HotPotato wrote:Sirius streams at 64 Kbps and up. Pandora, at your choice of 150 or 300. Apple (iTunes) at 256. Google Play, 320. Amazon Music Unlimited, 256 average up to 500. Spotify, your choice of 96, 160 or 320.
Low bitrate sounds bad. And, direct wired connection sounds better than Bluetooth.
Totally agree, except the part of wired audio necessarily sounding better.
If you have a current streaming device with the latest Bluetooth radio and standard. there should be no difference in audio quality between Bluetooth and wired. Both are digital, so the bit stream is either complete or it isn't complete. There are no "gray areas" that would cause audio quality to diminish. If the Bluetooth connection is marginal, you may get sporadic dropouts, but those should be obvious and won't affect the actual quality of the sound.
Note - in some instances, particularly with older gear, the device manufacturers deliberately "dumbed down" the audio stream for BT audio in order to achieve and maintain the signal. In my experience though, you'd need ideal circumstances to notice. I