I need help to select a music streamer

I Googled 16 bit vs 24 bit vs MQA today and viewed 3 technical videos and read three articles.  They said 24 bit produces less noise.  However, they all said in a blind listening test, no one would detect the difference.  I thought I heard a bigger space and the mid voicing and tweeters seemed clearer.

Who can I believe.  This didn’t make sense because 24 bit has a lot of data which must translate into greater detail.

My budget is $1,500.

@larry5729 There's a fair amount of blind testing suggesting that listeners can't distinguish resolution above redbook (CD), or even above the highest resolution mp3.

But even if you don't buy that, remember that an awful lot of allegedly high-res recordings have actually been converted from Redbook, and therefore all the remastering did was potentially add some jitter.

There's been some good discussion of MQA on Archimago -  https://archimago.blogspot.com/search?q=MQA

And this -  https://www.soundstagehifi.com/index.php/opinion/1057-mqa-one-year-later-suddenly-more-questions

Shofar,

Thanks!

You did not say where you stand on this.

larry5729

... they all said in a blind listening test, no one would detect the difference.

It's interesting how often "blind tests" are cited without providing any details of the test: who designed it, who participated, what the raw data show.

Good point Cleeds.  There is a huge difference between the public who is satisfied playing music through small wimpy speakers and Audiophiles who want to hear a recording with greater detail and the way it was designed to listen to.