DSD vs 24/192 vs 24/44 vs Tidal HiFi vs Spotify Extreme

A ripped CD can only ever be of CD quality - 16 bit and 44.1k. I have found in my system that a ripped CD played from the nas sounds a lot better than CD quality music streamed from Tidal - to such an extent that I don't use Tidal any more. 

Stepping up to high res music, so 24 bit 44k, 88k, 96k and 192k sounds better than 16 bit, so long as it's a good recording in the first place. But a well recorded CD resolution album can sound better than a badly recorded high res one. I've not heard DSD so cannot comment on that. I'll only buy music I like, rather than getting something because it's high definition and 'sounds good', and from what you say I'm sure you are the same. 

Yes it's got to sound good and something I want, but alas everything in life is a compromise. I want the best media quality but I love the ease and plentiful playlists of Spotify.

You've sort of answered most of your own questions,  if it sounds better to you,  then it is better.  But no you will not get DSD type quality with a CD rip,  no matter what its ripped or played with,  it will always be 16/44 PCM SQ & it can't be made any better.   

My opinions & thoughts on DSD:  what sounds best is not what I'm not getting into,  music is in the ear of the beholder.   DSD is a bit of a niche product area, the people who use it tend to be serious about recording & producing a high quality sound all the way through to the end product & in many cases where possible DSD, or similar, is used throughout the recording process & this is probably the main reason why we hear something better (or different).

Given the premise of the previous sentence,  with the different genre of the albums I have in DSD & on my system,  it sounds better than PCM & its very clear to the point its not really debatable. Sound stage is larger with clearly defined spatial separation & dynamic transients & range is more pronounced.

However IMO not all music is suitable for recording with DSD;  reading what I can from the recording studios that do use DSD;  all say it's better suited to simple live studio recordings using one or at least not that many microphones,  and small ensembles of acoustic, semi-acoustic, folk, choral & jazz & with no post recording mixing are most suited.  Complex multi-mic, multi track recordings that will always require mixing/mastering are not suitable.  The DSD experts like Blue Coast Music who produce all their acoustic folk albums in DSD from end to end have found it impossible to do the same with multi-mic & subsequent mixing with their big orchestra recordings,  they do these recordings up to the studio master production in PCM, finally converting to DSD & the usual PCM consumer codec's,   &  they more than often say the WAV album is better than the DSD version.      Sound Liaison who are another DSD studio & vendor have struggled to perfect a better way for the PCM to DSD conversion, they create the DSD master from a PCM studio master via an analogue chain & are very open about that.  They have now perfected recording in DXD & that enables the creation of a true DSD studio master.

Personally I have always looked for DSD when it's available & from a DSD specialist studio.   Other DSD conversions & especially with big orchestra's & more especially so with electric rock & jazz are a real mixed bag & I no longer bother,  24-bit WAV is a safer option - strictly IMO & with my ears of course     

Hungryhalibut posted:

I have found in my system that a ripped CD played from the nas sounds a lot better than CD quality music streamed from Tidal

And why is that? I've found exactly the same thing to be true. There's a sizable loss in quality going from 44.1 kHz 16 bit rebook to the same rate and depth on Tidal.The only explanation I can think of is that Tidal isn't streaming what it says it's streaming, but I checked on Roon (my preferred streaming software) and it confirms the data rate and depth. Something fishy is going on and I can't figure out what since both audio files are buffered in the same way before being transmitted into the DAC via USB.

At this point I only use Tidal to sample music, and buy everything I like because it sounds so much better. Anyone figure this out?

Obsydian posted:

Appreciate PCM and DSD high level approaches, not wanting technical discussions, more a does it sound better.

Well, there's some debate as the whether DSD is a good approach. Rob Watts for example, talks at length about how he feels it's flawed, and all his DACs convert DSD to PCM before processing.

Leaving that aside, higher resolution will sound better than lower resolution all things being equal, so when buying always buy the highest resolution available.  But if you go for classical music it's more complicated because some old performances available from digitally mastered analog sources don't even get up to rebook standard and yet sound better than newer 292/24 recordings. The type of instrument, the player (especially the player), the conductor, can all have a much greater effect on making the "sound better" than the resolution of the recording. It may have less dynamic range and more noise, and still sound better. Compare anything played by Joshua Bell to anything played by Grumiaux and you'll find the former is always recorded better and the latter always sounds better. 

Even outside classical this can be true. Diana Krall is always exquisitely well recorded. But anytime she sings something that was previously sung by someone else. Someone less blonde and less white, I find the older recording to sound far better.

