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Post by AudioHTIT on Mar 30, 2022 9:55:21 GMT -5
Interesting. I don’t have any skipping when playing Apple Music either at home or with my phone walking or in the car. "Skipping", as I call it, is when the song sounds like it sped up for a brief instant. There's no gap in sound, just missing a quarter beat or even less. Let's say it happened 4 times in one song, that song would be 1 second shorter. When I've tried to point it out to people, they didn't know it happened unless I was able to point it out several times and they paid attention. I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. |
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Post by 405x5 on Mar 30, 2022 10:10:48 GMT -5
Pandora.
Perfect non critical listening for me. Best alternative to FM radio I’ve ever had.
None of this stuff is on any high priority, so if there is better out there right now I could care less. High quality audio and commercial free 4.99 a month. I dumped a useless 13.00 a month sports subscription from my cable, added this and cut a profit! Lol 😂
Apple car play integration is seamless and my subscription allows for station downloading for offline listening.
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ttocs
Global Moderator 
I always have a wonderful time, wherever I am, whomever I'm with. (Elwood P Dowd)
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Post by ttocs on Mar 30, 2022 10:19:37 GMT -5
"Skipping", as I call it, is when the song sounds like it sped up for a brief instant. There's no gap in sound, just missing a quarter beat or even less. Let's say it happened 4 times in one song, that song would be 1 second shorter. When I've tried to point it out to people, they didn't know it happened unless I was able to point it out several times and they paid attention. I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. Just to be clear as possible here. I'm strictly talking about a song playing and part of it is missing but there is no gap in sound, the song plays continuously through to the end of the song. If you had a tape recording, cut a small section out and spliced the tape back together, the song would play with no break in sound but part of the song is missing. When listening it sounds like the song has speeded up just for an instant because it has "skipped ahead" a little. Regarding gapless playback, I've not had any issues with Apple Music or Amazon. But I have had gaps with Tidal from time to time, but then it would be gapless again. Not sure how it goes from gapless to gaps, then back to gapless, but it did. For the last year of my usage Tidal was gapless. Qobuz on the other hand has gaps when using a Mac and Chrome (Qobuz specifies using Chrome for the best experience), and there is not, nor will there be a fix as far as I've read about the issue. Going with Roon provides gapless and a better interface. Gaps with album play is absolutely intolerable. Only gapless need apply. |
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Post by tropicallutefisk on Mar 30, 2022 10:28:37 GMT -5
"Just to be clear as possible here. I'm strictly talking about a song playing and part of it is missing but there is no gap in sound, it plays continuously through the song."
Yes, I used to get this infrequently, but when it happened it would happen in a single listening session a few times then may not happen again for a few days. Interestingly, there was an iPad software update that seems to have eliminated this issue for me. Its been a couple months since Tidal skipped on me.
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ttocs
Global Moderator
I always have a wonderful time, wherever I am, whomever I'm with. (Elwood P Dowd)
Posts: 8,155
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Post by ttocs on Mar 30, 2022 10:56:52 GMT -5
"Just to be clear as possible here. I'm strictly talking about a song playing and part of it is missing but there is no gap in sound, it plays continuously through the song." Yes, I used to get this infrequently, but when it happened it would happen in a single listening session a few times then may not happen again for a few days. Interestingly, there was an iPad software update that seems to have eliminated this issue for me. Its been a couple months since Tidal skipped on me. I cancelled Tidal months ago and kept Apple Music. Both are an uphill battle for me to like. Apple Music skips regularly via ATV4K and iPhone. After about 20 hours so far with Roon/Qobuz, playback has been flawless, and an absolute pleasure. So now Apple Music is gone. So now it's just Pandora for non-critical background, and Roon/Qobuz. If there was a way to pay less and keep the quality of service I'd like to know. But I can't justify poor service because it costs less. Apple Music on Apple devices should play perfectly, but doesn't. And waiting for Apple to have better sound quality with Apple TV wasn't working either. Roon would do themselves a great favor by being more newbie friendly and explaining how to setup in a more easily digested manner. I would've signed up 3 years ago if I had known what I now know. |
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cawgijoe
Emo VIPs 
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Post by cawgijoe on Mar 30, 2022 12:17:42 GMT -5
