Asklemmy

HD 560S for the cans. For my source, I use spotify, using my local library of FLACS for the stuff I like a lot, and just normal spotifly for everything else.

I've got speakers for every occassion. Several in-ears, over ears, monitor phones, Bluetooth speakers, and main amp and stack. Because of this it all sits in that top of middle range to bottom of high range, else I'd be broke.

Mainly use Spotify and vinyl.

Car mostly now. 2.5” Pioneer dash speakers, 6.5” Polks and 6.5” Kenwoods, 10” Pioneer sub and monoblock amp. About a million times better than any upgraded audio system in a new car. Crystal clear audio, very tight controlled bass. It’s sublime.

Otherwise in the house from Apple Music Lossless through the Sonos Arc+sub gen 3+ surrounds and HomePod minis, very rarely through the home theater Atmos syste (Yamaha TSR-700 and Onkyo fronts and sub, and Niles in ceiling surrounds).

I’m a firm believer in not wasting money on expensive amps and gear for marginal gains (pardon the pun). I went to school for audio engineering and have mixed on $100K speakers. They sounded phenomenal but I have more fun in my car with its ~$600 system than anywhere else. Audio is very psychoacoustic. When you’re groovin’ the system almost doesn’t matter.

Amazon music streaming has flac with their HD quality, I really like my Vanatoo speakers with optical in

A technics changer or linear tracker. I think the changer has a shure cartridge still but the linear tracker has an at. Sometimes through a pair of numark ttxs with m447s and a rane.

Music collection as flac, navidrome as streaming server, symfonium as android app and B&W P5 or B&W Pi7 S2 for headphones.

I listen to music mostly on my computer and in the car. The car system is nothing special. I listen through either some ATH-M40fs cans, or Presonus Erie 3.5 monitors, which are honestly glorified bookshelf speakers, but decent for the price, IMHO. All running from my (older gen2) Focusrite 2i4 interface.

I used to listen in the train/metro/bus a lot more, but I now work remotely. That’s where I used Bluetooth stuff. No need to worry about the cable getting stiff in the cold or stuck in my winter jacket. I had a pair of Beats Studio 3 I paid less than $100 for that were pretty decent for the price I paid. The sound was as bass heavy as you’d imagine from the brand, but not terribly overpowering for casual listening, and the ANC in particular was pretty impressive. I also had some Anker wireless earbuds I got with a coupon on Drop (formerly Massdrop) that were good enough for listening to podcasts and having background music.

In terms of platforms, YouTube Music mostly, and a hand picked selection on Plex for stuff that’s not on there or that I want to have always available. The music discovery algorithms are completely useless for me though. It’s the one thing Spotify did better than YTM for me. The “My Mix” playlists and artist radios have been pushing me the same artists for months on end now. Want to know the ironic part? I discover most of my music on YouTube (not Music) nowadays…

I buy it if I can find it on a platform where the money is actually going to the musician. Then, I upload it in CD quality FLAC format to FunkWhale, and also add it to the SD card in my DAC (a Shanling Q1). Where it's convenient I listen on the DAC, where it's not I stream through FunkWhale.

Qobuz for me.

I have converted all my CDs to FLAC and I mostly listen to my music collection in stereo speakers instead of headphones because I find the sound more natural. I have built my sound system around the moOde audio software.

General listening: Spotify + car speakers w/ EQ

Immersive listening: FLACs + HD 560S w/ EQ + Scarlett 2i2 + foobar2k

MusicBee on PC

Vinyl Music Player on my phone

Local mp3s and flacs work the best

I dabble with YouTube Music and music-map.com for music discovery

Haven't found a nice self hosted music streaming setup that I'm happy with (unsatisfied with the apps and features). I want a nice looking app (super subject of course) that supports offline play and ReplayGain. I'm super happy with Navidrome but not with the Windows/Android apps

Sennheiser 6XX

I use deemix to get songs and jellyfin/finamp to listen on my phone. I do miss the discovery of new music from things like Spotify or YouTube music. If anyone has suggestions for music discovery I'd love to hear about them.

Sources:
• FLAC on Plex or Jellyfin
• Apple Music set to highest quality

Output:
• Bluetooth to Car speakers when driving
• AirPods when walking
• AppleTV to Denon receiver to Polk speakers when playing music for whole house (occasionally I use a turntable here instead)
• iPad to a 2.1 Edifier setup playing VSQ when falling asleep

Not often enough:
• Technics SL-1200MK5G or SL-1500C to my AKG K240 Studio headphones
• high

Edit:
Now I’m gonna have to go back through all my old Lemmy posts because there’s so much info here it feels like I doxxed myself.

Spotify through Sonos at home and work. Spotify on Google earbuds when out and about.

I used to really love music discovery on Spotify. I now find it's the same ald songs over and over. It finds what you like and reinforces that rather than gradually expand it.

FLACs through PlexAmp, either to nice headphones ($500 range) or two channel stereo into some decent speakers with a decent subwoofer. I'd like to upgrade to "full range" speakers one day and save the subwoofer for movies.

PlexAmp does FLAC when connected to Wi-Fi but I have it set to transcode if I'm using mobile data.

At home it gets played through Chromecast Audios (R.I.P) which keeps it all digital until it hits my receiver.

My ears.

No just joking, YouTube music mostly. It's convenient, available everywhere, has a large catalogue, and good enough quality for me.

Is there an active community outside of Reddit and headfi where one can talk about this? I haven't seen anything on Lemmy.

Easier question to answer: how don’t I listen to music:

Out of my phones speaker.

I’ve got a few pairs of earbuds, headphones, headphone dacs, and 2.0 system attached to my TV, Oh and the “premium” audio system my Prius came with. Spotify, Apple Music, Plex… wired, wireless

Were you looking for something specific?

Plex, though I do occasionally listen to online radios using my podcast player

My current chain is Tidal + Schiit Asgard DAC/amp + Audeze LCD-X. Moved from Spotify to Tidal last month and will never go back. I definitely prefer headphones over speakers, but have really been enjoying IK Multimedia iLoud Micro Monitors.

With a drink.

FLACs from CDs, deemix-gui, qobuz-dl, and Soulseek. 102,000 songs. Play at home with Logitech Media Server. On the road I've transcoded it all to 128kbps Opus so i can fit it on a microsd card and I play it with PowerAmp. I mostly use Blessing2 Dusk earbuds with a Shanling MW200 bluetooth neckband, but sometimes also I use Focal Clear OG open-back over-ear cans with a qdelix 5k for bluetooth.