Music streaming service Deezer released a desktop macOS app on Wednesday that offers high-definition lossless audio playback in the popular FLAC format.
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The app not only eliminates the hassle and additional step of opening up a new browser but desktop users with Premium+ account, who download the new app before January 2018, will be able to hear all their music in high-definition audio by selecting this option under sound settings.
Support for 16-bit FLAC is available to Premium+ subscribers, who currently pay $9.99 for the luxury. However, users who want to stream in the lossless format after January 2018 will have to subscribe to Deezer HiFi, which costs twice that at $19.99. (Deezer's new pricing matches Tidal's HiFi lossless subscription tier.)
The desktop Deezer app is currently still a beta, but it does include access to 43 million tracks as well as a working version of the Flow feature, which is similar to Apple Music's personalized playlists. Flow recommends songs based on previously played tracks, as well as video interviews and performances.
Deezer subscribers can download the desktop app using this link.
Top Rated Comments
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I had the misfortune of having to give up Tidal HiFi for Apple Music recently.
Tidal is terrible. They have the least amount of music and they push their rap garbage over any other types of music. You can search for anything and they push rap over other results. My unused trial ends next year.Other services are going to start offering higher than 16/44 CD quality soon if they haven’t already. Apple needs to lift their game.
In a world where you can shoot 4K video on your phone and 8K televisions will soon be a thing it’s crazy that digital music retailers like Apple still haven’t matched a 30 year-old audio standard.
This is just marketing crap. Nobody has ever been able to hear the difference between a 256kbps AAC audio file (like Apple Music is) and a 24bit WAV file. EVER. All the people that say they hear a difference didn't take a double blind test yet OR are so so afraid to show their test results online – I wonder why.
I believe you’re the one who is mistaken. You’re pushing tired old arguments that are increasingly being debunked with newer evidence to the contrary. In fact many of those studies you’re relying on were poorly described and relied upon listeners with no training or concern for high quality audio. I.e. the average joe where near enough is good enough.I've taken a double blind test several times and was never able to reliably tell the difference. By the way: I'm an audio engineer whose ears should be trained to do that. I can't. And all people who say they can are LIARS. They do biased tests by switching back and forth with them knowing which file is what. Of course your brain will tell you that WAV sounds better. But as soon as you don't know which is which you'll fail.
There’s a meta analysis of many studies which shows a positive identification at a statistically significant level for listeners who were trained to recognise high-res audio and knew what they were listening for (I’m a data analyst with a science degree so I know about stats). Furthermore, the analysis highlighted some studies that had fairly high rates of positive identification and in particular some individuals who have a much better ability than others. This could be due to many factors such as genetics, experience and lack of hearing damage. I’ll try to find it and post back. So just because you can’t tell doesn’t mean everyone else are LIARS.
As for Apple’s lossy AAC, I suspect it was converted from 16/44 lossless CD, which itself was created from higher resolution sources, making it sound worse than it otherwise should. This is why Apple began marketing their “Maatered for iTunes” albums. They’re probably much better because greater care was taken during the mastering process and conversion to 256 kbps was done in one go from the master.
I pity you if you can’t tell. Maybe you have damaged hearing or you just aren’t suited to your career. Unfortunately, many young people are damaging their hearing these days because of prolonged use of poor quality headphones of which which Apple’s bundled EarPods are amongst the worst.
I want to subscribe just to support efforts like this.
I believe you’re the one who is mistaken. You’re pushing tired old arguments that are increasingly being debunked with newer evidence to the contrary. In fact many of those studies you’re relying on were poorly described and relied upon listeners with no training or concern for high quality audio. I.e. the average joe where near enough is good enough.
You contradict yourself, you say you need to be trained to hear a difference, yet you say he can't tell a difference because he might have "damaged hearing". First of all, if you need to be "trained" to hear a difference it really isn't worth it to increase the file size of a track for mainstream consumption, also, I assume you are one of those insecure audiofools that buy snake oil and actually believe they can hear a difference, yet they offer ZERO PROOF.There’s a meta analysis of many studies which shows a positive identification at a statistically significant level for listeners who were trained to recognise high-res audio and knew what they were listening for (I’m a data analyst with a science degree so I know about stats). Furthermore, the analysis highlighted some studies that had fairly high rates of positive identification and in particular some individuals who have a much better ability than others. This could be due to many factors such as genetics, experience and lack of hearing damage. I’ll try to find it and post back. So just because you can’t tell doesn’t mean everyone else are LIARS.
As for Apple’s lossy AAC, I suspect it was converted from 16/44 lossless CD, which itself was created from higher resolution sources, making it sound worse than it otherwise should. This is why Apple began marketing their “Maatered for iTunes” albums. They’re probably much better because greater care was taken during the mastering process and conversion to 256 kbps was done in one go from the master.
I pity you if you can’t tell. Maybe you have damaged hearing or you just aren’t suited to your career. Unfortunately, many young people are damaging their hearing these days because of prolonged use of poor quality headphones of which which Apple’s bundled EarPods are amongst the worst.
I am not against Apple offering lossless or even hi res downloads / streaming, but with improved mastering and less compression. A poorly mastered track will still be horrible at 24/96. A great master will sound great, even as a 256k AAC file. Sorry, but I rather trust music engineers and people that actually create the music, over an "expert audiophile".