"Just to be clear as possible here. I'm strictly talking about a song playing and part of it is missing but there is no gap in sound, it plays continuously through the song." Yes, I used to get this infrequently, but when it happened it would happen in a single listening session a few times then may not happen again for a few days. Interestingly, there was an iPad software update that seems to have eliminated this issue for me. Its been a couple months since Tidal skipped on me. I cancelled Tidal months ago and kept Apple Music. Both are an uphill battle for me to like. Apple Music skips regularly via ATV4K and iPhone. After about 20 hours so far with Roon/Qobuz, playback has been flawless, and an absolute pleasure. So now Apple Music is gone. So now it's just Pandora for non-critical background, and Roon/Qobuz. If there was a way to pay less and keep the quality of service I'd like to know. But I can't justify poor service because it costs less. Apple Music on Apple devices should play perfectly, but doesn't. And waiting for Apple to have better sound quality with Apple TV wasn't working either. Roon would do themselves a great favor by being more newbie friendly and explaining how to setup in a more easily digested manner. I would've signed up 3 years ago if I had known what I now know. I normally never disagree with you, but in this case I do. I had no real issue with Tidal except for the price. Still working I just wasn't using it enough to justify the cost. I picked Apple Music prior to their "hi-res" update and for the price and usage it was fine. A big step up when they went higher quality IMO. Again...I will say that I don't hear the issues you describe via ATV4K or my Iphone 13 Pro. I will keep an open mind and listen for the "skipping" you describe when I get home tonight. If I do hear it, I will eat my words. I know people love to bash Apple, but for the price and quality of service, Apple Music has been excellent. |
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ttocs
Global Moderator
I always have a wonderful time, wherever I am, whomever I'm with. (Elwood P Dowd)
Posts: 8,155
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Post by ttocs on Mar 30, 2022 13:43:50 GMT -5
I normally never disagree with you, but in this case I do. That's perfectly ok. We can choose what we want based on what we expect. So many choices and variables to make life enjoyable. I had no real issue with Tidal except for the price. Still working I just wasn't using it enough to justify the cost. I picked Apple Music prior to their "hi-res" update and for the price and usage it was fine. A big step up when they went higher quality IMO. I also enjoyed Apple Music when they up'd the quality, and it's why I eventually cancelled Tidal. The quality was about the same for me when using my preferred way to stream - ATV4K. And herein lies the issue for me. I prefer to use the ATV4K, but it's not the best way to stream, and I knowingly continued to use it until I just decided that I wanted a better way. So if I'm forcing myself to use something else, then I want an interface I can find enjoyable to use. I normally never disagree with you, but in this case I do. Again...I will say that I don't hear the issues you describe via ATV4K or my Iphone 13 Pro. I will keep an open mind and listen for the "skipping" you describe when I get home tonight. If I do hear it, I will eat my words. I know people love to bash Apple, but for the price and quality of service, Apple Music has been excellent. It's very much ok to disagree, and I like hearing why. It's not a big deal if you don't hear what I hear. In fact, I'd recommend against trying to discover the problem since you're happy with the service. No need to have the issue of not being able to un-hear something. I want everyone to be happy. Like I used to say when I was 4 years old, "I happy what I got", and I'd like for everyone to experience the same contentedness. I'm a happy Apple devotee' with lots of products I enjoy using. So I'm not bashing willingly. Just saying I can only go so far with my usage of said products. If Apple says they will be taking the limitations off of the ATV4K with regards to audio quality then I'll try it yet again because I love the interface so much. I just am not willing to use the Mac interface for Apple Music. This is where Apple and I part ways. So I looked for another product, and so far, it's a happy find. And I'm not a audio quality snob or anything. Take listening to Pandora for example. I know it's not the best quality, but it's great to use for a "radio" to play random tracks. I can pay attention and choose to participate with tailoring future plays that might be more to my liking, or not. Either way, it's enjoyable, and I use it a lot. |
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Post by AudioHTIT on Mar 30, 2022 15:50:13 GMT -5
I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. Just to be clear as possible here. I'm strictly talking about a song playing and part of it is missing but there is no gap in sound, the song plays continuously through to the end of the song. If you had a tape recording, cut a small section out and spliced the tape back together, the song would play with no break in sound but part of the song is missing. When listening it sounds like the song has speeded up just for an instant because it has "skipped ahead" a little. Regarding gapless playback, I've not had any issues with Apple Music or Amazon. But I have had gaps with Tidal from time to time, but then it would be gapless again. Not sure how it goes from gapless to gaps, then back to gapless, but it did. For the last year of my usage Tidal was gapless. Qobuz on the other hand has gaps when using a Mac and Chrome (Qobuz specifies using Chrome for the best experience), and there is not, nor will there be a fix as far as I've read about the issue. Going with Roon provides gapless and a better interface. Gaps with album play is absolutely intolerable. Only gapless need apply. Sorry, I misread your posts, and somehow added a comment from ‘gapless’ in there, I should have noticed you switched to ‘skipping’ (which I only do down the sidewalk in the summer). I too will listen for this as it sounds annoying (and who doesn’t want to hear something annoying when the opportunity arises 🤷♂️). |
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KeithL
Administrator
Posts: 10,261
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Post by KeithL on Mar 30, 2022 17:05:27 GMT -5
I have one suggestion here....
