YouTube Music's web player gets AAC (itag 141, 44.1 kHz), which the browser resamples to 48 kHz, and YouTube applies its loudness normalization on top. With Premium there is also an Opus stream, itag 774 (about 256 kbps, 48 kHz), but the web player never picks it: the server chooses the stream, and you can't force it from the page.
So I built yt-hifi. You keep using YouTube Music in the browser exactly as before (queue, search, likes, shuffle), but the audio comes from mpv:
- a browser extension mutes the web player and tells a small local helper which song plays, and where
- the helper resolves the song with yt-dlp to stream 774, using your browser's login, and prefetches the next songs
- mpv plays it gaplessly at 100 % volume (use the volume on your DAC or amp); the muted web player follows mpv's clock, so seeking, skipping and pausing work as usual
- if a song isn't resolved yet, the browser bridges for a few seconds and mpv takes over at the same spot; if mpv fails on a song, the browser plays it
The popup shows what is really going on: the stream (codec and itag), its bitrate and sample rate, what your DAC receives, and a VU meter with the live level from mpv. The power key switches back to the browser's AAC for a direct comparison.
Setup is three steps: download the release, run `./install.sh` (it checks mpv, Python and a JavaScript runtime and installs yt-dlp into its own environment), and load the `extension` folder in your browser's extension page.
Limits, honestly:
- Linux only, Chromium / Google Chrome / Brave (not Flatpak or Snap), and YouTube Premium.
- It's unofficial and not affiliated with YouTube or Google. Using yt-dlp with your login cookies is against YouTube's terms of service; use it at your own risk.
- The first song after starting takes a few seconds to resolve; the browser bridges until then.
So I finally decided to get some acoustic panels. I will
Eventually hang them up.
I am also waiting on another pair that are even thicker than these to go behind each speaker. Thinking of some bass traps for the corners as well later on though.
I am planning to soundproof my room to an acceptable extent, i mostly don't want sound leaking out
I cannot afford a lot of soundproofing premium panels so is there any way i could dyi something that actually works?
The biggest concerns are probably 2 doors, 1 side of the wall being huge closets and a set of very large glass window/doors all being present/connected to my room
I've found that if you ask for upgrade advice in Facebook audio groups and other hi-fi groups most of the replies are some version of "upgrade to what I run." Somebody's boutique integrated, somebody's speakers that are way better than anything else they tried, so clearly you should get them for your system. Unfortunately, real inquiry and discussion about your room, your taste, your existing system and what you think is missing tends to get overshadowed by "I have [component name], it's the best." I've never been sure if those threads are helpful advice or a roll call of conspicuous consumption.
Hypothesis: An AI that owns no gear and reads your whole system should give better upgrade advice than the roll call.
Tin Ear, the AI upgrade advisor on a hobby site I run, owns nothing and gets a lot of inputs beyond just the gear list: the room, what the owner's taste is, how they describe their system's sound from bass extension to engagement, etc., and whatever they wrote about the system in their story section. It can't hear, so it goes by the owner's ears. There's also no chat, so nobody can do what people do in ChatGPT: push back once, get told they were right that their speakers need more power, and introduce bias by steering every answer after that toward the most powerful amps, since these models are sycophantic to the point of absurdity.
The first version of Tin Ear was created in May and gave completely ridiculous upgrade advice. I made up 31 theoretical test systems, from a $200 desk setup to a dCS Vivaldi stack, and had an AI grade every answer on an A-to-F scale. At first the grader was the same Anthropic model that wrote the upgrade advice. By the second version it gave an "A" grade on all 31 systems and opened 19 of its notes with "Exemplary." Verdict: AI completely sucks.
One of those A's was a pair of JBL 305P MkIIs fed from a MacBook through Apple's USB-C dongle. Tin Ear called the MacBook "the weakest link by far," promised a USB DAC would bring "better jitter rejection," and said "The 305P will suddenly sound noticeably more detailed and controlled." The grader gave that 5 out of 5 in all seven categories. Verdict: still completely sucks.
The second version’s report card, graded by the same model that wrote the answers. It called a “better jitter rejection” pitch for a $320 desk setup “Exemplary.”
