Sound quality USB in vs RoseTube

ROSE Products RS520
#1

I’m not sure if it is just my imagination but I noticed some differences between playing music from YouTube video (through USB in through RS520) vs playing from RoseTube (same music clip). It seems that playing through USB in from my laptop has a bit better clarity and sound has clearer separation than playing through RoseTube on the RS520.

Output is the same through Speaker Outputs to Kef R3 Meta.

Is it possible that the sound output is really different from presumably the same source (same clip) but using USB in vs from RS520 RoseTube itself? It almost like RS520 struggling with RoseTube video playback and the sound came out a bit more compressed. I don’t think that this is true but I tried listening to a few songs that I know very well many times in comparison and somehow I feel playing through my laptop and using USB in through RS520 give a bit better clarity sounds with more separation.

Thanks.

#2

The compression shouldn’t change just because of the player. The compression was applied before the bits made it onto the streaming source. RoseTube is supposed to automatically select the highest available stream available to its internal YouTube app. If, for some reason, your PC and RoseTube aren’t selecting the exact same version of a clip, you may hear a difference. It’s also possible that the PC player is trying to “improve” the audio. For example, my receiver has a setting for “restoring sound that was lost in compression.” From a mathematical standpoint, that makes no sense; you can’t recover data that isn’t there. But it might make the sound more pleasing.

#3

@Zxypher

RoseTube simply supports the playback links of videos on YouTube.
Therefore, the same videos on YouTube cannot be played in a different way on RoseTube.

#4

@ROSEHAN @JerrySNB

Thank you. I thought the same that the sound quality should be the same between playing Youtube from laptop (selecting USB as the input on RS520) and through Rosetube (selecting RS520 as the Input). But I was surprised on the differences. The differences are not large but perceptible. The only thing I can think of that differ between these 2 playback are

(1) Any optimizations done in the laptop processing.
(2) Laptop is connecting via Lan Cat6A and RS520 is connecting via WiFi6.

I will try to connect RS520 through Lan Cat6A and see if there is any difference.

Thanks.

#5

I doubt that the speed of your link will make a difference in the quality, unless your gear is automatically downshifting to a source with a lower bitrate so it can compensate for a lower bandwidth. If a link can’t keep up, things stall, drop out entirely, skip, or whatever. For example, if a digital TV signal has bandwidth problems, you’ll get pixelation and audio stuttering—not less vibrant colors.

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