[classact]

What would be a good streaming music service for the PB that provides pretty-darned-good sound quality, and also pretty-darned-good control and flexibility over choosing songs, artists, and then of course genres and such in that order?

The Slacker quality is not up to par for my tastes. Other than that, I prefer it over anything else I've seen (well, only tried Pandora and a few others so far) in that it gives me considerable control over choosing what and who I want to listen to -- which is very important to me. The bitrate/quality of Slacker on the PlayBook (and my OS7 phone) is way too lacking for me, though.

On a separate but related topic, for purchasing songs and albums I see 7digital is going to run BB10's music store, and that right now the BB Music Store enables integration between the PB and phone, but I don't yet know what the bitrate/quality is.

While I do like to buy albums and songs I also like the flexibility of streaming -- having broader access to things I'll only listen to once or on occasion, and being able to find new things with genres.

Thanks!

[rjkolo]

I use Nobex Radio, you can chose a LOT of stations around the world as well as by genera for stations that they have. Pandora works well, just load up the website.

[dusdal]

Bitrate and sound quality of 7digital based store is very good. Both on PB and BB.

For streaming I use BBM music. It's fantastic for sampling different songs and finding songs that you want to purchase later IMHO anyways.

[classact]

Bitrate and sound quality of 7digital based store is very good. Both on PB and BB.

For streaming I use BBM music. It's fantastic for sampling different songs and finding songs that you want to purchase later IMHO anyways.

Thanks.

Being that I'm not one to get much into social media, BBM Music doesn't seem to be for me (BBM Music goes live, here's why it sucks).

Slacker would be great for me if the bitrate/quality wasn't so darned lousy. It's so poor I don't even bother for anything except maybe some vocals -- anything with instruments is so glaringly lacking to me.

I'll be looking into 7digital for purchases, though Amazon may do fine for now -- I'll have to look into the differences.

I may have to live with these current limitations for now, until I'm on BB10 next year (which may be later in the year since I have to wait for the enterprise servers to be up to speed at my hosting provider).

Thanks again.

[kill_9]

7Digital provides excellent sound quality for the albums and individual songs available for purchase. I have downloaded a number of albums through 7Digital on the BlackBerry PlayBook with good results and the cost is reasonable. You can download purchase songs to multiple devices without having to buy the song each time; there is an upper limit of 5 if I recall correctly.

[dusdal]

Thanks.

Being that I'm not one to get much into social media, BBM Music doesn't seem to be for me (BBM Music goes live, here's why it sucks).

Slacker would be great for me if the bitrate/quality wasn't so darned lousy. It's so poor I don't even bother for anything except maybe some vocals -- anything with instruments is so glaringly lacking to me.

I'll be looking into 7digital for purchases, though Amazon may do fine for now -- I'll have to look into the differences.

I may have to live with these current limitations for now, until I'm on BB10 next year (which may be later in the year since I have to wait for the enterprise servers to be up to speed at my hosting provider).

Thanks again.

There is a great deal of misinformation in regards to BBM music. I currently have 330+ contact's music available to me or 10,000+ songs. I choose what I want to listen to by name, genre, shuffle all, choose a favorite contact and listen to their list, listen to a playlist that I created from those 10,000 songs, listen to a playlist that one of those contacts created from their collection of songs etc.

Of those 330+ contacts, I personally know 3 and have them on my BBM list.

[rotorwrench]

For one thing, streamed music and quality in the same sentence is an oxymoron, as far as free services go. No such thing. For music purchase, not streaming, 7Digital, Amazon, and many other music stores are offering at least 256kpbs to 320kpbs. Google "high bit rate music stores", many will come up. Better yet, and for true quality, that being lossless, many stores are offering wav and Flac. The PB doesn't support Flac but the later BB phones do, such as my 9930. Flac will give you lossless quality but smaller file size. Spotify, OMG, Rdio etc...offer 256 to 320kbps streamed with paid subscriptions. Pandora , Slacker, LastFM and other free services stream in 64 to 128kbps, pretty sucky on good systems, and 64 on mobile devices. But for a paid or premium subscription you can only get up to 192kbps with the latter guys. I personally no longer listen to compressed music, but if that's too restrictive for you, and you want the best quality you can get with mp3, as you say, at least insure your purchased downloads are 256/256vbr or higher, but don't expect it to be CD quality. You will notice the difference using decent cans or IEMs, especially if you have an ear. With lesser quality players, cans or IEMs, you'll still notice a difference between 64/128kbps audio and 256. In the end, all that matters is what you enjoy listening to. Good luck