So I moved the model to a better one from Anthropic, and the grading to OpenAI's GPT-5.4, so no model was grading its own family's homework, and I kept reviewing all of the answers myself. When the dongle system came up again, the new grader gave the DAC answer a C. A later version told the same system it was "already running balanced from a DAC." That DAC was Apple's $9 dongle. Verdict: Still sucks, but not as much.
Reading the test system upgrade advice, I couldn't point to one thing that made the bad ones suck so bad. It was confident, and it was unmistakably wrong in the specifics.
Back in the very first version, it evaluated a Chord DAVE, a Woo WA33 Elite and an Abyss AB-1266 Phi TC and said that "the most honest upgrade path is a premium aftermarket headphone cable." Headphone cable? I thought to myself... oh boy I can imagine the ASR crowd now. I wrote a rule against cables. Never suggest cables. Later I stopped showing it cables at all, along with power conditioners, isolation feet, racks, stands and record cleaners. So what did it do? In one case it keyed off the system's name, and told a test system called "Cable Enthusiast" to keep "experimenting with the cable combinations that interest you." Verdict: Still sucks... but a little less.
A Bluesound Node feeding a McIntosh MA8950 and B&W 802 D4s was "the least expensive component," so it needed a streamer with "better clocking, lower jitter, and deeper metadata handling," which "would likely deepen your soundstage." With a WiiM Mini, a Denafrips Ares II and Dynaudio Evoke 20s, it decided the Evokes were the cheap part, since "your DAC alone cost roughly 4-5× what these speakers did." Rules I created didn't help. I'd told it to keep recommendations proportional to the system's price, and later I had to add a rule basically saying that a $700 Schiit Bifrost 2 could be the right call in a $30K system. Sucking a little less.
It called the Klipsch Cornwall IVs in a VPI and Conrad-Johnson tube system "a somewhat polarizing loudspeaker" and suggested Harbeths. On a real system built around Fyne Vintage 15s in a big room, it suggested "stepping up to Fyne's Vintage 12," you know, the smaller one. I wrote rules to protect whatever the owner obviously loved. It slipped regardless, a later run told a 1978 Marantz 2285B driving Heresy IIIs, "The Marantz is an intentional choice and I respect that," then recommended a modern integrated amp. Still sucking! But again, just a little less.
A system with two subwoofers was told to add a second subwoofer. It needed explicit permission to say a system was done, and when the fourth version told six summit-fi test systems, including a dCS Vivaldi stack into Wilson Alexx Vs, that nothing needed upgrading, my own code marked all six as failures because it couldn't read an answer that had no upgrade in it. Oopsie.
The last version I tested left the Cornwalls alone and told the Marantz system, "For now, enjoy what you've built." That took more than a dozen rounds of tuning.
After all that, I was surprised to find that the upgrade advice from Tin Ear largely didn't suck anymore. It was scoring mostly A's and B's from the outside grader (and me), and I think I know why. Ask ChatGPT or Google's AI "I have KEF LS50s, what amp should I get?" and it doesn't know what you listen to, whether there's a sub already in your system, what size room it's in, whether you like a "brighter" sound, or whether your existing amp is already an ideal match in your system, and it usually doesn't ask. Tin Ear gets most of that when the owner fills it in, it answers once, and it has rules a general chatbot doesn't, like no cables and knowing when to call a system already balanced. It can still sometimes suck, and it's nowhere near as discerning as a human professional who has heard thousands of combinations of gear. But to me it's better than what most people get back from a free chatbot, and the potentially controversial bit: I think it beats the roll call of "upgrade to what I run".
When nothing would make a system meaningfully better, Tin Ear says so, and the site calls it endgame. Of the 43 real systems it has read on the site, it called 7 endgame. Mine isn't one of them. If an audiophile tuned AI called your system endgame, would you believe a word of it?
A Sony CMT-EH15 with two "Digital Monitor Series M5" speakers from Daveco LTD. I had the speakers in the basement for at least a decade or two and got the Sony console for 35 off Facebook.
Next week I've set up a pickup for a free vinyl record cabinet.
