Amazon HD Music goes live

Discussion in 'Audio Hardware' started by BubbaMc, Sep 17, 2019.

  1. Tim S

    Tim S Senior Member

    Location:
    East Tennessee
    In short it means that because all this is going through the windows mixer/system what is actually coming out of your computer is totally dependent on the settings you choose for your device capability.

    If you set them lower than the streaming file, windows will downsample.

    If you set them higher than the streaming file, windows will upsample.

    The resolution shown in the amazon app means nothing.

    The resolution shown on your DAC means nothing.
     
  2. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    yes, shows as playing at 24/192 but audio captured from the stream, when viewing the sound wave, reveals exactly what I said. See image below.
    [​IMG]
     
  3. Tim S

    Tim S Senior Member

    Location:
    East Tennessee
    What are your windows audio device settings when you captured this stream?
     
  4. texquad

    texquad Senior Member

    Location:
    Home of The Alamo
    I'm new to Amazon music and only signed on to hear the Ultra HD tracks. When I check the resolution while listening to UHD tracks Amazon shows that the "Track Quality": 24/96 but my PC's "Device Capability" is only: 24/44.1 and it's "Currently Playing" at 24/44.1. Sometimes UHD tracks only play at 16/44.1. I get get periodic dropouts. I use Spectrum formally TimeWarner for my internet provider. I've started using a external USB headphone DAC that should do 24/192. Does that help? I have noticed I get better track quality on my Samsung S9. Do I need to up my internet speed to make this work properly on my PC?
     
  5. OpethPA

    OpethPA Embracing my inner geek

    Location:
    NJ

    Internet Speed , assuming you are not running on a shared 5mb connection, is not going to be the least likely culprit so before you up that there are multiple other steps to try.

    What is the current computer you are running on? What version of Windows, assuming that is what you are running, and have you followed the various guides out there for maximizing Windows sound.
     
  6. sami

    sami Mono still rules

    Location:
    Down The Shore
    Which USB headphone DAC?
     
  7. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    studio quality, 192/24
     
  8. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    sounds good, will do this when I return from holidays abroad.
    be back after the new year and will start this
     
    Tim S likes this.
  9. mtrot

    mtrot Forum Resident

    Location:
    Tyler, TX
    Well, I have no idea how to read that, but if what you are saying is true, you should report Amazon to the FTC for fraud.
     
  10. SKBubba

    SKBubba Forum Resident

    Location:
    Tennessee
    Well, now I have to take all that back. My Amazon Windows desktop app quit working after a Windows update and nothing I tried made it work again. So back to Qobuz with Roon. I will miss Amazon's 'stations'. They work better than roon radio with tidal or qobuz. But qobuz sounds excellent, plays bit-perfect, and they seem to have fixed their volume leveling issues. The are supposed to be coming out next year with an autoplay/radio/station feature similar to tidal and amazon. Roon radio +qobuz will get me by 'till then
     
  11. sunspot42

    sunspot42 Forum Resident

    Location:
    San Francisco
    Good lord. More bugs than a sewer.

    Hire some effing developers who know what they're doing, Amazon. I realize this will take some precious Bezos cash, but somehow I think he'll survive.

    [​IMG]
     
    ClassicalCD likes this.
  12. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    tracks showing no audio info above -20k are NOT hi-res
     
    TonyCzar and sunspot42 like this.
  13. Gaslight

    Gaslight ⎧⚍⎫⚑

    Location:
    Northeast USA
    For Amazon HD, have you offline downloaded before recording? The app has had known issues with downsampling to lossy when streaming only, for no apparent reason. But offline downloads / playing those back do not have the same issues.

    I'd test your examples myself...but my trial just ended today (went back to Tidal for now).
     
    Last edited: Dec 20, 2019
    Billy Infinity likes this.
  14. texquad

    texquad Senior Member

    Location:
    Home of The Alamo
    I'm running Window 7 Ultimate with an Intel i5-4590 CPU at 3.30 GHz w/8GB RAM 64-bit. I just purchased a FX-Audio DAC-X6 that I'm testing out and my internet speed is 240 mbps.
     
  15. TarnishedEars

    TarnishedEars Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Seattle area
    What program, or programs are you using to perform such tests? And what tests are these programs running which enables them to verify that these streams are not CD quality?
     
  16. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    no, i'll have to give that a try
     
    Gaslight likes this.
  17. scoredaddy

    scoredaddy Forum Resident

    Location:
    NYC
    already explained in a previous post
     
  18. TarnishedEars

    TarnishedEars Forum Resident

    Location:
    The Seattle area
    Nevermind...
     
    Last edited: Dec 21, 2019
  19. I gotta give Amazon credit for getting me seriously interested in music streaming with their HD service. Because it pushed Qobuz into lowering their monthly rate to $14.99, cheap enough for me to want to give it a try, and so I am three weeks into a Qobuz free month trial, and after numerous annoying headaches with their Windows app, today I installed Audirvana to handle my Qobuz stream and Wow Bob Wow. This is what I'm talkin' about! Beautiful sound and stable playback performance. Listening to some vintage Steve Kuhn on ECM at 16/44 and sounding so good... and the Hi-Res offerings, my oh my. I am going to give Tidal a free trial run within the next month or so, and decide on which of the two I wanna keep. Would never have given this a shot were it not for Amazon, and many thanks to the forum users who have documented all of the drawbacks and failures of Amazon HD for saving me from wasting my time with that business. I don't care how much deeper their catalog is, as far as I'm concerned what I want foremost is optimal sound quality and dependable performance. Loving Qobuz/Audirvana so far...
     
    allegro and ClassicalCD like this.
  20. D700

    D700 Just Add Scotch

    Location:
    USA
    So for those folks getting inconsistent bit rate within same album, is this just adaptive stream rate mechanism when network of buffer problems exist?

    the way to tell would be to go back and play track at different times, see if rate changes

    downloading It as other suggested would confirm they at least have the right file

    if this is what’s going on, I’m curios how the other services handle that.
     
  21. texquad

    texquad Senior Member

    Location:
    Home of The Alamo
    Yes, I've seen this too.
     
  22. RickH

    RickH Connoisseur of deep album cuts

    Location:
    Raleigh, NC
    General observation and fun feature of the service is that once you have added several albums and songs to “My Music”, then click on your “Songs”, then the shuffle icon, you’ll find you now have a really cool radio station-like mix of tunes.
     
    D700 and sami like this.
  23. allegro

    allegro Well-Known Member

    Location:
    USA
    Unless your DAC is broken the DAC display will agree with the bit depth and sample rate set in Windows Sounds. This was the first tip off to me that Amazon Music HD was operating in shared mode.
     
    Tim S likes this.
  24. mtrot

    mtrot Forum Resident

    Location:
    Tyler, TX
    I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays! Hey, if you are a fan of Mahler's music or classical music in general, I just want to say that I'm listening to this Mahler Symphony No.5 now in 24/192 on Amazon HD Music. OMG, the sound is glorious, so smooth and pure sounding. Seriously, try it out. As far as I can tell, this is not available in high res on any disc format. Discogs does, however, show some 24/192 data files. I had this on my Amazon wish list and somebody gave it to me for Christmas. But when I checked in Amazon Music HD, I found that it was in Ultra HD. So, I returned the disc for credit.
    [​IMG]
     
  25. allegro

    allegro Well-Known Member

    Location:
    USA
    Qobuz has it also at Open Qobuz

    You can also buy it at HD Tracks.
     
    Last edited: Jan 3, 2020

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