Jump to content

Switched to Amazon HD from Tidal


Fido

Recommended Posts

I have been streaming music for a couple of years now. First on Apple, Pandora and then Spotify before subscribing to Tidal. Each has pluses and minuses but I recently tried Amazon HD and am very impressed with the music selection choices and incredible high res quality of millions of their offerings. Tidal runs $19.99 a month and Amazon HD runs $12.99 for Prime members. There appears to be many more songs on Amazon that are super high res than on Tidal and they all sound fantastic on my system. So goodbye Tidal hello Amazon HD. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Smart move my progression is similar. I'm now working on my signal chain to make sure I get all that Hi-Res goodness. It's great to live in a time where I can have CD and sometimes better quality sound right at my fingertips. If you would have told me 20 years ago that I would be able to do what we are able to do today with streaming music I would have called you crazy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 minutes ago, Fido said:

I have been streaming music for a couple of years now. First on Apple, Pandora and then Spotify before subscribing to Tidal. Each has pluses and minuses but I recently tried Amazon HD and am very impressed with the music selection choices and incredible high res quality of millions of their offerings. Tidal runs $19.99 a month and Amazon HD runs $12.99 for Prime members. There appears to be many more songs on Amazon that are super high res than on Tidal and they all sound fantastic on my system. So goodbye Tidal hello Amazon HD. 

Using Tidal at the moment. Just for clarification, is the Amazon HD,  $12.99 in addition to the Prime membership fee. or part of?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 minutes ago, Shiva said:

Using Tidal at the moment. Just for clarification, is the Amazon HD,  $12.99 in addition to the Prime membership fee. or part of?

The $12.99 is in addition to Prime membership fee but my wife and I use Amazon Prime already for most of our online purchases and find it a great value for our lifestyle.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 minutes ago, Fido said:

Family plan for 6 members is $14.99

Amazon HD is in Europe only available in the UK and Germany.

Qobuz and Spotify are availabel all over Europe.

 

I have Amazon Prime (for video) and they are messing up things with subtitles, languages and audio sync. Compared to Disney+ and Netflix, Amazon Prime is one huge disappointment, both in content and technology. Here in Europe, language setting and subtitles and audio tracks are really important. If you mess that up, you leave a bad impression.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I’ve been using Tidal for a little over a year. It doesn’t have all the music I listen to, but offers a lot of live recordings and unreleased content I haven’t found anywhere else. Still it is missing bands that should be included. For example, Metallica was just made available at Christmas. I’m gonna look in to Amazon HD and compare. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 minutes ago, nickyboy6100 said:

I’ve been using Tidal for a little over a year. It doesn’t have all the music I listen to, but offers a lot of live recordings and unreleased content I haven’t found anywhere else. Still it is missing bands that should be included. For example, Metallica was just made available at Christmas. I’m gonna look in to Amazon HD and compare. 

As I stated I find all streaming services have plus and minuses. I like Tidal and their exclusive content but Amazon HD also has exclusive content, it’s just different content. For the music I listen to Amazon actually has more super high quality songs and it costs less than Tidal. $$$$$ no object I’d subscribe to all of them. Lol

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use Amazon HD also and I'm very happy with it. There is a fair amount of exclusive content. I like having several versions of my favorite albums available. Bonus content, demos, etc. The user interface isn't flashy, but I have yet to be disappointed with the available content.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Has that original crappy clunky interface gotten any better with Amazon HD yet?  What I mainly didn't like about it was the inability of being able to control the desktop app from a phone or tablet like how Spotify does it.  But what I loathed more than that was, if you saved an artist, you couldn't just go to that artist and see all of their disography; it's like you had to know up front what you wanted to go to.  I really wanted to like it and keep it but stayed with Spotify....which also works well with all my Google Home devices.  Not to mention that Android Auto didn't support it at the time.  Maybe that's different now.

 

But if they could make those two things work, I'd consider.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I tried Amazon HD. I dropped it after the three months free trial that was offered to me at product launch. I didn't like the available selections. I listen mainly to old jazz records and classical. Stuff that was available on Tidal was lacking on Amazon. Also it was a pain for me to stream as it was incompatible with my Volumio based streamer. Maybe it's better now, I don't know. I have been a very happy camper with Tidal and have been a subscriber for years now.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

34 minutes ago, Edgar said:

I looked into Amazon HD, but it seemed only to be supported by Amazon devices. Has that changed? And do any Amazon-compatible devices offer digital outputs without resampling?

 

It worked on my Galaxy S9 and they make a desktop app for Windows.  But, the phone app can't control the desktop app like Spotify can do, and point it to whatever device to stream it to.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Edgar said:

I looked into Amazon HD, but it seemed only to be supported by Amazon devices. Has that changed? And do any Amazon-compatible devices offer digital outputs without resampling?

I do not understand those comments. I can play Amazon HD on my iPhone, Ipad, MacBook Pro and thru my Node2i without any problem and my Node 2i outputs to my Dac via coaxial. without any resampling.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

36 minutes ago, Fido said:

I do not understand those comments. I can play Amazon HD on my iPhone, Ipad, MacBook Pro and thru my Node2i without any problem and my Node 2i outputs to my Dac via coaxial. without any resampling.

 

Perhaps things have changed since last I checked. That's why I asked.

I run Tidal through the same Nuc computer that I use for DSP crossovers and other signal processing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, avguytx said:

Has that original crappy clunky interface gotten any better with Amazon HD yet?  What I mainly didn't like about it was the inability of being able to control the desktop app from a phone or tablet like how Spotify does it.  But what I loathed more than that was, if you saved an artist, you couldn't just go to that artist and see all of their disography; it's like you had to know up front what you wanted to go to.  I really wanted to like it and keep it but stayed with Spotify....which also works well with all my Google Home devices.  Not to mention that Android Auto didn't support it at the time.  Maybe that's different now.

 

But if they could make those two things work, I'd consider.

Amazon HD music currently works with Android Auto, I use it all the time in the car. I've been using it for several years now, and once the HD version was available I upgraded right away. I search by artist all the time, and have never had a problem finding an entire discography. Usually there are multiple versions of popular albums with Ultra HD tracks playing up to 24 bit / 96kHz Flac files. I use the desktop app at work and feed USB out from my PC into my DAC and then to head phone amp. Phone app will not control desktop app like Spotify though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, capo72 said:

Amazon HD music currently works with Android Auto, I use it all the time in the car. I've been using it for several years now, and once the HD version was available I upgraded right away. I search by artist all the time, and have never had a problem finding an entire discography. Usually there are multiple versions of popular albums with Ultra HD tracks playing up to 24 bit / 96kHz Flac files. I use the desktop app at work and feed USB out from my PC into my DAC and then to head phone amp. Phone app will not control desktop app like Spotify though.

 

Maybe it's got something to do with how they were saved.  But for 4 months, I put it through its paces and the two parts that I hated were the not being able to control the desktop app from the phone app (like Spotify connect) and saving, then finding, the artist list like Spotify does.  There's trade offs for both, or any of them, but at the end of the day, I took Spotify for the ease of control.  I might try it again and see at  some point because it definitely sounded good.  I also enjoy the Spotify playlists as I have no time or desire to sit and make them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

×
×
  • Create New...