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Competitor Feedback (rdio, MOG, etc.)?

Competitor Feedback (rdio, MOG, etc.)?

since obviously a lot of peeps are jumping ship after the most recent update not addressing anyone's issues, i though it might be helpful to start a thread to compare major features and bugs between spotify and its competitors.  i know there are several people here who are very meticulous in documenting spotify's issues and have a genuine interest in helping its users, so let's start helping them by making the case for switching to another service.  my first choice is probably rdio, which i'll be evaluating this weekend.  i tried MOG about a year ago, and their android app was quite horrible as well, but a year has passed, and they're surely worth another look.  just to note my personal preference -- i won't be giving any more money to spotify -- ever.  so even if there is no worthy alternative, i'm going back to MP3s for mobile listening.

 

my biggest gripe with rdio is that they don't want to disclose what audio format/quality they are using (they claim it varies based on connection quality, but i don't think there is any official position for downloaded tracks).  this doesn't sit well with me, as i listen on high-end systems (at home and in car) and i want to know i'm getting the best quality possible.  i'm also very interested in AVRCP bluetooth connections with track info, as i listen in the car a lot.  anyone aware of which competitors have implemented this (we all know spotify never will -- that's got to be pretty far down the list from landscape view)?  i may be willing to make some tradeoffs though for an app that has its basic **bleep** working properly, doesn't have massive rogue data leaks, has landsacpe view, can provide a simple setting to specify storage location, and maybe actually gets an update that fixes a bug or two every six months or so.  i know i'm setting the bar pretty high though.

 

i'll report back my findings for rdio, then i'll probably check out MOG.  i'm hoping several other people will also evaluate these competitors and others, and report findings/major bugs, etc.

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The only one I have used is Grooveshark. Last Christmas I tried signing my parents up for Spotify but because of the stupid Facebook requirement I couldn't, so I got Grooveshark for them and myself.

 

Because that site is based on user uploads, the library there is a total mess, but their Android app is great. The website version even has a library you can sort by artist-album, and if you bother searching for the correctly tagged songs, the library view is amazing. Sadly, Grooveshark has their own kind of song queuing system where you have to either make a playlist or pick the songs you want to play one by one, which is quite frustrating on mobile.

 

 

 

But back to the subject of Spotify. Did your developers just waste a month developing some kind of Facebook feature instead of adding fixes that everyone wants, listed nicely in licenced's large thread? Not only that, but you implemented a sign up button which only gives you the option of using a Facebook account. I thought the days of sucking up to Facebook as hard as possible were over but looks like they aren't after all!

 

No matter what Spotify employees say, it looks like Facebook is controlling them. This update is just incredibly tragic.

I tested out Rdio for free the time they give you.

First, I found almost all of the music I listened to on spotify, from rdio. There was some albums missing.

Second, the android client is more stable and doesn't lose the queue when in background, but the UI is not so user friendly as spotify. So for a2dp car users, I recommend rdio. Though there is no avrcp 1.3 support yet, so the song title and artist text doesn't get transmitted. But atleast it works and doesn't lose the queue.

Third, I really didn't like the idea, that you have to use it from the browser, there is no native client. As I'm on linux and like to use special keys to back/forward, I can't because it's browser based. There might be some way to do it, but I didn't bother to find out how.

And fourth, the sound quality is a gray field. I personally didn't notice the difference when listening over a2dp in car, but I didn't have anything to compare it to at that time, because I canceled my spotify subscription. And from my computer it sounds like you lose the bottom frequencies, it's a bit flat. Like it would be heavily encoded. I have some high end equipment, so I can't say if you can hear this from "normal" computer speakers and how much does it bother the individual.

 

edit: oh, and the android client is clumsy because everytime you e.g. open playlists it loads them from the server i guess, so it doesn't cache anything client side. It's quite annoying infact. There's always a "loading" circle about...

I've tried Deezer today. As far as I know, it's only available in Europe and Asia.

 

What I liked: volume levels between albums seem to be adjusted a lot better than in Spotify, it's incredibly easy to add songs from your personal collection, the mobile app is simple to use and displays large album art

 

What I disliked: max of 400 tracks per playlist (this was a HUGE letdown), sometimes songs aren't added to playlists correctly, quite a lot of typing errors in the Dutch translation

 

So basically, I would only recommend Deezer if you use small playlists. They said they will make playlists larger in the future, but that could take some time. For now, I'm back with Spotify.

You still need a Facebook account to use Deezer. No good.

 

Even though Spotify is heavily favoring Facebook signups as well, at least there's an option now to not have Facebook.

Deezer is not so good in Android, Spotify is way better.

So you say, but why? What did you not like about Deezer? As far as I've tried it the apps are both very similar in functionality.

I feel that Spotify for Android is more functional and also better design. Also there is better sound quality in Spotify.

 

However I really like Free radio in Deezer - it's good for folks that need just simple, free radio.

Stupify: you don't need a facebook account to make an account for deezer.

And about deezer & rdio clients, they are very similar in design but deezer is more better to use and simpler and spotify is about as easy imho. But, for my use spotify ui design isn't so good overall. Atleast rdio & deezer work properly.

It's not giving any other option than Facebook. There's a login option for a deezer account but no way to actually create an account.

 

It's exactly like Spotify was before: Facebook is required for new users but if you signed up before the Facebook deal you can go without FB.

That's weird. I just signed up today in the morning without any facebook. I have the premium+ for free a couple of days to test how it works on android.

When I click sign up, the only option given is "Sign up/log in with Facebook". I also tried the mobile app but it's the same thing there. Facebook only. The front page has a huge ad for them where the only choice is "Sign up with Facebook now".

Top left, beside the deezer logo, there is Deezer Offers. From there select Try Now, premium or p+.

I didn't choose any payment method, and got an email to verify it, even when it said "choose a payment".

 

Have fun.

 

People really should investigate a little bit more before making any conclusions 😉

One thing that isn't so good with Deezer, is that it limits the mobile device amount to 2. And I happen to have 3 devices on which I listen music on. Work phone in the car, my normal phone in the car, and my tablet is connected to the home theatre.

 

So that's one more reason to move back to spotify. But not until they fix the queue disappearing and avrcp1.3

 

 

edit: This is a bit coincidental, but no client this far supports song name/text on android. That's Deezer, Rdio and Spotify. And Deezer & Rdio seems so much alike, that it makes you wonder if they outsourced the coding part to the same company. Or then they just copy eachother. Nontheless Rdio seems to work the best on android, but is a bit of a mess. I hope spotify gets its s**t together and start to really fixing things crucial.

I tried Samsung Music Hub on my SIII.

 

Genererally it is ok (same price as Spotify). Problems is, it often loses the complete downloaded songs and you have to download again. And also the download function does not work for all songs so sometimes you have to play the songs to download them. So if you have a lot of songs .. hard work

 

Pro:

 

* Unlimited Sound download >3333 songs

 

Contra:

 

* Often Manual download of songs takes very long

* Albums dissapear

* Bad support

Peter

Using Spotify on Thinkpad Yoga, Iphone 6Plus, Ipad Mini 2, Playstation 3 & 4

Here's a quick feature comparison that I did between spotify and  some of it's competitors. If you find any other features that should be in the added then leave me a comment!  BTW - even with all that, I'm sticking with Spotify for now. But I do wish they'd work on some of those feature requests and bug fixes before everyone's patience runs out.

pernalin

Nice work pernalin! Was looking for something like that to get an overview on what's going on at the streaming market.

Yeah, really nice, pernalin!

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