid and a dollop of imagination? Might make things right as rain.

cheers,

AJ
 
I have done some testing with this exact scenario so I'm an expert. Hahaaaaa. Anyhow. Internal stoored music was always better than NAS and Tidal when I had regular house cat 6 wiring with rj45 jacks and punch down blocks with jumpers at the data panel.
I installed the Linear Solution switch and one jumper that was cat 5, changed it to cat 6. Now the music is better from the NAS than my internal drive. FYI, I only have one PS in my server powering both the OS drive and music drive.

Go to the Blue Jeans cable site and read about Ethernet cables. Your high speed might not be so high. Anyhow, I inserted a loom of Blue Jeans Ethernet about 20 hours ago. I have not done a back to back test of Tidal to NAS yet, but, last week I was excited to run my new Mojo Audio Mystique V3 DAC through its passes. I have about 100 to 150 hours on it now. I was not prepared for what I heard. I pulled up tidal and played Live in Paris by Dianna Krall. I was literally pinned to my listening spot for 4 songs. Epiphany rolling over me to realization of musical space and structure I never understood. I felt I was listening to one of the finest stereo I have heard. Even compared to the 300k and 500k units I have been exposed too. This was through tidal playback. I did run files from my NAS and was experiencing the same wow. I was not testing any tidal to NAS so it was different music.

In short, done right, playback through tidal can be phenomenal. Everything counts. It has to be structured right. Any choke point is just that. It won't perform to it's highest level unless you design and implement component and parts tailored to the purpose, I would assume in my scenario, a router built for audio with a linear PS would be another step in the right direction.
 
I do not listen to any streaming services, such as Tidal. I perfer to own my music. I purchase and download most of music in as high of resolution version that I can find.

I also purchase CDs and SACDs and immediately rip them to my music server. I keep all of my music on internal SSD drives (backed up on multiple external drives and my NAS). Therefore I have files from Redbook quality up to DSD256, all up-converted to 24.6 Mhz using HQPlayer and controlled by Roon.

There is nothing wrong with Tidal and other streaming services. I simply prefer to have all of my music locally, and of course do not worry about any particular service going out of business.
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I started ripping my CDs long ago. I have since discovered that the ripped CDs that I did very early on do not sound as good as the original CD. I have confirmed that this was due to human error (mine!) when I did not know how to properly use the settings of EAC. I eventually started using DBPoweramp with no issues.

Last night I found one of those old ripped CDs and it clearly does not sound great. I will not bother re-ripping since the Tidal version of the CD sounds great.
 
I'm finding a lot depends on the artist in Tidal as well. I forget the artist but the sound was not on par with what I'm used to from Tidal, I switched to Rickie Lee Jones, the overall improvement was big.

I heard somewhere if you select a title and it's not available in 1411 but may be available in 320, Tidal will defaultto 320 to play your selection. Anyone know if this is true?
 
Mr Peabody said:
I'm finding a lot depends on the artist in Tidal as well. I forget the artist but the sound was not on par with what I'm used to from Tidal, I switched to Rickie Lee Jones, the overall improvement was big.

I heard somewhere if you select a title and it's not available in 1411 but may be available in 320, Tidal will defaultto 320 to play your selection. Anyone know if this is true?
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In all discussions like this one, I find that recording and mastering tends to be the defining factor more often than not.
 
True.

I remember the artist was Simply Red, Picture Book. I bought the LP when it first came out and it was quite a bit better then many of my LP's at the time, then later the CD, which I feel is decent sound quality. So was surprised on Tidal it didn't sound so good.

asindc said:
In all discussions like this one, I find that recording and mastering tends to be the defining factor more often than not.
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Randy Myers said:


There is nothing wrong with Tidal and other streaming services. I simply prefer to have all of my music locally, and of course do not worry about any particular service going out of business.
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I believe Streaming services are a huge benefit to artist. They really have no other way to get their name out there. If the streaming services went away, I believe bands for the most part would only have local followings. Since the only money most make is from touring, their ability to generate money would be severely limited and many may just call it quits. That's my Hmmmm pontificating on the issue.
Streaming is also the primary way I find new music now. I like to know I want to purchase a download or record, or tape. I have bought an album because its a local band in a coffee shop, only to give it back to the coffee shop.
 
Kingrex said:
I believe Streaming services are a huge benefit to artist. They really have no other way to get their name out there. If the streaming services went away, I believe bands for the most part would only have local followings. Since the only money most make is from touring, their ability to generate money would be severely limited and many may just call it quits. That's my Hmmmm pontificating on the issue.
Streaming is also the primary way I find new music now. I like to know I want to purchase a download or record, or tape. I have bought an album because its a local band in a coffee shop, only to give it back to the coffee shop.
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From everything that I have read, artists get very little money and most (starting) artists cannot live from it.

To say that without streaming artists would be relegated to local shows is not accurate. The Beatles, The Stones, Dylan, and hundreds more artists became globally known before streaming existed.

I stream music and truly like it. But I fell compelled to offer my two cents.
 
Anybody know how royalties were paid from jukeboxes? It seems paying royalties from music not bought isn't new and streaming should generate way more spins than a jukebox.

On the other hand, I suppose jukeboxes weren't a threat to physical media in the same way as streaming.
 
I want to be clear about what I was saying. Nobody makes anything as far as royalties from streaming services. All they get is visibility. I believe that visibility drives download, vinyl and ticket sales.
 
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