Article: Amazon Music HD Is Still Lossy

[Daren F]

4 minutes ago, UELong said:

It's Canada who gets overlooked, too much.  Would a VPN allow Canadians to get Kobuz?

You can create an account with a VPN but payment will fail with a Canadian credit card or paypal account.

[Daren F]

8 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

If I can get a node 2i for testing I’ll get it done. 

 

The Node 2i is currently on sale for $449.00 USD. $100.00 off.

 

I had one on order specifically for Amazon HD but canceled when I read this thread.

 

DTS Play-Fi will also play amazon Music HD bit perfect.

[Daren F]

Just now, The Computer Audiophile said:

There’s no way to test this. Given my other testing with Play-Fi devices, I’d be absolutely shocked if this was bit perfect. 

 

I say bit perfect in the sense that the bit rate and sample rate change on my preamp to reflect what Amazon claims the track quality is.

[Daren F]

26 minutes ago, UELong said:

I may try it with Paypal, anyway.  I use it, not my card, to pay for tracks bought from HDT, with no problem.  It might work.  And, to keep it relevant: with Kobuz or other services, who needs to put even more money in Amazon Jeff's pocket?

 

Good luck, I hope it works for you. 

 

I even sent a message to customer service asking for an exception but they refused it.

[Daren F]

40 minutes ago, audiobomber said:

I did some sound checks and found Amazon HD doesn't sound as good as a CD rip, but better than Google Play and YouTube Music. How do Tidal and Qobuz compare? A friend brought Roon/Tidal over with his Mac and I was not impressed at all. PRaT was not good.

 

I find that a locally stored files (rips) played with Roon or Jriver sound better than Tidal streams played with Roon.

[Daren F]

1 hour ago, JETHEAT said:

nothing irritates me more than the amazon music HD app with family plan. 

 

i listened via a windows10 pc with a dac magic 100 connected via usb2. which was intern connected to R-41pm's and a SW-100 from klipsch. for the price it was very enjoyable. but it was just always missing something. i then tried to use HD tracks .com and musicbee. this was more enjoyable but more technical to set up. having to force your signal from the windows computer is just not believable to me. i guess it works i don't know it works. 

 

as it stands i want to still get into a network streamer but f*** that s***. all of the ones i have looked at from cambridge audio to NAD to marantz all seemingly ignore amazon music hd. i wonder why. 

 

there are so many variables in picking hifi components you can easily run into decision paralysis. 

 

NAD/Bluesound BluOs and Marantz/HEOS do support Amazon Music HD (AMHD) 

 

I have no experience with HEOS but I do have a Bluesound Node 2i and am able to play AMHD via the BluOs app bit perfect.

 

Comparing AMHD to qobuz, I agree that there seems to be something missing in terms of sound quality. Not sure why AMHD's bits sound different than qobuz's bits but, IMO, qobuz sounds better.