These comparisons never seem to state what original version of cd is being compared to say the Tidal version. I have said before my original Brothers in arms cd by Dire Straits, does not compare favourably to the Tidal remastered. I am never sure from the posts that apples and apples are being compared?

Gazza posted:

These comparisons never seem to state what original version of cd is being compared to say the Tidal version. 

In my case, all comparisons are of the same version.

I have two DSD albums which sound absolutely sublime. But they are also available in 24/192. So which format were they originally recorded in? Are they good because they were native DSDs or because the conversion of PCM to DSD somehow imbued them with a lifelike quality? Like everything else, it goes to provenance. Not to mention the quality of the original recording and production.  Ripping a CD to PCM files won't give you anything remotely like a collection DSD files. The processes are different and the volume of data is an order of magnitude greater for DSD, as would be expected from SACD files.

Does it matter? I've got some DSDs that sound breathtakingly life like and a couple which are muddy. I've got some absolutely superb 24bit material and some that sounds like shit. And I've got some CDs which sound superior to any copies, remasters or derivatives issued at higher resolutions. You have to take the rough with the smooth. 

perizoqui posted:

Gazza posted:

These comparisons never seem to state what original version of cd is being compared to say the Tidal version. 

In my case, all comparisons are of the same version.

I could only compare from the Spotify up to 44/192 with Bob Marley, sadly not available in DSD 

Harry posted:

I have two DSD albums which sound absolutely sublime. But they are also available in 24/192. So which format were they originally recorded in? Are they good because they were native DSDs or because the conversion of PCM to DSD somehow imbued them with a lifelike quality? Like everything else, it goes to provenance. Not to mention the quality of the original recording and production.  Ripping a CD to PCM files won't give you anything remotely like a collection DSD files. The processes are different and the volume of data is an order of magnitude greater for DSD, as would be expected from SACD files.

Does it matter? I've got some DSDs that sound breathtakingly life like and a couple which are muddy. I've got some absolutely superb 24bit material and some that sounds like shit. And I've got some CDs which sound superior to any copies, remasters or derivatives issued at higher resolutions. You have to take the rough with the smooth. 

Size wise the DSD Celine Dion album was over 3GB for 16 tracks.

Rough with smooth is for me, im waiting for Spotify Hifi (if and when it gets out of closed beta) it's good enough (Tidal Hifi as the surrogate) to trade off catalog of tunes, I prefer Spotify playlists.

That said for specific albums I like, I will be looking for 44/192 or DSD

For anyone looking to demo the same tracks http://www.2l.no/hires/index.html

perizoqui posted:

At this point I only use Tidal to sample music, and buy everything I like because it sounds so much better. Anyone figure this out?

Yes I have in part , and I have posted previously on the matter. The Naim streamers are sensitive to interframe timing variations and how hard the TCP state machine is having to work in the steamer hardware. With Tidal, because the packets are coming over the Internet there is typically much variation to its timing and the TCP machine is usually working pretty hard and this affects the resultant SQ. however you may find the SQ varies subtly as the internet/media server timing dynamics change over time. The other consideration is that Tidal uses FLAC, and again Naim streamers seem to perform at their best when not decoding FLAC.

So a possible fix is to use a media proxy that buffers and transcodes the media... I havent  found or written one yet.. but interestingly the BBC are running a trial of streaming FLAC over the internet. I have been playing that using MinimServer effectively acting as a media proxy server and transcoder, kind of  as a session border controller,  and the SQ on the Naim streamer is outstanding.

When one locally streams on the home network, the interframe timing is more consistent and the network transport machine (TCP) is not having to work hard and I see a resultant lift in SQ

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

perizoqui posted:

At this point I only use Tidal to sample music, and buy everything I like because it sounds so much better. Anyone figure this out?

Yes I have in part , and I have posted previously on the matter. The Naim streamers are sensitive to interframe timing variations and how hard the TCP state machine is having to work in the steamer hardware. With Tidal, because the packets are coming over the Internet there is typically much variation to its timing and the TCP machine is usually working pretty hard and this affects the resultant SQ. however you may find the SQ varies subtly as the internet/media server timing dynamics change over time. The other consideration is that Tidal uses FLAC, and again Naim streamers seem to perform at their best when not decoding FLAC.

So a possible fix is to use a media proxy that buffers and transcodes the media... I havent  found or written one yet.. but interestingly the BBC are running a trial of streaming FLAC over the internet. I have been playing that using MinimServer effectively acting as a media proxy server and transcoder, kind of  as a session border controller,  and the SQ on the Naim streamer is outstanding.

When one locally streams on the home network, the interframe timing is more consistent and the network transport machine (TCP) is not having to work hard and I see a resultant lift in SQ

So similar to CD vs ripped to USB or NAS, less jitter busting.

