[Bsmooth]

There seems to be quite a difference between streamed Music vs CD ripped music. I use DBPowerAmp to rip my CD's yet when played on the same equipment the CD ripped music seems rather dull and bland sounding. Plus the Streamed music, and I'm talking just Amazon Prime music, not the higher bandwidth Tidal recordings seems to have more Dynamic Range as well.
 To me this should be just the opposite, so I'm at a bit of a loss. My rips vary, some being FLAC and some 320 MP3's
Can anyone explain how this can be ?

[Doublej]

For starters you need to make sure that the volume levels are matched between the two sources for each item being compared.

[Bsmooth]

Yes I wondered about that. My rips are pretty consistent, but they do seem to be at a lower volume. I must say I'm pretty impressed with what the streaming sounds like.
 I'm trying to keep my rips loud without going over the limits, pretty much like my cassette copies back in the good old days with just the occasionally visit into the red. I also check the rips with Audacity to make sure they look and sound good.
 I only wish I could get all those streamed songs as well to keep.

[ricmon]

It looks like the software you are using can support several formats.  Make sure you ripping to FLAC.

Ric

[RDavidson]

Amazon streaming is very likely mp3 quality. If you look into how mp3's are compressed, the top end and bottom end of the music is chopped to help save file space. Then those frequencies leftover at the top and bottom ends are boosted, to supposedly make up for the data that was previously chopped. So I can understand the sound seeming more dynamic...because it has artificially been made so. The drawback is a the loss of overall fidelity, resolution and dynamic range especially. How much loss you'll notice is very dependant on your system's resolution and your ears (of course). I also imagine that different types of music are affected by mp3 compression differently. "Simple" music might not suffer as badly as complex music, like chamber orchestra.

[Bsmooth]

That sort of makes sense to me . When listening to ripped CD's I seem to hear more detail in the instruments, and subtle details, yet the Streamed music sounds brighter. Its a bit confusing to say the least, but in a way makes a lot of sense.
I've actually found on a lot of pop and rock recordings I can tell little difference between an MP3 and a FLAC recording. Theres a little difference, but not a lot.
 I can'r wait to listen to some Jazz or a few classical pieces, there should be a lot more difference there. Its either that or I'm just getting too old to tell the difference !

[audiobomber]

There seems to be quite a difference between streamed Music vs CD ripped music. I use DBPowerAmp to rip my CD's yet when played on the same equipment the CD ripped music seems rather dull and bland sounding. Plus the Streamed music, and I'm talking just Amazon Prime music, not the higher bandwidth Tidal recordings seems to have more Dynamic Range as well.
 To me this should be just the opposite, so I'm at a bit of a loss. My rips vary, some being FLAC and some 320 MP3's
Can anyone explain how this can be ?

Something wrong here for sure. Do your CD's also sound dull and bland?

I ripped my CD collection to zero compression FLAC. Whether I play a CD or its ripped version makes no difference. The sound is very slightly different due to different upstream gear, but I have no preference (using the same DAC).

[Bsmooth]

There even seems to be differences in the quality of the streaming as well, especially depending on which service you are using.