Airfoil bad quality?

[jdubs]

I have used Airfoil for years just to casually capture anything like youtube that I might want to play. I've been using Tidal, however, and thought it would be an option. While listening, I noticed the level (and maybe quality) waxing and waning. Also, someone told me it (airfoil) can only stream at mp3 levels. Kinda diminishes the idea of Tidal HiFi. Any experience or info on this?

I saw that tuneblade paired with tuneaero is advertised as "uncompressed cd quality". Is this a better option?

[KeithL]

I took a quick look at Airfoil (I assume we're talking about the Rogue Amoeba software) - and any specific mention of the audio quality is distinctly absent.

However, you must also always remember that streaming is just that - streaming. Streaming is NOT like playing a file off a local hard disk. NOBODY, including Tidal, can guarantee that there won't be a momentary service outage or slowdown on your Internet connection that may cause a momentary dropout - or necessitate that they momentarily reduce your quality. They can use buffering to do their best to avoid or eliminate it. However, in the end, they'd usually rather have you experience (and hopefully not notice) slightly reduced quality for a few seconds than have a big red window pop up that says "audio lost" while your audio stops cold. So, at best, you should think of it like recording something off a good quality radio broadcast.

Beyond that, in general, any recording software or "audio interceptor" should spell out somewhere whether it will capture and record "the actual original unaltered audio stream" or not. There are no ifs, ands, or buts - it's either a bit-perfect recording of the original stream or it isn't. (In most cases the limitations in the communication channels inside the operating system itself preclude being able to promise bit perfect recording.) I would assume that any application that is able to do that consistently would crow about it and make it a major selling point... and otherwise I would be dubious that you're getting exactly that.

However, ignoring all the details, for best quality I would suggest the usual stuff: Try to NOT have any other programs running; make sure nothing else is downloading or streaming while you're making a recording; especially make sure that nothing else that uses AUDIO is running on the computer you're using; and it's probably best to record to an internal hard drive rather than a USB drive or USB stick..

May 13, 2016 15:46:51 GMT -5 jdubs said:

I have used Airfoil for years just to casually capture anything like youtube that I might want to play. I've been using Tidal, however, and thought it would be an option. While listening, I noticed the level (and maybe quality) waxing and waning. Also, someone told me it (airfoil) can only stream at mp3 levels. Kinda diminishes the idea of Tidal HiFi. Any experience or info on this?

I saw that tuneblade paired with tuneaero is advertised as "uncompressed cd quality". Is this a better option?

[jdubs]

Thanks!

Yes, that's the airfoil I'm talking about.

I'm not recording; I'm listening.