Spotify

[frumpytrickle]

Who uses it?

Who's a premium member?

I'm auditioning the regular version right now, not impressed with the sound quality at all, even worse is that the sound breaks up frequently, kinda crunches out.



Normal? Will it happen with Premium?

Running about 75meg broadband here for what its worth..


edit - a better description for the crunchy noise would be to say a pre-delay has been applied

Edited by frumpytrickle on Friday 3rd October 15:51

[GG89]

I've been a premium member for about a year now.

Usually run it through my phone on 4G, sound quality is fine to my ears. Works well on my home wifi, too.

No complaints.

[Torquey]

I've been using premium for a while and love it.

I have read something about getting better quality with a premium account. It all sounds fine to my ears.

Premium is free to try for 30 days... And if you keep you phone in flight mode forever more it wont remove the music from your phone



From there help page:
What bitrate does Spotify use for streaming?

Spotify uses 3 quality ratings for streaming, all in the Ogg Vorbis format.
• ~96 kbps ? Normal quality on mobile.

• ~160 kbps ? Desktop and web player standard quality.
? High quality on mobile.

• ~320 kbps (only available to Premium subscribers) ? Desktop high quality.
? Extreme quality on mobile.

Edited by Torquey on Friday 3rd October 16:07

[Crafty_]

I use it, no problems with stuttering/break up here, home is ~6-8Mb, phone is on 4g, that has no problems either.

[durbster]

I love Spotify.

It's well written software and a good service that I feel I get decent value out of.

I have no problems streaming during my commute which has numerous network deadzones and H+ speeds at best.

[outnumbered]

I have spotify premium, and use it a lot through the HiFi system (streamed via a Squeezebox Touch, but you can use lots of different clients: Sonos, Mac, Pc etc). At 320kbps, the quality is fine, I can't tell the difference from a ripped CD.

[frumpytrickle]

Cool, it's something here then.

Was hoping to get an AR receiver with a spotify service attached.

[legzr1]

outnumbered said:

I have spotify premium, and use it a lot through the HiFi system (streamed via a Squeezebox Touch, but you can use lots of different clients: Sonos, Mac, Pc etc). At 320kbps, the quality is fine, I can't tell the difference from a ripped CD.

If you've ripped the CD at 320kbps there shouldn't be any difference in quality.

Ripping to FLAC, ALAC or WAV can show differences on a decent system - playing through earbuds on a packed train using a phone I guess 320 would be ample.

[rsv gone!]

I'm still using the cheapo version and I've had no issues of stuttering; either at home (100meg) or using 3G in the car.

[hajaba123]

Daft question, does it eat up 3G allowance?
Would be good to use the free version in the car on the road

[anonymous-user]

GG89 said:

I've been a premium member for about a year now.
No complaints.

Same here, running 1 account between a family of 4 and never an issue and pretty happy with the whole set up

[rsv gone!]

hajaba123 said:

Daft question, does it eat up 3G allowance?
Would be good to use the free version in the car on the road

I'm on an unlimited tariff, so I couldn't say.

[anonymous-user]

hajaba123 said:

Daft question, does it eat up 3G allowance?
Would be good to use the free version in the car on the road

I use the premium service, but I believe the function you'd need (like I did at the time) is available on the free service. Basically I save a playlist via the desktop version of Spotify, and whilst I have WiFi on at home, make the playlist available offline. That way you can have your WiFi and data turned off, and it'll happily stream any saved playlists via your mobile app - hence hours of driving, no data usage.

I learnt the hard way, as my mobile app was set to download playlists automatically, so it blitzed my month's data rather rapidly.

The only negative thing I'd say about the free service is the automated messages popping up every so often. Other than that, brilliant service. The browse function is also great, some cracking playlists available from all genres, for all activities.

[durbster]

hajaba123 said:

Daft question, does it eat up 3G allowance?
Would be good to use the free version in the car on the road

A typical song in MP3 format is around 8Mb at high quality. At a lower bitrates that'll drop to around 5Mb per song.

Spotify itself doesn't ask for much. Some graphics for the single/album art and artist if you're looking at the app while it's playing, but that'll barely register.

[bristolracer]

No problems here.
Costs 9.99 a month
A bit of diligence with your other bills- gas electric broadband tv etc will free up the dosh for it.

[HenryJM]

Yes, I listen to little else,mainly over sonos thoughout the house.

[anonymous-user]

Buy the premium using the gift card available from the supermarket. I am hot a regular listener so don't want a full time subscription.

[numtumfutunch]

hajaba123 said:

Daft question, does it eat up 3G allowance?
Would be good to use the free version in the car on the road

I have mine set on the middle quality setting when out and about
It uses a predictable 100MB per hour of 3G phone data

You can so your own maths from that

Cheers

[thehawk]

Yes, I pay for the premium version, it has now replaced every other music source that I have had. Gets streamed throughout the house on Sonos, I don't bother with my own music library/NAS anymore. Also I download for offline listening on my phone and don't bother copying my own stuff anymore either. Frees up a lot of space as I just use it on demand - only time I'm without internet is when I'm on a plane and then I have 30-40 albums downloaded which takes up around 5GB.

It's just so convenient.

[Brigand]

For a long time I was a stalwart of the CD, mainly for listening to in the car, so I used iTunes to buy music to burn to disk or stick on my phone.

I've used Spotify for a couple of years now, mainly to listen to music at work on the PC, but a few months ago I decided that paying a tenner a month for unlimited music, anywhere I go, was worth it and took the plunge.

Now all my music in the car is played from my phone; I have Spotify installed and download my favourite albums to there.

iTunes has been binned and its Spotify all the way now. I've never had any issues with sound quality, and now I'm a premium member I've set my phone and PC to download & play in the highest quality possible. I think the biggest draw for me was liking one or two songs from an album, but not wanting to have to buy the whole thing on the strength of two tracks. Now I can just make compilation playlists of just the stuff I like, so it works out cheaper in the long run and I only have a catalogue of what I like.