[classact]

There is a great deal of misinformation in regards to BBM music. I currently have 330+ contact's music available to me or 10,000+ songs. I choose what I want to listen to by name, genre, shuffle all, choose a favorite contact and listen to their list, listen to a playlist that I created from those 10,000 songs, listen to a playlist that one of those contacts created from their collection of songs etc.

Of those 330+ contacts, I personally know 3 and have them on my BBM list.

I appreciate the input. I don't pretend to fully understand how it all actually works. I think I just prefer to keep my own browsing to myself. Of all the BB App Store apps I've installed, I've never allowed any to "share" anything I do over BBM. I shy away from Facebook all I can. I'm just not someone who wants others looking at what I do, as innocuous as music might be. And I don't know where the lines are between what others do and don't see once I'm sharing in either direction. I just like to choose who I'm showing to and sharing with. A cleaner way of browsing and selecting seems more attractive to me.

But maybe it really is a matter of understanding it. I mean, the idea of trying the playlist of somebody else never even occurred to me before. Then again, if they drop a song I lose it too? I try to keep tighter control over my listening content. I don't do a lot of songs, but it would frustrate me if something I was listening to and expecting was suddenly not there.

Do others have to see my BBM ID, or anything about what I'm doing?

Thanks again.

[classact]

For one thing, streamed music and quality in the same sentence is an oxymoron, as far as free services go. No such thing. For music purchase, not streaming, 7Digital, Amazon, and many other music stores are offering at least 256kpbs to 320kpbs. Google "high bit rate music stores", many will come up. Better yet, and for true quality, that being lossless, many stores are offering wav and Flac. The PB doesn't support Flac but the later BB phones do, such as my 9930. Flac will give you lossless quality but smaller file size. Spotify, OMG, Rdio etc...offer 256 to 320kbps streamed with paid subscriptions. Pandora , Slacker, LastFM and other free services stream in 64 to 128kbps, pretty sucky on good systems, and 64 on mobile devices. But for a paid or premium subscription you can only get up to 192kbps with the latter guys. I personally no longer listen to compressed music, but if that's too restrictive for you, and you want the best quality you can get with mp3, as you say, at least insure your purchased downloads are 256/256vbr or higher, but don't expect it to be CD quality. You will notice the difference using decent cans or IEMs, especially if you have an ear. With lesser quality players, cans or IEMs, you'll still notice a difference between 64/128kbps audio and 256. In the end, all that matters is what you enjoy listening to. Good luck

I don't want "free" anything. I'll be paying for premium service in anything I do. And obviously on that basis very good quality is available with streaming. Unfortunately, though, while MOG is top quality and top rated in almost all ways, it does not play on a PlayBook or on a BlackBerry smartphone, period (at least not according to what their tech support has emphatically told me).

I'm after 256 and up. I don't need anything higher than 256, though 320 is nice, too. Beyond that is beyond my level of perception with the "pretty good" equipment I use (including near top-of-the-line Shure IEMs).

From what you're saying, it seems the only way to get the quality I want at this point in time is to stay with purchased downloads.

Thanks!

[dave1701]

Grooveshark - Free Music Streaming, Online Music

[classact]

Looks like 7digital is the way I'm going for purchases from now on.

The reasoning is that I'm mainly playing the music with my PlayBook at home on good speakers (and secondarily on my BB smartphone), and 7digital is actually the default music provider that RIM has been partnered with for the PlayBook ever since the PlayBook first came out. Just click on the default Music Store icon on the PlayBook and it takes you to 7-digital. Also, it's designed to easily "sync" between computer and PlayBook or between computer and BB smartphone using BB Desktop Manager. And, when BB10 comes out, the music provider RIM will be using will still be 7digital. And the quality is there, of course (256 kbps and 320 kbps, from what I can tell).

