CD or Streaming... am I missing out?

Local files sound better to me than streaming, but streaming can sound enjoyable. The real benefit of streaming is the ability to switch music really easily and to have 100s of thousands of music tracks accessible whenever you want them. It's been a huge change in how I discover new music.

I will always be oriented toward listening, my precious hours, to the best SQ I can muster. However, it seems very attractive to check out something like Pandora and how when selecting a favorite artist they mix in related content from others. Think I will spend some daily time listening to Pandora through the app on my smart TV. A good idea to discover new artists and music. Have that as a handy guide to buy new CDs or LPs.

Think I will spend some daily time listening to Pandora through the app on my smart TV. A good idea to discover new artists and music. Have that as a handy guide to buy new CDs or LPs.

Good way to look at it, use the internet services as a sampler library, then look for the "least compressed" version CD/LP of it using the "dynamic range data website" http://dr.loudness-war.info/ (usually the earliest/first one)
Get the label/cat no. buy used one for a couple of dollars on ebay, like I do.

Cheers George

+1 to what @georgehifi says.

Streaming can sound quite enjoyable, it's just not quite as good as playing back local files and definitely not as good as vinyl. However, I find that in this year of COVID and working from home that I'm streaming most of the time, because it allows me to listen to music while doing other things more easily.

See if you like the idea of listening through Pandora. Just know that if you like the idea of streaming, you can get FAR better sound quality via Qobuz. Even Spotify Premium sounds pretty decent. (Amazon HiFi & Tidal do not).

What do you specifically hear with Qobuz that’s better than Amazon Hd and Tidal?