Cost of hi def / res tracks

Yes. I would rather pay for the redbook CD. Downloads (hi res or otherwise) has to be 30-40% lower in price before I will bite. 

Naim has the most reasonable pricing it seems, when the SQ of highres is  a factor. I cannot understand why Linn charges close to double the Price of a 24 bit download compared to a cd download.

Another problem is the actual quality of 24 bit versions vs 16 bit versions, especially on hdtracks with so many old remasters, from a time when highres recordings was not possible.

2112 Deluxe edition from Amazon. CD, DVD-A containing the 24/96 tracks and a comprehensive booklet for £13.75

2112 Deluxe edition from Linn comprising of just the 24/96 files £20.00

Goldmine time. If not for Linn then for the label. This may not be representative of the hikes being imposed but it’s enough for me not to consider this source.

Happily, there are places like Computer Audiophile (to name but one) where you can check providence (to an extent) and technical specification. HDTracks have let some howlers out and IMO are unfairly criticised. They are the retailer. It’s the same as it ever was and has little to do with HiRes, past there being even more scope for the labels to foist tat upon us.

I think Qobuz are fairly reasonable and HDTracks are the sanest. Sure, CDs are significantly cheaper, but I am old enough to remember when a fairly ropey CD would set you back £15.  Some reissues and Japanese imports retail at considerably more.

Perfect scenario for me is to sell my Japanese imports when they go out of print. Just sold a first edition of 90125 SHM-CD for £55, got the HiRes download to replace it and covered the purchase costs of both. It’s not the first time I’ve managed this but obviously the scope for reproducing it is limited.

What’s never going to change is the uncertainty surrounding sound quality. At least Amazon will take a poor CD or DVD back if you give the appropriate reason. Once you’ve downloader you’re either happy or screwed and there’s no way back. Back in the day I could walk down a street and listen to mates’ stuff or borrow it before buying. I don’t know how many miles I would have to drive now to find a kindred spirit.

I think we are being asked to pay too much for downloads. There is no cd to make, no packaging, no transport costs, so why are we charged so much?

I prefer to buy CD's and they are a real bargain these days.

I think this calls for a forum type of solution. Because labels and retailers also haven't thought about the scenario of people who bought the CD and want the high dev later on because they like it so much or started to switch to HD.

So what I would suggest in the forum to start a thread on what are according to forum members realy good high res albums.

As I am not yet on streaming I can't start the thread as I would not be able to contribute.

I am quite selective with my purchases of hi res downloads, and typically rely on third-party reviews. I've not tried Harry's recommendation of Computer Audiophile, but do read the Steve Hoffman forums for this.

The Grateful Dead and Eagles and Doors catalogs from HDTracks have been quite impressive to me, and I enjoy listening to them. 

There are occasional examples of very reasonable pricing - Steven Wilson’s “The Raven that refused to sing” is available for £7.50 (minus artwork, which is easily sourced) as a 24/96 FLAC download from Burning Shed and the CD is £9.99.  If only more could be encouraged to follow this example.

There will always be a big subjective component. For my own part, further to this I am more concerned with how much I enjoy it compared to other versions and regardless of how it looks on a spectrogram. In fairness, I think a number of HiRes versions of old favourites sound sufficiently different to be of interest or not of interest but there are few (they do exist) where I think HiRes is demonstrably better.

Notwithstanding all this, I would be very much up for a thread along these lines. As a cross section of the music loving community, the population herein is intelligent and has more than an average number of ears I can trust.

Well which is it?

"Interesting results you are getting versus lossy streams -- of course, not at all what's expected!"

My experience so far is ...the most important thing is how an album is played in studio, recorded and mastered. You can have as many bits and samples as you want, but if they're not right, they are useless or close to it.

The other one is, that Players + Systems(Computers, OS, Configuration, drivers and so on) make a lot of impact to SQ. Before I crossed into streaming world with Dac-V1, I had had completely different opinion. 

Mark Waldrep from AIX/iTrax is on the brink of lauching his revamped website where he will for each album offer information about its provenance (so what masters have been used in the digitising process) and also will he be presenting spectragrams so you can see how the tracks looks (if it has been brickwalled, has high frequency noise like you get with DSD sources, or whether it contains any higher frequencies than 22kHz at all, etc) so you can see what you are buying and if it can actually claim to be a high-res recording at all.

i hope it will set a level of transparancy others will be forced to follow.

cheers

Aleg

If you are into classical music have a look at eClassical.com, you will find regularly very good new recordings in high res for as little as US$10.49 which is just under €8.00

they sell mostly Harmonia Mundi and BIS. The shop is actually owned by BIS.

so have a look

cheers

Aleg

That is very useful to know indeed Aleg.

I will check that site out.

Thank you.

@ Dan43.  The examples you quoted seem to be excellent value and adds to the evidence that it is possible to deliver at reasonable cost, and the need to shop around.

@Hook.  The prices you quote demonstrate even better value and goes to illustrate what can be done commercially.  In fact the prices almost make me wish I lived in America.  You asked if the 24/96 download sounds £2.49 better than the CD.  I seem to have confused you here as the 24/96 download is £2.49 cheaper than the CD.  To me the 24/96 sounds cleaner but I am not very good at expressing how I hear music as I consider myself to be slightly cloth-eared - and that is in the good ear.  However, one thing I am sure of is that the CD is not worth £2.49 more than the 24/96 download.

Thanks Aleg, useful information.  Hopefully more will follow suit. 

Didn't know this one - thanks.

I am trying to corrrelate this:

"Bugs me too SJB.  Enough so that I am sticking with buying used CDs. They seem like such great bargains compared to premium priced downloads."

with

"and I'd pay more to access higher resolution streams."

Hook would seem to be saying he would pay more to stream hi-res tracks (e.g. from Qobuz) than lossy ones (e.g. Spotify).

It is great to see that people parse posts here like  poetry. increses faith in human nature and all that lark.

SJB

I'm sure that the 'raw material/distribution costs are zero' argument (though a very fair point) is a red herring. The real issue, certainly for the classical music industry at least, is the bottom falling out of the market and the record companies being desperate to recoup any of the enormous costs involved by Any Means Necessary.

If you ignore live recordings, where the performance would have happened anyway, there's very little recording of large scale works going on these days compared to the 80s/90s, where record companies would think nothing of taking over, say, Watford Town Hall with a massive orchestra and famous conductor to take their time recording some huge bit of repertoire like Mahler 8. They just can't afford it these days. Much cheaper to record a choir of 16 people, or a piano & violin duet and sell it for the same price.

So, with things so tight, if they have a reason for charging a bit extra for a high-res version of a track (which, as has been pointed out, was recorded at a higher res anyway), they're going to take it. If you don't like it, keep your money in your pocket. But, just like supporting a local record shop, if you're lucky enough to have one, you can argue that paying the extra goes to making more of the stuff we love so much.

Mark

@Hook: Currently, cds fetch about $1 when you resell them - so not sure why being able to resell is a consideration at all.

I would be more than happy to pay the same amount of money for a cd quality digital download - as a CD itself. That way, I won't have to deal with all the ripping, meta-data, and bit perfect nonsense. In fact, given a choice between a physical CD and CD quality download - I'll take the download, since I'll be introducing less plastic in the world. Yes, there is an energy cost to running servers, but I digress...

If it's 24/96, it makes sense for it to be a few dollars more.

You do realize that the cost of plastic - or the CD medium itself is just a few cents today - so whether it's a download or a CD, it's really a wash from a value perspective. Running Servers to do a download isn't free either.

This is a lot like folks who like to have their software for free.. because it's just software...

Why?

SJB