Spotify Anyone?
Feb 15, 2012 at 9:30 PM Post #32 of 39


Quote:
As bloop said, gapless playback is a real buzzkill. Selection is okay: much much better than grooveshark (where you'll find 23 versions of the album, each with a different half of the songs), but I'm not convinced it's better than what I'm already using. Convenience is great. I would upgrade to the premium (I almost did), but I read that gapless doesn't work regardless of premium/free. I can't pay for something that is missing something so basic (probably doesn't look basic from the perspective of their software team :p).
 
I noticed that you can't mute the ads: when I turn down the volume, wait ~30s, and turn it back up, the ad keeps going where I cut it off. Sort of frustrating and it makes me want to pay premium, but like I said, I don't want to do that. So I just don't use it due to minor snags. :|

Yeah none of these have gapless, or I have not found one. So what does the premium stream at? 320K Mp3? 
 
 
 
Feb 16, 2012 at 12:01 PM Post #33 of 39

Yes, that's the rate.
 
Quote:
Yeah none of these have gapless, or I have not found one. So what does the premium stream at? 320K Mp3? 
 
 



 
 
Feb 17, 2012 at 7:12 PM Post #34 of 39
That is the rate, but the format is actually OGG Vorbis, q9 OGG Vorbis to be exact. "Audio streams are in the Vorbis format at q5 (approx. 160 kbit/s),[55] or optional q9 (approx. 320kbit/s)[56] for Premium subscribers. Spotify boasts having an almost buffer-free streaming service." -Wikipedia 
 
Feb 17, 2012 at 7:18 PM Post #35 of 39
Interesting OGG claims to be superior to MP3 at the same bit rate.
Thoughts?

 
Quote:
That is the rate, but the format is actually OGG Vorbis, q9 OGG Vorbis to be exact. "Audio streams are in the Vorbis format at q5 (approx. 160 kbit/s),[55] or optional q9 (approx. 320kbit/s)[56] for Premium subscribers. Spotify boasts having an almost buffer-free streaming service." -Wikipedia 



 
 
Feb 17, 2012 at 7:25 PM Post #36 of 39
Quote:
Interesting OGG claims to be superior to MP3 at the same bit rate.
Thoughts?


It's possible at low bit rates (which I believe OGG was mostly designed for since it defaults to Q3 (~110 kbps VBR)). It's not likely at 320 kbps and above, since 320 kbps MP3 is indistinguishable from lossless in most cases anyway.
 
The compression artifacts will probably appear in different ways, so knowing how to hear the flaws of MP3 might not help one hear the flaws of high bit rate OGG. The reverse would be true too. MP3 might be more transparent for some people, if they know what to listen for in OGG.
 
Feb 17, 2012 at 10:43 PM Post #37 of 39

I use Spotify at 320k quite a bit and it is indeed quite good.
Now if they would just add a radio feature similar to Pandora (multiple band/song seeds)
Quote:
It's possible at low bit rates (which I believe OGG was mostly designed for since it defaults to Q3 (~110 kbps VBR)). It's not likely at 320 kbps and above, since 320 kbps MP3 is indistinguishable from lossless in most cases anyway.
 
The compression artifacts will probably appear in different ways, so knowing how to hear the flaws of MP3 might not help one hear the flaws of high bit rate OGG. The reverse would be true too. MP3 might be more transparent for some people, if they know what to listen for in OGG.



 
 
Feb 18, 2012 at 2:50 AM Post #38 of 39
yea, the new 320k premium is pretty darn good. I have it playing through a squeezebox touch fed to a bifrost dac via optical. Some tracks do sound digital and a little harsh. But that is provoked a lot by the cans I use which can be bright at times. Overall I'm happy with it, and I think its worth the 10 bucks a month. 
 
Feb 18, 2012 at 10:58 AM Post #39 of 39
I agree that spotify is quite good, but to me, mog seems to have the better sound quality of the two- as well as a wider variety of music (at least in the genres I favor).  
 
Although not without its faults, I also prefer the mog interface.  The slider giving you a pandora like experience, but with much greater control over how far the selections depart from your starting point, is also pretty awesome.
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top