„Audiophiles don’t use their equipment to listen to your music. Audiophiles use your music to listen to their equipment.“
Alan Parsons
Spotify -> MOTU M2 -> HiFiMan Ananda non-stealth
“High resolution” audio is completely useless for listening (16 bit 44.1 kHz is the best it gets) and there is little value in lossless encodes for listening purposes too, so I don’t get the point of all those “Hifi” streaming services.
If you own lossless encodes, I guess it doesn’t hurt to use them even for listening as storage is cheap these days.Speaking of which, I’d like to switch to purchasing my music though because Spotify will certainly continue on its path towards full enshittification. I want to be in a position where I own all my favourite music before Spotify will be infected with ads on premium plans. Oh and artists are somewhat more likely to be paid a little for their work that way (I hope…)
I plan to use the free YT music for discovery at that point.Completely full of ads already, I routinely get promoted podcasts and gig ticket and merch notifications despite them being turned off.
I started using Spotify lite on my phone. And thankfully, there’s plenty of alternative clients on desktop (such as ncspot). No crap UI elements, just playlists.
I have converted all my CDs to FLAC and I mostly listen to my music collection in stereo speakers instead of headphones because I find the sound more natural. I have built my sound system around the moOde audio software.
Qobuz for me.
Best streaming sound available but I had some skipping issues even on very good connections and options for auto Playlist generation and new music discovery was way behind other services. Great if you always knew exaewhat you wanted to hear, but I went to Tidal and their focus on quality is better than most other services but the music discovery algorithms really are quite good, I find myself more eager than ever to tune in to a streaming service.
Removed by mod
Clean your ear wax.
How do you do it?
Removed by mod
Cleaning out your ears is so huge.
I just use YouTube music revanced
You should give ReVanced Extended a try. My biggest complaint about YT Music is that plays music videos with long intros, but with YT Music RVX you can have SponsorBlock and skip non-music parts automatically.
Ehhh, I’m ballin on a budget, so take that into account.
Generally, if I really want to sink into the music, I’m going with either my lgg7 and my beyerdynamic 770 80 ohm; or whatever device can connect with my usb DAC, a fiio q3.
I do have other options, but that’s my main listening because I simply don’t have the budget to do a proper system with how little I get a chance to listen to music away from headphones. My computer has a decent sound card, and some klipsch speakers that aren’t bad. There’s a home theater unit with cd/bluray hooked up, as well as the shieldTV, and the ability to connect via Bluetooth or cable to whatever device I prefer.
My car is decent, but not audiophile level. More bass focused than anything else.
I do have other headphones. Some tin t2s, some sonys, an old set of koss, that kind of thing.
File wise, its flac and opus.
I use poweramp and/or usb audio player pro. I prefer poweramp, but the other does bit perfect, which I do like on occasion, and it’s more DAC friendly.
I’m happy with the options I have, all considered. Most of it was picked up either on sale or used. I would save up while shopping, then get the best I could get when I was ready. But the key to me is that when I want to, I can listen to anything I have and hear the nuance of it. The sound is as clean as I can get it on my budget, and in all reality, my old ears can’t make use of anything fancier.
You spend almost fifty years living and listening to it loud, you aren’t going to get much bang for your buck out of the really high dollar, precise gear. Hell, I can barely tell a difference between lossless files and mp3 om any given listening method. It’s there, I can still hear a difference, but it’s barely there for me. The better gear helps, but not enough to keep upgrading for tiny changes.
At home: Spotify through Amazon Fire TV through Klipsch The Fives.
On the move: Spotify through Jabra Elite 4 Active.
In the bathroom: Spotify through UE Boom.
I really want to ditch Spotify, but in the meantime…
Same, but I want to export my playlists and liked songs from Spotify. Going through that manually atm seems like too much of a hassle.
If you plan to move to another service, there exists a number of tools to aid in moving playlists between streamers. It is really easy, once you find a good one.
Helped me break the feeling of being locked in due to have 100s of playlists.
Tried one service but didn’t work with some Spotify lists, like the yearly ones. Any good recommendation that might include these as well?
Budget audiophile here: I wear Superlux HD681 semi-open back cans paired with a Creative G6 DAC/amp.