If you're playing music from a local server or file storage... and you want an album side to play perfectly gapless every time... Just take your favorite audio editor and create a single track of the entire side... and name it something like "Dark Side of The Moon - FULL". That way you can pick individual songs... or the entire album or side... and not ever have to worry about who or what supports "gapless playback".
Storage space is so cheap nowadays that you really don't have to feel bad about the duplication.
(If you use a proper editor, and don't fiddle with the sample rate, bit depth, or dither, you can merge multiple tracks bit-perfect with no problem.)
Personally, since I don't have all that many albums I care about in this regard, it wasn't a big project...
- Dark Side of the Moon - Rush 2112
- and one or two more.
"Skipping", as I call it, is when the song sounds like it sped up for a brief instant. There's no gap in sound, just missing a quarter beat or even less. Let's say it happened 4 times in one song, that song would be 1 second shorter. When I've tried to point it out to people, they didn't know it happened unless I was able to point it out several times and they paid attention. I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. |
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Post by AudioHTIT on Apr 1, 2022 8:53:36 GMT -5
I have one suggestion here.... If you're playing music from a local server or file storage... and you want an album side to play perfectly gapless every time... Just take your favorite audio editor and create a single track of the entire side... and name it something like "Dark Side of The Moon - FULL". That way you can pick individual songs... or the entire album or side... and not ever have to worry about who or what supports "gapless playback".
Storage space is so cheap nowadays that you really don't have to feel bad about the duplication.
(If you use a proper editor, and don't fiddle with the sample rate, bit depth, or dither, you can merge multiple tracks bit-perfect with no problem.)
Personally, since I don't have all that many albums I care about in this regard, it wasn't a big project... - Dark Side of the Moon - Rush 2112 - and one or two more.
I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. This might be a good solution for someone with a limited concern about this issue, but would be a considerable amount of work for the many dozens of ‘pace sensitive’ albums I listen to. Fortunately, I do not have a problem with gapless playback using Apple Music and the CDs I’ve ripped, nor with my Oppo and the CDs I play. I will say that some remastered or anniversary releases (with additional cuts), might suffer from gaps or timing issues, but I blame the producer’s insensitivity to this and not the player. Though this thread is about streaming, and if I had a player that couldn’t gaplessly stream albums (in real time or downloaded), I’d have to choose something else, I consider this a must have feature, and want my music to play the way the artist intended, without jumping through hoops. I also want to point out that pacing is not just limited to the ‘classics’ like those listed above; I have several modern albums (post 2K) that are not concept albums, but where songs may be butted up against each other, or effects blended between songs. IMO this is a required feature for any type of streaming or physical player, ttocs put it well ‘only gapless need apply’. |
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Post by AudioHTIT on Apr 5, 2022 20:17:44 GMT -5
Got this eMail today, as I’m now using Apple Music exclusively I won’t be renewing, but Amazon Music Unlimited is still a good deal and good quality. The price below is for annual billing, and includes HD & UHD bitrates.
“Starting May 5, 2022, we are increasing the price of your Amazon Music Unlimited plan so we can continue to bring you new content and features. The price will change from $79 to $89, plus applicable taxes, per billing cycle”
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Post by drtrey3 on Apr 6, 2022 8:08:15 GMT -5
I did the same thing with the multi track Chicago piece called "Ballet for a Girl from Buchannon." The transitions between the sections are killer and I feel the music cut off if I listen to the individual tracks. Trey I have one suggestion here.... If you're playing music from a local server or file storage... and you want an album side to play perfectly gapless every time... Just take your favorite audio editor and create a single track of the entire side... and name it something like "Dark Side of The Moon - FULL". That way you can pick individual songs... or the entire album or side... and not ever have to worry about who or what supports "gapless playback".
Storage space is so cheap nowadays that you really don't have to feel bad about the duplication.
