Quote Originally Posted by High_Plains_Drifter View Post
I've switched from Spotify Premium to Amazon Unlimited because Amazon has HD and Ultra HD streaming, and with the equipment I have I'm always looking for the best sound, and Amazon Ultra HD and HD streaming they have Spotify beat all to smithereens. Spotify streams at 320kHz top. Amazon HD streams at 860kHz, and their Ultra HD streams at 1,440kHz, an amazingly fast bit rate, and you can damn sure hear it, it's awesome.

But I used to be able to find any song on Spotify on Youtube to post here. Not so with Amazon. Spotify boasts a 30M song library, but Amazon says they have 50M... guess so. There's a few now I can't find on Youtube. So if you're an audiophile fanatic like me, get Amazon Unlimited Music.
If you want the best quality sound, avoid MP3's entirely. The whole point of them is to make the file size small, which means compressing the data, so that only the 'necessary' sound remains. Better, as your post hints, to go for the HD formats, like AIFF, FLAC, and even the older WAV files. Yes, they take up far more space, but an audiophile will probably think it worth the sacrifice.

I signed up to Qobuz a while ago. Their bog-standard 'entry' (i.e lowest !) streaming quality is MP3's set at 320kbps. From there, they offer HD streams of FLAC files going up to 24bit 192kHz ...

https://www.qobuz.com/us-en/music/streaming/offers

Of late, I've basically abandoned music and listened to news and discussion outputs. Oh, and here's a real treat to hold in one's imagination: the 'persuasive' sound of Jeremy Corbyn walking around in circles, as the most convincing means he has of persuading our Lefties that he's fit to continue on as Labour leader ....