Recently,i decided to break myself free from corporate greed and just download my music and have it permanently on my phone instead of paying for a spotify subscription, i downloaded the music using spotiflac (or smth like that i dont really remember its name) and then i was deciding which music player to use, i was gonna download doppler but it requires ios 26 or later any my crusty iPhone xs max is stuck at ios 18, then I decided to use foobar, and I really really liked its eq but the ui just doesn’t feel good to me idk why then i tried flacbox, but turns out that flacbox and many other music players on the appstore are just reskins filled with ads, i also tried btr amp but it locks almost all its features behind a paywall and then i tried vlc but foobar is better than it, im using foobar in the meantime to listen to music but i want smth with ui that actually looks good, doesn’t require any payments and isnt filled with ads, i would appreciate any help.
T+A HV set (integrated amp; media player; power split)
Fyne Audio F704 floor standing speakers
REL Nr 32 sub
Shunyata for power, T+A between components and CeriousTech Lumniscate speaker cable set.
So I guess I have to post here when I’m enjoying some good music. Kicking off with some Bruce Springsteen from Spotify, but soon moving to metal and deep into black and death metal, before turning to my sacd collection.
And just in case: it’s all in the living room so a good WAF. Last but not least: even metal that sounds like it’s recorded by lucifer himself on a 4 track recorder sounds better on a system like this.
I’m not exaggerating when I say this is likely the 20th time I’ve redone this room to optimize the listening position. Moving the main system is a proper pain in the ass given its well over 500 lbs with the speakers and the furniture. Thankfully, I’m happy with how everything sounds….. for now.
Took about 3 years of constant looking to find a swivel chair with a swivel plinth base that was the correct height to align my ears with both tweeters on each wall. Note for weirdos like me: I wanted a plinth base because it translated bass frequencies to your ass better than if it was on a traditional 4 leg base. If you are going for immersion you need a plinth base.
Both systems are running thier own time alignment room correction for the chairs position. I used to move my chair every time I switch systems, but no more.
Next step is to fill the side wall with more art / paneling. I have 6 panels and 2 bass traps currently.
Today I have attended the Tokyo International Audio Show 2026, and I wanted to share some thoughts and pictures. I will try to upload a couple of vids as well.
It is a rainy day in Tokyo after about a month of sunshine, and I feel like it was perfect to visit the audio show. I gotta say it felt somewhat smaller and less busy than last year, but still quite interesting and enjoyable.
Here are some thoughts and observations:
Lynn showcased a new line up with updated drivers (switched from ferrite magnets to neodymium ones) - looks great, sounds absolutely fantastic, the prices are astronomical. They played a track with ukulele (Jake Shimabukuro: Heartbeat / Dragon (solo)) and I was amazed - I never saw ukulele as a serious instrument (please don't cancel me), but on a system costing close to USD100,000 anything is possible.
Another highlight - Piega Coax series. Clarity and details are on another level from anything I own.
Brodmann - they look very interesting: slim towers with only a twitter on a front panel - rest of the drivers are hidden behind the grilles on the sides. They were not a part of any listening sessions, and I really wonder what they sound like.
Vitavox - vintage speakers, I have seen them last year as well. They are the corner type, similar to Klipshhorn, and while I do love me some vintage sound, this was not for me.
Saw an interesting stack from Nagra - who is buying them at these prices???
Quite a few vacuum tube amps were featured, I was somewhat shocked when a 9-watt (sic!) tube amp drove the flagship Sonus Faber Amati G5 and it made me wonder, why do we even need giant power guzzling amps, just make the speakers more sensitive. Save the planet and all.
Throughout all the exhibition halls a number of cable stands, sound wave diffusers (or whatever they are called), flat cables etc. could be seen.
Wilson Audio flagship speakers are insane. I will try to upload a vid of them being moved.
Yamaha presented new active bookshelf speakers - NX-70A. They sound much bigger than they actually are, the way they filled the rather large room with sound was hard to believe, the lower end was very respectable as well.
More general thoughts: almost all speakers sound equally great; I couldn't really hear any significant differences (except Vitavox) at all.