The headphones are $25 but have the the most realistic soundstage I’ve ever heard in a pair of cans, even better than $500+ ones. Pinna activation is almost perfect; feels more like being surrounded by speakers than wearing headphones. Makes them amazing for gaming and movies, but not the best for music due to harsh siblants in the 12kHz range, which I’ve managed to EQ out a bit using Equalizer APO. Nice neutral sound otherwise, mids are almost perfectly flat and bass is tight—yet full—extending well below 20hz. Honestly you can’t do better without spending half a grand or more.
FLACs/Qobuz via Roon. I spend the most time in my office so that’s where my favorite setup is. LS50 Metas + SVS SB-1000 Pro + Peachtree GaN stack.
I also love my HD660s with the Bottlehead Crack tube amp I built.
MusicBee on PC
Vinyl Music Player on my phone
Local mp3s and flacs work the best
I dabble with YouTube Music and music-map.com for music discovery
Haven’t found a nice self hosted music streaming setup that I’m happy with (unsatisfied with the apps and features). I want a nice looking app (super subject of course) that supports offline play and ReplayGain. I’m super happy with Navidrome but not with the Windows/Android apps
A technics changer or linear tracker. I think the changer has a shure cartridge still but the linear tracker has an at. Sometimes through a pair of numark ttxs with m447s and a rane.
I listen to music mostly on my computer and in the car. The car system is nothing special. I listen through either some ATH-M40fs cans, or Presonus Erie 3.5 monitors, which are honestly glorified bookshelf speakers, but decent for the price, IMHO. All running from my (older gen2) Focusrite 2i4 interface.
I used to listen in the train/metro/bus a lot more, but I now work remotely. That’s where I used Bluetooth stuff. No need to worry about the cable getting stiff in the cold or stuck in my winter jacket. I had a pair of Beats Studio 3 I paid less than $100 for that were pretty decent for the price I paid. The sound was as bass heavy as you’d imagine from the brand, but not terribly overpowering for casual listening, and the ANC in particular was pretty impressive. I also had some Anker wireless earbuds I got with a coupon on Drop (formerly Massdrop) that were good enough for listening to podcasts and having background music.
In terms of platforms, YouTube Music mostly, and a hand picked selection on Plex for stuff that’s not on there or that I want to have always available. The music discovery algorithms are completely useless for me though. It’s the one thing Spotify did better than YTM for me. The “My Mix” playlists and artist radios have been pushing me the same artists for months on end now. Want to know the ironic part? I discover most of my music on YouTube (not Music) nowadays…
Honestly as far as cheap small monitors go, I really don’t mind the Eries. They’re not perfect for sure but they give a generally balanced sound and I paired them with a nice mackie sub to get pretty decent frequency coverage. Certainly perfectly decent for producing a variety of music and generally for listening to things.
I’d put them in that gap between general purpose computer/multimedia speakers, and “proper” monitors. That product range used to be a pretty terrible place to be in, but these surprised me for sure. They’re flat-ish enough that I don’t feel like I’m shooting myself in the foot using them for light production work. The bass is indeed not quite it, but what can we really expect from drivers that size. I don’t have great experience using subs for production, but that’s probably me. They’re surprisingly good for the price point and form factor, at the very least.
Yeah I think flat enough is the right phrase. Their bass is definitely lacking but with a well configured sub (I set the crossover at about 80Hz I think) you can compensate. My only feeling about producing with a sub is unless you’re in a very well acoustically treated room, it’s worth checking your mix on good headphones and a few sets of speakers to make sure your interesting sub bass parts are actually coming through nicely. They are good though to really work out what’s going on in the sub frequencies of your mix. Also makes it really obvious when those areas are getting muddy.
At home: FLACs ripped from CDs (prefer to buy albums I enjoy instead of Spotifying them) -> KORG DS-DAC 100 -> TEAC AX-501 -> Elac Carina BS243.4
On the go: The same FLACs on Pixel 6 Pro -> B&O Beoplay HX
If I want the highest quality streaming, then Amazon Music.
Otherwise, things I’ve purchased in 96khz or 192khz from ProStudioMasters.com
I work in the audio post industry, so I’m generally listening on my work rig either through Genelec speakers or Beyer DT880 Pro headphones, fed by a UA Apollo audio interface.
