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Apple Music to add lossless audio for no added cost. Definitely Pandora needs to bump up the audio quality now to complete with the other music streaming services.
I moved your post over to the Feature Requests board to keep everything organized, and because other listeners may be interested in this option implemented as well.
Existing feature requests that you may want to see added to Pandora include:
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For more information about how feature requests work on the Pandora Community, feel free to check out this helpful infographic: "How do requests become features?"
Apple Music now offers Lossless streaming at no additional cost. Isn’t it time for Pandora to increase the sound quality? Pandora is only offering 192 kbps as its highest available streaming quality. This is the lowest quality of every music stream service. Is there some reason Pandora seems to not be interested in improving the quality or even addressing the situation? I am completely confused by the entire situation. I am willing to subscribe at this very second if the sound quality would just be improved.
lossless is a big step but 320kbps is not too much ask for and should have been part of the paid service a long time ago. I love Pandora but like any relationship if you feel taken advantage of and ignored then you might start looking elsewhere for your needs. Well I met Spotify the other day and was offered their freebie service who's sound quality was better than my current paid service (Hmm) makes me wonder what their paid service might be like. Ever since you got in bed with Sirius you started ignoring us and only seemed to care about the money you were making off the free service ad revenues and to hell with what we needed. I really don't want to leave but I have my happiness to consider and deserve to be treated better. I hope you and your cheap-**ahem** freeloading parasite friends who are ruining things for the rest of us will be happy together. By the way just in case you hadn't noticed the 10 million lovers you've already lost it's about to be 10 million and one. Now it's not too late you can buy us some flowers (320kbps...hint,hint lover) and actually start talking to us and maybe we can work things out, if not it was nice while it lasted and don't let the door hit you on your way out.
Please implement so I can cancel my Tidal subscription and upgrade my Pandora subscription. Pandora's recommendation engine is way better than Tidal's.
This is literally the only sticking point with whether I now redirect my subscription to Apple Music. The audio quality is noticeably better there. Lossless would bring a whole bunch of subscribers from Tidal as well.
For more information about that channel's features and functionality, you'll want to contact TIDAL's customer support to inquire further. Many channels on Roku are developed and maintained by the channel provider themselves.
We appreciate your understanding.
Kariza D. Roku Forum Moderator
Thanks for responding Kariza,
I wasn't asking about Tidals features and functionality I was asking about Roku's compatibility. I did contact Tidal and I will share the correspondence with you.
"
Sep 9, 2021, 2:04 PM EDT
Apparently not all Roku devices allow for uncompressed flac files to be passed through to my receiver and it's DAC. My Roku Premiere+ insist on compressing your lossless stream to a 48khz sampling of unknown bitrate that sounds no better than a low level mp3 service. Any attempts to get Roku to clarify which of their devices have the passthrough options are ignored. Your announcement of getting the Tidal service on Roku was the soul reason for my signing up for your HiFi service but if the only Roku device I can get HiFi through is the Roku Tv then I can't use your service. If there is a device that allows for direct streaming (no mobiles) to my system please let me know as I would love to use your top tier service.
Much appreciation and Thank you."
Response from Tidal.
Hello,
Thank you for reaching back out! My name is Jaquitta, I will be glad to
I'd be happy to help answer your questions.
With the Roku app, the highest audio quality that is supported is HiFi - 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz).
MQA is not currently available on Roku TV.
In order to listen to the MQA format to its fullest extent, your equipment needs to be MQA capable. Otherwise, you will not be getting the full MQA experience but you will still be enjoying a better sound quality than HiFi.
If you do not use a DAC at all, the TIDAL client will decode the MQA in 1x unfolding. A DAC which is MQA capable can unfold up to 8x (provided the DAC has that capability). With the desktop and/or a non-MQA DAC you will get 24bit/88.2 (96) kHz . The stream quality of each album depends on the labels’ engineering of the album. Please ensure that the "passthrough MQA" is not enabled if you do not have an MQA DAC.
Let me know if you have any other questions - I'm always happy to help.
Have a great day!
My response To Tidal's response.
"
Hello Jaquitta,
Thank you for your quick response.
I know that "With the Roku app, the highest audio quality that is supported is HiFi - 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz)"
I know that "MQA is not currently available on Roku TV." and I'm not even trying to get MQA only HiFi - 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz)
I do have DAC in the receiver that my Roku Device is attached to, the problem is that my current Roku device (Premiere+) insists on compressing your HiFi - 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz) so that my receiver never gets the lossless stream but instead gets a 48khz unknown bitrate and format.
My question was which of the Roku devices actually support the transmission of HiFi - 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz) without compressing it.
The only reason I'm asking Tidal this question is that I've asked Roku and they have ignored me and everyone else who has asked the same question and if I can't get your uncompressed 1411 kbps - Lossless (16/44.1 kHz) through my current or any other Roku device then I can't use your service.
Since claiming a new partnership with the Roku platform I thought maybe you would have the answer or maybe Roku would answer Tidal about the actual device support as this directly affects your customer base. Just because they support your app on thier service it doesn't mean they support the delivery of your lossless stream to your customers who will end up blaming Tidal they when pay a premium price for a service that sounds no better than a cheap mp3 service.
Thank you again, Jaquitta.
Please, pass this on to people in sales (or whoever) as High resolution music delivery is the newest thing but nobody has gotten it right yet, it's still too complicated and Roku is a large market with a possible simple solution to delivery "IF" the equipment works.
I GIVE UP.
This is my last response with Tidal.
TIDAL Support(TIDAL) This really depends on the setup inside each Roku device, as a whole Roku does say they are FLAC compatible: It just depends, if Roku has certain models that cannot handle full lossless then the Roku Support Team would be the best ones to check on this, please check your model specifics to find which would allow the level of streaming you want.
Thank you for understanding and let me know if you have any other questions.
I know Roku is FLAC compatible they just insists on compressing it instead of letting my DAC decode it (no passthrough) and as far as the Roku Support Team they have been ignoring the questions about compression and passthrough from lots of people for years (literarily) long before it became an issue with Tidal so expecting an answer from them is not an option. The only solution I can see is for Tidals higher management to give Roku a little flack….pun intended….this really will affect Tidals bottom line because if Roku can’t deliver the service paid for then Tidal takes the blame and loses the customers. Again, Roku has a large customer base with a possible simple delivery system if it would just deliver your signal untouched.
I really do appreciate your time Jaquitta.
Please pass this up the chain.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I'm quitting Tidal like I did Amazon HD, no use paying for lossless that you can't get because there's no streamer to support it. If some one wants to suggest Shield, don't, I checked it out and apparently they are now experiencing the exact same problem, they've had the passthrough option removed without explanation and left with same 48khz and no sample or bitrate info and a few pissed off and confused Shield fans.
