I hope those in this partnership don't cross the audio DMZ and cause the loudness wars to flare up once again. It isn't often that remasters actually sound better when created for the masses. While this may seem like a good thing, I'm unfortunately not optimistic. Cole, Waylon Jennings, Ramones, 2 Chainz, Lady Gaga, The Notorious B.I.G., Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez, and more. I'm sure some people have seen the newly announced partnership between Amazon and Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group to release new high resolution remasters of albums from Eagles, Marvin Gaye, Nirvana, Tom Petty, Diana Ross, Linkin Park, J. There really isn't a reason to look at user interface and catalog if the company can't even stream the lossless audio it advertises. The company has had one year to fix issues, but based on its responses to users' request for these basic features, I won't hold my breath that the service or app will improve. It's hard for me to even think about looking further into Amazon Music HD as an option for people who care about sound quality and customer service. There's no excuse to advertise and offer content at multiple sample rates, yet require users to manually change their control panel / audio midi settings between tracks just to hear the native quality. Apps that take control of the sample rate have been around for over a decade. This is problematic for people who think they are streaming what Amazon calls Ultra HD, but are really listening to a CD quality stream because that's what their computer is set to play. Even though Amazon says the file is 16/44.1 or 24/192 etc., the Amazon Music HD app can't change the sample rate of the audio output.
#Amazon music family plan windows 10#
For example, if I set Windows 10 to output 24/96 audio and set it to give exclusive access to Amazon Music HD, the music will always be output to my DAC at 24/96. These other apps played bit perfect when I ran them through the exact same tests this morning.įurthermore, the Amazon Music HD applications for Windows and macOS will not change the same rate automatically. If there is something special about Amazon Music HD, that isn't required for Qobuz and Tidal, I'd appreciate someone pointing it out to me. Note: Not to toot my own horn, but I've been around the bit perfect block a few times and understand what's required to obtain bit perfect playback. In other words, when Amazon says it's playing a 24 bit / 96 kHz file, I can get my DAC to say 24/96, but the stream doesn't pass bit perfect testing. I can match the sample rate of the audio sent from Amazon Music HD, but the stream or the file is being altered somewhere before it hits my house. The quick and dirty truth is that I can't play bit perfect audio from Amazon Music HD on Windows 10, macOS Catalina (10.15.7), or a Sonos Port using coaxial S/PDIF digital output. If a service or app can't output bit perfect audio, then I have big problems because I don't know where the losses are happening and how big the losses are. What is Amazon Music HD's highest quality? I started testing where I always start testing, with bit perfect playback. A USB cable between the computer and one's system is all that's required and Amazon Music HD will send along its highest quality. The limited number of options for playback isn't a showstopper in and of itself because many audiophiles use computers directly attached to their HiFi systems. One year on, the landscape is still Sonos, Bluesound, and Denon HEOS (I'm sure people will let me know if I missed any). Given that Amazon is notoriously difficult to work with, it's no surprise that we have so few options.
There just aren't many options for listening in another way, such as integration with Lumin, Aurender, Auralic, JRiver, Roon, etc. Most of this use has been on my mobile phone or desktop. I've been an Amazon Music HD subscriber since day one and have used the service off and on since signing up. Let's take a look at Amazon Music HD, one year later. Not long after Amazon launched, Qobuz matched its pricing and now offers a $14.99 /month plan and $24.99 /month family plan.
At the time Amazon's $14.99 per month plan was the lower than all the other lossless or above music services. Many people uninterested in the success of small businesses and good customer service cheered the new offering from the 1.7 Trillion dollar company. Just over one year ago Amazon launched its Amazon Music HD streaming service.
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