Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion HiFi & HT Chat Spotify now available in the US!

WOW!!!

From the above link

* Classical Music..................Only 2 out of 10 Tracks are Streamed at 320Kbps

* Newly Available Music.........Only 7 out of 25 are at 320kbps

* That's 9 out of 35 total........or Only 26% are at 320kbps

Surprised this hasn't been raised before on here

Seems strange that even the Majority of New and "Popular" stuff is only at 160kbps

I wonder if this has to do with Spotify's own policies..........or if many of the Labels are simply not allowing them to Stream at the higher bit rates

I can't really comment on the perceived sound quality of 160kbps OGG..........I do know that anything below 256kbps MP3 is borderline unlistenable IMHO

Either way, 26% falls into the realm of False Advertising to me

Just don't listen to "Born to Run" on "Born to Run".

Yes, but even as a "Music Evaluation" service to listen to new Albums before deciding to buy or not, that kind of defeats the purpose

Imagine if the first time hearing "Born to Run" was thru Spotify........then based on your comment above, I'm not sure you'd be investing in the Album

I've long wanted access to Spotify Premium.........primarily because I thought it offered the highest quality of all the Services.........now I'm not so sure!!!

Now Meridian have an even better excuse.

I have zero interest in anything but lossless.

Take a look at DS Audio and I'm sure there are other similar apps for other brand NAS's that allow you to listen to your music anywhere on the planet so long as you can get online:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ds-audio/id321495303?mt=8

I thought these images might illustrate the effect of Spotify volume normalisation.

Bartok - Concerto for Orchestra (Ivan Fischer, Budapest Festival Orchestra). The vertical green lines separate the tracks (movements).

Spotify with no volume normalisation:



Spotify with volume normalisation:



Note how noticeable gain is applied even to tracks which touch -0.7dB with the result that some of the climaxes are pushed into (soft) clipping. Also note how the dynamic relationships between movements are destroyed.

jesus

Perhaps Spotify and classical, with its huge dynamic range, should be avoided on Intel based systems.

I still think the premium service is a very good deal despite its limitations. The ability to cache 1000s of songs on up to 3 mobile devices is generous and I've saved a fortune in iTunes vouchers for the kids. And, if your phone is like mine, 160kbps is not the limiting factor regarding sound quality

Well, just click volume normalisation off(?)

Crion,

The point is that you have no option to "click volume normalisation off" if you are running Squeezebox Server on a PC or a NAS or hardware server which isn't ARM based. It's permanently on.

What will Spotify offer that MOG does not already offer? I pay $5.00/month and all the content is 320k, all the time.

JohnGB,

I am afraid this is OT.

Interested in your use of HP Microserver. Looked it up & seems very cheap, but my understanding of servers & networks is limited. Can it be used as a NAS, in effect? And is Ubuntu compatible with Windows? No doubt there are more questions I should ask. Anyway, intriguing!

Locus

Is MOG on iPhone/android/sonos/squeezebox/windows/mac/onkyo as well. ?

13M+ songs with 10k added every day? Offline playlists on mobile devices? Share and collaborate on favourite playlists?