For streaming, I guessI'll have to stay with Slacker, which is useful to at least find new things I like, which I can then buy from 7digital. This is just until MOG is available for BlackBerry (which I expect will probably occur with BB10), or when some other 256+ streaming service is available for BB. (I have to say I really am not thrilled with the Slacker apps on the PB or my 9930 at all. While the features are great were it not for the lousy sound quality, the problem with the app is that it crashes quite frequently on both my PB and my phone. On the PB I can just close and reopen the app, but the phone requires a reboot of the device, which of course is quite a pain.)
EDIT: Unless I warm up to BBM Music once I learn more.

Thanks again!

[rotorwrench]

I don't want "free" anything. I'll be paying for premium service in anything I do. And obviously on that basis very good quality is available with streaming. Unfortunately, though, while MOG is top quality and top rated in almost all ways, it does not play on a PlayBook or on a BlackBerry smartphone, period (at least not according to what their tech support has emphatically told me).

I'm after 256 and up. I don't need anything higher than 256, though 320 is nice, too. Beyond that is beyond my level of perception with the "pretty good" equipment I use (including near top-of-the-line Shure IEMs).

From what you're saying, it seems the only way to get the quality I want at this point in time is to stay with purchased downloads.

Thanks!

I'm sorry. I was talking of streaming in general, as there are stream services, as mentioned previously, that do go up to 256 and 320, which is your target. I must have misread, as to streaming on the PB I have no opinion nor know what works on it as I've never tried. As to the Shures, if you're using 425's or up and a good player, I bet you can discern the difference between 256/320 mp3 and wav/lossless on certain tracks, especially those with a good mix of upper and lower frequencies, where you'll pick up on the shallower sound and clipped highs. A good check is to take a quality recording with a good mix of instruments and vocals ( I use Yes's Roundabout or a cut from Tachovsky's Four Seasons) load it to your player in 256 and wav. Have someone else select either one without you knowing and listen for all nuances of the instruments and vocals, as well as depth and soundstage. Then listen to the other track. Pick the one that has the most detail and depth, overall better quality. Repeat this two or three times to assure consistency. In a quiet environment, people almost always choose the wav/Flac track when I try this with them. Nevertheless, as I said before, if you enjoy what you're listening to, then stay with it

[rotorwrench]

Grooveshark - Free Music Streaming, Online Music

Grooveshark streams at 128 and states that in their help section, same as free Pandora.

[classact]

@ rotowrench, I appreciate the input. I'll try not to be too distracted from my business responsibilities by your provocative insights into the fact that I can still detect more detail (or lack thereof!) if I go to even better files. :-)

Maybe one of these days.

Thanks again!

[jnak00]

I use 7Digital on both the Playbook and my phone. One caution - if you buy music on your phone and download over the mobile network, rather than wifi, the bitrate sucks. If you download on your phone using wifi, it's much better quality. Overall I'm pretty happy using 7Digital - prices are decent and selection is not bad.

[Boight]

Every song I've bought from 7digital is 320mps .mp3
There are .FLAC songs on 7digital.. and I'll leave it at that. Neutron claims to play them, and they demo with the store app, don't know about PB's player.

[rotorwrench]

Every song I've bought from 7digital is 320mps .mp3
There are .FLAC songs on 7digital.. and I'll leave it at that. Neutron claims to play them, and they demo with the store app, don't know about PB's player.

You're right, they started offering FLAC in 16bit last August but limited in available albums, although increasing daily 24bit is now available also, but more and more stores are offering FLAC as well. I still have some tracks from them back when my only choice was 256. They're a good store.

[Johnny Smythe]

fmgem.com Web based. It pulls from Youtube with great results. Really easy to use. It lets you search on artists, pull their discography and turn any album into a playlist. It looks like it just came out and is in beta, but I stopped using grooveshark and spotify because this site gets everything.

No mobile version yet.

[keyboard_cat]

Bitrate and sound quality of 7digital based store is very good. Both on PB and BB.

For streaming I use BBM music. It's fantastic for sampling different songs and finding songs that you want to purchase later IMHO anyways.

Apparently BBM Music is being shut down on June 2nd, fyi.

[bovcrx]

Spotify Web player

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