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CD Quality Versus Streaming Quality

I realize this will be a contentious subject, and far be it from me to challenge any of the many expert opinions on this forum, but if I may offer my feedback vis-a-vis what I am hearing, and gain some knowledge in the process.

i will begin saying that my digital front end setup is not state of the art, but i have had the good fortune to listen to a number of really high-end systems. I guess the number one deficit in my digital front end is a streamer server, and no question about it that will improve the sound.

My CD player is a universal player; Pioneer BDP-09fd. It uses Wolfson DACs. It has been modified to a degree. I have bought and sold other players, but kept this one, because it has a beautiful sound that serves the music well.

Recently, i ventured over to my son’s place and we hooked up my player (he doesn’t have one and rely’s on streaming only) We compared tracks / albums of CD quality and master quality streamed on Tidal with ‘redbook’ CDs I have. For example, some Lee Ritenaur CDs and some Indian classical and the wonderful Mozart and Chopin.
His system is highly resolving.

we were both very surprised to find the CDs played on the player to be the better sound. And not just by a little. The sound was clearly superior, with higher resolution and definition, spatial ques, much better and clearer imaging. Very surprising indeed. Shouldn’t there be no difference? This would suggest the streaming service is throttling the bandwidth or compressing the signal?

i am most interested to hear others’ observations, and suggestions as to why this might be? I do love the convenience aspect of streaming, but it IS expensive for a chap like me of fairly modest means. The Tidal HiFi topline service is $30 per month I believe, something the good lady is not too thrilled about. God forbid I should suggest Roon on top of that I may likely get my walking papers. I jest, but only partially LoL. My point is, if I pay this sort of money, isn’t it fair to expect sound to equal the digital stream from the CD player and silver disc?
Thoughts?

AK





4afsanakhan

Showing 2 responses by audphile1

audphile1's avatar
audphile1
4,169 posts
 
I’ve run into sound quality issues recently running Qobuz. I posted about it here. It caused enough grief that I signed up for a 3 month Tidal trial. I have since tested multiple albums to compare Qobuz and Tidal and in 99% of the cases I prefer Tidal. Qobuz sounds flat with glaring mids that results in an uneasy overall presentation. Vocals are more recessed and are set further back, details are more subdued. With Tidal the music just flows easier with better overall clarity and more relaxed, more inviting presentation. Acoustic bass has better texture. As I’m reading comments on this thread I see majority prefer Qobuz over Tidal. I’m wondering is it really that system dependent? I don’t dispute what others hear but at the ssme time I know what I hear as well.
As far as CD vs streaming…few days ago I had an opportunity to test a $550 CD transport driving my DAC via SPDIF cable and it bettered Tidal, Qobuz and CD Rips ( FLAC/WAV) files on the hard drive that’s connected to my streamer. It was just more engaging, more real sounding with better detail retrieval and better sense of conveying the emotions in the music with layers and textures that aren’t as apparent with streaming. Listening to streaming after listening to a good old original redbook CD sounded lifeless. Now don’t get me wrong…streaming sounds good on its own but not immediately after I heard the same material on CD.
System:
Auralic Aries G1 streamer (Audience AU24se USB cable)
Bryston BDA-3 DAC
Rogue RP-5 pre
Rogue ST-100 amp
Martin Logan Montis speakers

Interconnects:
Acoustic Zen Matrix Ref II
Acoustic Zen Absolute Copper
Sp. Cables - Audience AU24sx
audphile1's avatar
audphile1
4,169 posts
 
I forgot to mention in my post that I also used Roon for over a year. It is just flat out impressive when it comes to managing your streaming services and local HDD/NAS music as a database that puts everything at your fingertips. It also has this amazing feature to auto play similar music after you’re done listening to a song or an album, and I discovered tons of new music that I never heard before. The convenience and this Roon “radio” feature managed to temporarily conceal additional levels of sound quality degradation introduced by Roon alone. I canceled Roon after I compared streaming using my streamer as Roon end-point vs streaming using the streamer’s native app and forgoing Roon altogether. I felt that with Roon the dynamic range was further reduced causing the music to sound even more lifeless. I never looked back. 
But…I wouldn’t totally give up on streaming though as it provides new music discovery, selection and convenience that can’t be beat. I just hope some of these frustration inducing variables can be worked out at the source and they find a way to stabilize it. For now, I am on a hunt for a CD transport.
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