Have you noticed the music on YouTube or any other music download or streaming service sounds better when played from a CD?

Japanese music service RecoChoku has begun the distribution of “high-resolution” music—a high fidelity sound that exceeds the compressed quality found on CDs.

High-fidelity sound can be found in music files that haven’t been compressed, while most other services, including Spotify, Pandora, Youtube, and those less than legal downloads many fans have to resort to, etc. deliver significantly compressed audio/music files with a steep cut in quality for the sake of smaller files sizes and quicker downloading speeds.

RecoChoku still offers AAC (128/320kbps), the usual format offered by most digital music sites, at its normal price point but for FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec) on average you will be paying more than double, probably for space reasons. FLAC files take up more space than lossy files; 250MB to 400MB per hour, compared to, say, 256-kbps AAC files, which requires about 115MB for the same amount of music.

With limited spaces on most mobile devices and the fact neither iTunes nor any Apple hardware natively supports FLAC files in favor of their own lossless format, there can be some obstacles before you can begin listening to high-resolution music.

Additionally, due to the standard of music compression being low for so long, cheaper headphones and sound systems were made accordingly and often don’t allow you to hear the full potential of your favorite music. Higher quality sounds requires higher quality headphones and sound systems. RecoChoku offers a selection of Pioneer devices available for sale that will allow you to appreciate your music at the quality it was meant to be heard.

But despite all potential obstacles, music quality is worth it, right?