(If you use a proper editor, and don't fiddle with the sample rate, bit depth, or dither, you can merge multiple tracks bit-perfect with no problem.)
Personally, since I don't have all that many albums I care about in this regard, it wasn't a big project... - Dark Side of the Moon - Rush 2112 - and one or two more.
I’ve generally had good ‘gapless’ performance with Apple Music, but have occasionally heard what you describe, I think some ‘remasters’ may be the culprits. It’s most noticeable with concept albums you know well from the vinyl days, your music memory knows how the timing should be between songs. The classic examples most of us would know are “Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band”, and “Dark Side of the Moon”, another big one for me is Todd Rundgren’s “A Wizard, A True Star”, but any album you know, where the timing or flow between songs is critical can be a good test of gapless playback. As I typically listen to albums, I find this feature as important as sound quality, and a good reason to choose a different player. |
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KeithL
Administrator
Posts: 10,261
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Post by KeithL on Apr 7, 2022 14:06:20 GMT -5
I happened to just notice your post... and I am going to reply to it. The "catch" is that "gapless playback" is NOT specifically a part of any standard or requirement... It isn't part of the Red Book CD playback standard...
And, while some streaming services seem to offer it, others may not... And, likewise, many software players offer it, at least as an option... But it is still an optional feature...
And therefore it isn't reasonable for the producer or artist to EXPECT it to be available... So, if they really want something to be played without any gaps, they really should master it as a single track.
(There is no limit on how long a single track can be on a CD or in an audio file... beyond the desire of certain people to play the songs separately.) One thing worth noting is that, in the old days, there was a way to do this, which was used on many classical albums CDs. It is actually possible for each track on a CD to include multiple "index marks". This then allows users with players that support this feature to play the entire track... or to jump directly to one of those index marks. (They would actually be displayed as "Track 1.1" etc.) However, even though some discs still have it, I haven't seen a player that supports this in many years.
And, for that matter, there is a "default gap" included in the actual standard for certain types of mastering... However, at least in the old days, this could be bypassed in some mastering software by "adding negative time to the pre-set gap to cancel it out". (So, the default gap was two seconds, but if you told the program to "add minus two seconds", you ended up with a gap length of zero.) I haven't seen this option mentioned lately either (but, to be fair, I haven't looked).
Also, to be fair, it is worth mentioning that re-tracking an album only takes a few minutes. You don't actually have to listen to the entire album if you're just trimming the ends of the tracks and sticking them together....  ) And, along with saving your new single track album as a digital audio file, you can also write it onto a new CD if you like. This sort of thing has gotten a lot easier than it was in the old days...and, on most computers that still have CD drives, it only takes a few minutes to write a CD.
And, last but not least, if you edit your own files, you can actually CORRECT those remasters where they added gaps that didn't belong there.  (And even adjust things like EQ if you like.)
I have one suggestion here.... If you're playing music from a local server or file storage... and you want an album side to play perfectly gapless every time... Just take your favorite audio editor and create a single track of the entire side... and name it something like "Dark Side of The Moon - FULL". That way you can pick individual songs... or the entire album or side... and not ever have to worry about who or what supports "gapless playback".
Storage space is so cheap nowadays that you really don't have to feel bad about the duplication.
(If you use a proper editor, and don't fiddle with the sample rate, bit depth, or dither, you can merge multiple tracks bit-perfect with no problem.)
Personally, since I don't have all that many albums I care about in this regard, it wasn't a big project... - Dark Side of the Moon - Rush 2112 - and one or two more.
This might be a good solution for someone with a limited concern about this issue, but would be a considerable amount of work for the many dozens of ‘pace sensitive’ albums I listen to. Fortunately, I do not have a problem with gapless playback using Apple Music and the CDs I’ve ripped, nor with my Oppo and the CDs I play. I will say that some remastered or anniversary releases (with additional cuts), might suffer from gaps or timing issues, but I blame the producer’s insensitivity to this and not the player. Though this thread is about streaming, and if I had a player that couldn’t gaplessly stream albums (in real time or downloaded), I’d have to choose something else, I consider this a must have feature, and want my music to play the way the artist intended, without jumping through hoops. I also want to point out that pacing is not just limited to the ‘classics’ like those listed above; I have several modern albums (post 2K) that are not concept albums, but where songs may be butted up against each other, or effects blended between songs. IMO this is a required feature for any type of streaming or physical player, ttocs put it well ‘only gapless need apply’. |
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