On a personal note Simon, nice to have wise men like you to explain the science in understandable terms ; )

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

perizoqui posted:

At this point I only use Tidal to sample music, and buy everything I like because it sounds so much better. Anyone figure this out?

Yes I have in part , and I have posted previously on the matter. The Naim streamers are sensitive to interframe timing variations and how hard the TCP state machine is having to work in the steamer hardware. With Tidal, because the packets are coming over the Internet there is typically much variation to its timing and the TCP machine is usually working pretty hard and this affects the resultant SQ. however you may find the SQ varies subtly as the internet/media server timing dynamics change over time. The other consideration is that Tidal uses FLAC, and again Naim streamers seem to perform at their best when not decoding FLAC.

So a possible fix is to use a media proxy that buffers and transcodes the media... I havent  found or written one yet.. but interestingly the BBC are running a trial of streaming FLAC over the internet. I have been playing that using MinimServer effectively acting as a media proxy server and transcoder, kind of  as a session border controller,  and the SQ on the Naim streamer is outstanding.

When one locally streams on the home network, the interframe timing is more consistent and the network transport machine (TCP) is not having to work hard and I see a resultant lift in SQ

Thanks Simon,

Unfortunately my case may be a bit different. I am already using a media proxy (Roon server, RAAT, and a DietPi implementation of a Roon Bridge) to feed my DAC. Perhaps you're still right, and Roon buffers data differently from Tidal than from my hard drive... will have to check on the Roon forum. Still, I would say downloaded AAC from iTunes sounds significantly better than streaming CD quality from Tidal. Tidal's "HiFi" sounds about the same as Naim Radio or BBC 3 on my system. 

Streaming on my system I would rank sources as follows:

(192/24 = 96/24) >> Redbook > iTunes AAC downloads >>> (Tidal HiFi = iTunes streaming = internet radio)

My experience is that the biggest jump is from streaming to local. The next from CD to high resolution. I don't notice a difference between 192 and 96. I do notice a difference between AAC and Redbook, but not as big as the jump from Redbook to high res and nowhere near as big as the jump from internet to local network streaming. Curious if other's experience is similar.

Best,

---Pedro

Going to contradict my prior statement, I love DSD. Been listening for 2hrs now, started with a few of my usual playlists on Tidal, then felt them lacking, onto USB and a few albums I like 44/192, that all lasted 30 mins, the last hour plus has been DSD bloody Celine Dion, even my Mrs was like err what's up with you, but alas she agreed it did sound so musical : |

Yep tried Celine on Tidal Hifi, same tracks, she is still &$*÷*$*, sorry not my cup of normal tea, but DSD is so much more musical and listenable, the Tidal version sounds limp, lifeless, boxed in, compressed, horrible.

Just downloading a sample @ DSD 256 11.2896Mbit/s

Will I wet my pants or realise life's to shirt and stick to Hifi stream quality ... to be continued

Darn Atom can't play the 256, can someone at Naim confirm if DSD support as listed is all encompassing or only partial then ?

The nac272 which has the same processor does not process either 128 or 256 files, but does 64 k so I would guess you may need to ask for a refund on your file purchase.

Just tested some more, 128 and 64 work, just pause to say WOW, but 256 is a no go.

Gaza's your right, but I love my Atom, this recall other brochure mistakes/claims, that's not right, it should be Ronseal, does what it says on the tin.

Just looked at the Atom support page, lists 64 and 128 only for dsd files

Gazza posted:

Just looked at the Atom support page, lists 64 and 128 only for dsd files

Lol and just confirmdd with another two 256, does not work 64 and 128 are fine, actually more than fine, bloody good.

I find that streaming the same album after converting to DSD 128 (C filter) on Tidal sounds better than the original 16/44.2 khz.

OK, just to be disruptive:

I don't find file resolution is predictive. For me it comes down to the quality of the master, be that at 16 or 24bit on the various frequencies.

I have never truly listened to DSD so I cannot comment.

M

if we live in Europe, don't listen to classical music, how many dsd albums can we download ?

perhaps 10 or 20?  the vast majority was recorded on analog master tapes first.  If i am wrong, please tell me, i would be very satisfied to have more dsd than i have. For modern music, from late 90's, can we find dsd albums for pop/rock or jazz?  I found personally no one, just a few dsd from 70´s or 80's albums : in this case i prefer a lot more the lp version.

I convert everything to DSD while using TEAC UD-501.  It sounds better in DSD than PCM whereas the DAC-V1 (I find)  to be the opposite. The file format is one thing but the conversion obviously counts too (i.e. PCM/DSD may not be both optimum, in a given DAC).