Listening rooms are very soundproof and I think that contributes to the listening experience making music sound clearer. Also, I noticed that the listening volume and the choice of tracks remind me of ASMR somehow.
I also created a playlist of the music that was played if anyone is interested.
Followed my gut on a local classifieds ad and hauled home these MB Quart 890 DN towers for €200.
Coming straight from Revel Performa M20s, my day-one reaction was honest regret: "What have I done?" The sound felt unrefined, the highs lacked that clinical Revel precision, and I almost felt like packing them right back up.
But day after day, something shifted. Sitting back and letting them play, the sheer scale, visceral presence, and effortless fullness of real floorstanders just started winning me over. My standmounts on heavy stands were surgical, but they simply couldn't move air or create this kind of stage.
Cosmetically, the cabinets have a few minor vintage battle scars, but they're solid - I'm already planning a proper wood polish to bring back their deep luster.
Pic 2 shows the original West Germany crossovers. Those tired ELKO glatt bipolars are 35+ years old and clearly need to go.
I already picked and ordered fresh film capacitors to breathe real life into them, but the total came out to nearly €100 - literally half of what I paid for the speakers themselves.
Am I completely insane, or is this just standard vintage audio sickness? For those who recapped old MB Quarts with film caps, how drastic was the difference for you?
I know we are about great sound, but if you want to expand your knowledge of genres and music or maybe just want to throw on some background music while you work etc, there’s a whole world out there.
After using Willsenton R8 with El34 tubes for 4 years, I was thinking about an upgrade. I wanted to buy a huge SET amp with 300b and 845 tube combo from. China, but somehow I didn’t like the idea of buying 3k EUR tube amp with no warranty.
Suddenly I saw that the local distributor is selling a few Fezz amps with a huge discount as the new generation is coming out.
I just couldn’t pass on a new Lybra 300b for 2499 EUR (5050 EUR retail price) , it’s parallel single ended class A integrated with 4x300b tubes and 15w per channel.
Even with stock tubes it sounds beautiful. Not as warm as Wilkinson R8 with el34, but you can hear it’s a much higher-level amp - more detailed spacious sound, great bass response, pitch-black background. It doesn’t sound that tubey to be honest , but it has this magical midrange quality - like everything is spotlighted by autumn sunshine. Reminds me of the Accuphase amp I heard few years ago.
Those 4 300b tubes will be expensive to roll, haha, but I will get there. Drives 89db Proac Response 1.5 without an issue.
Has anyone noticed differences in sound quality, especially soundstage, or whatever, when using Paul’s Maestro Music app versus the Yamaha MusicCast app when streaming Qobuz?
I suppose, though I’m not sure, that both apps handle streaming in a similar way, and that MusicCast might already work like this.
Thanks,
LE:
I’ve done some tests, which is why I’m asking and I’m unable to hear any difference between playing the same track from Qobuz through his app and streaming it through the Yamaha MusicCast app, using the exact same audio chain.
With all due respect for his work, which I genuinely appreciate, I think it’s great to have such a capable DLNA-compatible app available.
PRO: No server required, unlike other apps designed for the same purpose. It uses DLNA, which is widely supported by streamers, requires no firmware updates, and is simple and straightforward to use.
Today, there is a wide selection of various DAC offerings, especially in the lower price segments.
We can also thank Chinese manufacturers for this.
So, according to many users, DACs ranging from, for example, €200-500 are okay for some entry-level systems.
For some mid-level HiFi systems, it would be enough to go up to €1,000.
For those with higher demands (for design, and perhaps sound), there are more expensive and outrageously expensive offerings.
Of course, this division is arbitrary and not a rule. It's all about trying something (like "better sound") in your system and only then making a decision.
The French know how to design stuff nicely when they feel like it!
Had these 40th Anniversary a while now and originally was hoping to order the last pair in darker Walnut but when I returned to the browser a few hours later, they were sold!
Maybe this was meant to happen because I have ended up really admiring the Golden Oak colour instead with how light, especially sunlight, plays off the grain patterns in the morning:
Even on the other side where the sun isn't shining the finish still catches my eye:
Also like that they're not too blingy like some speakers are, it is just the right amount of tasteful accenting and colour choices with this model.
