Tidal flac is now a reality for hi-res streaming. With the demise of MQA this was inevitable and I for one couldn’t be happier. I have never been convinced by MQA. I could see the point of it if bandwidth was an issue but it isn’t so all I and many others have wanted from Tidal is hi-res flac. Neither of my external Dacs are MQA compliant that’s how much I deemed MQA a necessity. So here’s the burning question Can I hear a difference? I played the latest offering from Terrace Martin this morning through headphones and it sounded sublime at 24bit/64k but it’s early days yet and I need to do a lot more listening before I finally nail my colours. Why you may ask haven’t I simply switched to Amazon or Qobuz instead of waiting for Tidal to see sense and ditch MQA? Well firstly they haven’t exactly ditched it. It’s still available as they add hi-res flac alongside it. I believe they currently have an offering of six million songs in hi-res flac with more being added all the while to the current catalogue of over 100 million tracks. Secondly I just prefer the UI of » Continue Reading.
ATM. Streamers
A lot of my listening is done via streaming. Before the vinyl purists start I know I am evil incarnate but living in an already cluttered one bedroom flat I really do not have the space for a vast record collection so needs must. At the moment I am streaming flac and hi-bitrate music files to my Marantz amp via an Audioengine B1 Bluetooth receiver in Aptx through a toslink connection. When the music arrives through my Dali floorstanders it sounds pretty acceptable but I am wondering if when I can eventually afford it should I invest in something like the Bluesound Node 2I streamer which I could hardwire via Ethernet to my router and so eliminate the need for Bluetooth. Would this improve the sound enough to warrant my saving up the cash to invest in it? Anyone got any idea? No rush as it’s entirely dependent upon my making some sales or getting some commissioned work in which is as always in the lap of the gods. I’m all ears. For the sake of clarity this is entirely a question about streaming sound quality. I have no downloaded music I wish to stream and in a one bedroom » Continue Reading.
ATM: music players for flac
Hi-de-ho! I have a new Android phone, and I’m looking at player apps, preferably compatible with flac files. MusicBee, BlackPlayer, Media Monkey….lots of ’em out there, many free – any personal recommendations?
Might also be an opportunity to upgrade the desk player from WinAmp (no longer supported, I believe) to something better/more seamless. At the moment, all the mp3s are in iTunes and the flac files (all cd and lp rips at the moment) just sit in a folder – nice to have something which consolidates and lets me play both.
All suggestion gratefully received….many thanks in advance.