Sound Quality of red book CDs vs.streaming

I want to make clear that streaming quality of Qobuz and Tidal is not bad. I think for most it is more than acceptable. I have many clients who use it.

I only use it when new clients want to listen to a particular artist or song I do not own.

But the Modified Lumin L1 drive with the modified SBooster is about 80% better in result. When you compare the same music between streaming by Tidal and Qobuz and the modified Lumin L1 (with modified SBooster) the level in excitement and emotion is far superior.

When I showed the difference between it at our clients their house the reactions where priceless. It are the smiles you see on their faces and becoming a kid again.

Audio at a superior level is so addictive. And this is what we want to share with as many people as possible all over the world!!

Still most recordings are still poor and limited. So if you play them by CD, streaming or a recordplayer. It all will not help you. Here is still the weakest point.

Does it have to do with money?

For the biggest part I would say: No.

There are many small studios who can make really good recordings. And they do not own the best equipment. It depends more about the skills and knowledge of the people who are responsible for the recordings.

We are a lot more than a retailer. I have worked in audio shops as well. I have even run a shop. But the limitations of it made me aware that this is not the way to go.

I wanted to bring both sound&vision to a superior level. This needs a totally different approach. So I started to spend a lot more time in research and tests. Consulting in sound&vision is also so much more fun than working in an audioshop.

I have seen in over 20 years how limited audioshops are in result. So I wanted to create something what could bring a superior level than the poor level people get by trial and error.

I met hundreds of people with trial and error systems. And they all own lmited systems with too many faults in it. Over 95% owned very little music. This proofs that trial and error is very ineffective. With those people I had a good conversation admitted they never had been happy with their system.

I think it is difficult to become very happy with any trial and error system with faults. I always say: each fault is one too many. It will always limit them in a high level in intensity and emotion.

Statement Audio Pro-measurement is the biggest step to a world of freedom without the limitations of the acoustic problems of a room. But also the research in smog, magnetisme and highfrequent noise made us solve many more faults in each system.

When I see and hear where we are now. 10 years ago I could not even think or imagine that it all would be possible. I created so many huge steps and improvements. What makes the world in sound&vision so much nicer.

Has anyone else noticed that quite a few hi res downloads are aggressively compressed? It seems inescapable, even SACDs, and Japanese SHD CDs and Blu Ray. I mean, what’s the point?

Dear geoffkait,

you are 100% right and I have the same experiences. That is why Hi-res does not garantee you anything. There are also many poor DSD and MQA recordings as well.

No format can ever garantee you anything. It costs me a lot of time to find good new music and in a good quality. That is why I spend 3-4 hours each single week. There is no other way to find it.

@rvpiano-re the question of master tapes as a source, my impression is that most of the majors will not let the master tape out of the door, and usually supply a flat transfer on hi-rez. There are of course exceptions- the "audiophile labels" like Acoustic Sounds and a few others (Classic, ORG, MoFi in some cases) do get access to the tapes, probably because of long working relationships with the labels. For digital streaming, I suspect that if the end product is a digital file, there is even less likelihood that a master tape was used as a source, and which master? A safety? A copy made for a particular market may sound different than another. It’s the stuff that keeps record hounds searching, comparing notes and pressings. I don’t know the answer as it applies to streaming, which was one of my questions earlier in this thread- whether the streaming platforms identify the source and mastering.
What I wrote above really applies to older recordings where tape was the medium. If you are a Steve Wilson fan, you’ll know that he remixes a lot of this stuff (mainly prog rock) in the digital domain using the multitracks and eschews ’mastering’ as such, believing that his mixes are the final product without more EQ (apart from what may be necessary to meet an RIAA curve for the LP releases). Some of that stuff is pretty good if you are a fan of this type of music.