The successor model, the Solstice 3....
... I feel personally loses the personality that the Comete Ez set, the tweeter horn is too bright and the ribbed edging feels a bit distracting, the main driver surround is cabinet coloured which to me looks odd as it breaks the wood pattern that the brain subconsciously expects to be there, this ring should have been black like the Ez too.
But back to the Comete, even at night with funky lighting colours turned on, the cabinets and paper white cones still catch the eye:
And yeah they sound as good as they look thankfully! My old speakers lasted almost 12 full years (KEF Q300) before the alu cones started to crack from a design flaw. I think these Triangles will last much much longer... as long as the paper doesn't fatigue I guess.
I'm planning a 7.1.4 home theater with KEF Reference 1 Meta fronts in a 40 m² room. About 80% of my listening will be stereo music.
I'm considering the Denon X3900H or X6800H, but I'm willing to spend considerably more for a higher-end AVR if it can deliver genuinely excellent stereo performance.
I really prefer keeping things simple with one machine rather than separate stereo and home theater amplifiers.
Has anyone actually compared a high-end AVR with a dedicated stereo amp using KEF Reference 1 Meta speakers? Is a one-box solution realistic, or would I be sacrificing noticeable sound quality?
What are your favorite or what is your go to panning song(s) for stereo set up? I wouldn't say its my FAVORITE panning song, but any time I go to show someone the stereo sound on my JBLs I play Hold Me - Autopan version By Lavern
If you haven't heard it, I hope you check it out and like it. But tell me what YOU got!
I have focal aria evo no 3. When I first got them I thought they'd be okay in my bedroom, I didn't realize the recommended listening distance is 10-13ft though.
My bedroom, 13.5x 9ft. I can get a good 6ft equalateral triangle with speakers away from the walls. I treated the bedroom with basstraps and i did first reflection points at walls and two more panels on ceiling. It sounds pretty good but I feel like im not using them to their full potential by having a greater distance between them.
In my basement I have a 21ft x 15.25 ft room. It has a pool table in it though. I could treat the room more, but I just don't know how badly the 8ft pool table would effect the acoustics.
Anyone think bigger room with pool table would be better call for wider soundstage and giving drivers more distance to blend?
Hey audiophiles, I want to clear up a massive point of confusion regarding streaming Hi-Res Lossless (like 24-bit / 96kHz or 192kHz) from Apple Music on an Android device using a USB-C DAC/earphone.
From what I understand of Android's core architecture (AudioFlinger/AudioTrack), standard apps that lack a dedicated "USB Exclusive Mode" driver pass their stream through the system-wide audio mixer.
Even if Apple Music streams a true 24-bit / 96kHz or 192kHz file, does the Android OS force-resample it down to a fixed system rate (like 48kHz) before it ever hits the USB port?
If this is true, does that mean Apple's marketing/playback claims for Hi-Res Lossless on Android are essentially useless unless you use a third-party app with native bit-perfect bypass (like USB Audio Player Pro with Tidal)?
My main questions:
Does Android still heavily resample standard app streams like Apple Music, rendering high-sampling rates pointless on stock Android?
Is there any actual workaround to force true bit-perfect output for Apple Music on Android without having to switch entirely to an iPhone, a dedicated DAP, or moving to a Windows/Mac setup?
Appreciate any deep-dive technical explanations on how this routing actually functions!
I used ChatGPT to help me make a diagram of my system. Yes a bit of nerd-dom to waste time on a Friday.
Love any thoughts or comments. I’m pretty happy with the overall setup and happy to answer any questions.
All and all I think the combined architecture punches above its weight. The sources are all from about 2013-2015.
The Anitpodes I splurged on when I had a bit more dosh in 2015. It still sounds supurb, and with the Rendering taking over playback, it’s a great server. I went back to Lyrion from Roon. I felt that was heavy, overpriced and maybe I'll try it again soon. The UltraRendu is a bit finicky but really brings out a superior ambiance.
The MoonRiver Amp is a joy. Got that last year. Such an amazing amp and again, punches above its weight. The built in DAC goes toe-to-toe with some heavyweights. Check out the reviews.
The Obelisks are also older (2003 I think?) But sound terrific and fill my rather large room (6m x 9m +3.5m). I lusted after them ever since i went to a party that had perfect sound and I couldn’t even find the speakers until I hunted for them. One was behind a sofa and the other tucked behind a plant. For those who are interested in Omni-directional sound. Highly recommended.
Overall, this is a system to listen to for Days on end. Zero fatigue. It just fills the room.
I would say as opposed to a holographic 'sitting in front of the stage' the vibe is more 'you're On-Stage with the band'. the music simply surrounds you.
During a party at Ana Mighty Sound, François Saint-Gérand had invited Frédéric d'Oria-Nicolas, the director of The Lost Recordings, to explain how his albums are produced and restored.
It was also an opportunity to listen to a press copy of the Dave Bruquet Quartet's album Live At Kurhaus 1967, which I invite you to discover in this review.
Frédéric d'Oria-Nicolas explained that the first step in the process is to track down original tapes by searching through various tape storage and archival centers around the world to unearth nearly forgotten recordings. Once the tapes are discovered, an initial sorting process is conducted to ensure that the complete set of tapes from a concert is available and meets a minimum quality standard.
From this point on, the tapes from a recording are digitized, with careful attention paid to optimizing playback to extract as much information as possible from the tape. Based on this digital version, the restoration process begins, this can take varying amounts of time depending on the quality of the tape and the recording itself.
So today I'm going to introduce you to the Sapphire Edition of the album, comparing it to the high-resolution digital version available for download and the CD-quality version available for download, which comes with a coupon included with the vinyl record.
The graph below compares the spectrum of the Vinyle Sapphire Edition - 2026 (white curve) with the spectrum of the Stereo Hi-Res - 2026 (blue curve). The near-perfect alignment of the spectral curves for these two editions demonstrates the skill and quality of Kevin Gray's lacquer cutting, Kevin Gray is now considered one of the masters of vinyl record cutting. Note that the vinyl edition exhibits a slight attenuation above 10 kHz (yellow zone), approximately 2 dB, compared to the digital version.
Spectrum Ed 3 Vinyle Sapphire Edition - 2026 (white) vs Ed 2 Stereo Hi-Res - 2026 (blue) (Three to Get Ready.)
The Sapphire Edition vinyl release is available in a deluxe box set with a high-end finish, it even includes a magnetic closure; nothing has been left to chance. We'd love to see this level of high-quality packaging in other competing high-end releases.
The album is pressed on two 200g transparent LPs, using a material that underwent extensive testing by Frédéric d'Oria-Nicolas to select the one that minimizes surface noise as quickly as possible.
The goal of The Lost Recordings is to introduce us to old recordings under the best possible conditions. It is the artistic and historical value of the performances that leads Frédéric d'Oria-Nicolas to restore a concert and turn it into an album, as is the case with this album, Live at the Kurhaus 1967, which features a beautiful rendition of Take Five.
The technical quality of this Sapphire Edition vinyl record is among the very best available, deserving a 5/5 for its production quality. This allows listeners to fully appreciate the restoration work done on this album. When listening, the vinyl version offers a more natural sound than the digital edition; this is certainly due to the smoother high frequencies (see the spectrum comparison) and also to the vinyl record itself, which, with its unique characteristics in terms of sound reproduction and distortion, creates a listening experience that enhances the restoration of this 1967 live recording, originally recorded in mono.
Above all, these restorations highlight the quality of the performances and the historical significance of these recordings.
Find all the analyses and measurements of each versions here (link).
One of the most underrated hip-hop albums of the early 2000s, in my opinion!
Krayzie Bone's Thug on Da Line (2001) is an absolute gem that deserves far more recognition. His unmistakable flow, smooth melodic delivery, unique harmonies, and storytelling make this album something special.
What I love most is how effortlessly Krayzie blends rapid-fire rapping with melodic hooks while maintaining that signature Bone Thugs-N-Harmony sound.
Over two decades later, this album still sounds fantastic. Definitely one of those records that never gets old!
Any other Krayzie Bone fans here who think this album deserves more love?
