[voxie]

I will for sure give it another try.

From personal experience they are not the quickest in responding but they usually do within 48 Hours.

 

[Richter Di]

Short update on the Qobuz matter.
Qobuz published a new Android version and this works on my Sony NW-ZX2. So this a great step forward. Very happy.

That's strange... I'm PM'ing you the email of the Qobuz iOS team member who got back to me. If you still don't get a response, then I think it's safe to say their customer service has gone downhill massively...

The guy whoms address you send me answered, although I have to say honestly that I so far had not written only the one email to the general ios qobuz address. He asked some questions and did not get all the facts right.
I wrote:
“2. In the past when you bought a HiRes title you were able to download it to your iOS device. Now it changes always when you pick the HiRes otpion (and you bought the title) to CD quality.”
His answer:
“Apple doesn't allow us to "download" audio files directly to your Apple device. You can import them, but with a Hi-Fi subscription you can only import files up to CD quality. However, you can download your purchases in Hi-Res on your Android device, or from our Desktop app (Windows/OSX)”
This doesn’t make any sense since a) I was only talking about HiRes titles I bought and b) it worked in the past and my DACs always showed that the titles were HiRes. So I answered him. Let’s see what he will come up with.

Regarding the buggy import function he wrote to me:
“You are right, and we are working on this functionnality. You should see some serious improvements on the following updates.”

 

[Richter Di]

Short update on the Qobuz matter.
Qobuz published a new Android version and this works on my Sony NW-ZX2. So this a great step forward. Very happy.

Did I just wrote this?
Responsiveness to pick the download quality is a nightmare and pure luck plus:
I hoped my problems were gone on my Sony NW-ZX2 with the new Android version 4.0.10 but although it is much better, I can not import or download my bought HiRes titles. The differentiation between the two seems to be a new feature of this release, since I do not have this kind of differentiation on my iPad Qobuz app.
The app starts to import or download the bought HiRes title and finishes it. So it says for example The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper - Title 1 - HiRes
But when I start it say in German “deleted from the imported tracks” and plays in the case of Sgt Pepper a MP3. That can’t be right!

 

[Richter Di]

It is getting stranger and stranger. Now. The Hi Res download worked with a different title but The Beatles Sgt. Pepper still does not work.

 

[animeismylife]

Regarding the buggy import function he wrote to me:
“You are right, and we are working on this functionnality. You should see some serious improvements on the following updates.”

Let's give them some time to work out all the bugs They'll be launching in the US soon and to compete with market leaders like Spotify, Apple & Tidal, they'll have to seriously step up their game...

Do keep us updated on any further communication from their end

 

[kasimodem]

Hi,

I've subscribed the Sublime+ offer and I enjoy streaming hi-res music on the go.
Here in Europe Qobuz is the first and only provider to let stream hi-res 24/192 music, even Tidal don't have this I think.
Of course you need a big mobile phone data plan and to live in a 4G/LTE area, but it's quite common now.

Since the first days of 2018, Qobuz has released an update for its apps and it's quite better now, less laggy and buggy.
I really enjoy it as I was using Apple Music before but I first listen to classical music and on this Qobuz is much richer.

I hope some other streaming services will soon begin to have hi-res plans too, I mean more than 16/44 that can have today Deezer and Tidal.
I would enjoy an Apple Music hi-res plan to fit my iPhone

 

[S Crowther]

I switched from Qobuz to Tidal about a year ago when I noticed that not all the Qobuz albums were lossless and sometimes just a few tracks were lossless on an album shown as lossless and the rest mp3.

 

[animeismylife]

Hi,

I've subscribed the Sublime+ offer and I enjoy streaming hi-res music on the go.
Here in Europe Qobuz is the first and only provider to let stream hi-res 24/192 music, even Tidal don't have this I think.
Of course you need a big mobile phone data plan and to live in a 4G/LTE area, but it's quite common now.

Since the first days of 2018, Qobuz has released an update for its apps and it's quite better now, less laggy and buggy.
I really enjoy it as I was using Apple Music before but I first listen to classical music and on this Qobuz is much richer.

I hope some other streaming services will soon begin to have hi-res plans too, I mean more than 16/44 that can have today Deezer and Tidal.
I would enjoy an Apple Music hi-res plan to fit my iPhone

Hello! I'm glad you're enjoying Qobuz and thanks for letting us know that the iOS app is better now!

 

[animeismylife]

I switched from Qobuz to Tidal about a year ago when I noticed that not all the Qobuz albums were lossless and sometimes just a few tracks were lossless on an album shown as lossless and the rest mp3.

Hmm, do you have any evidence to support this? It could've been a bug that later got fixed in an update. If you go through @Richter Di's posts in this thread, he also faced a similar issue where his hi-res purchases were getting downloaded as 16 bit. This issue was fixed in the latest update. I unsubscribed just 3 months back and in the time that I was subscribed, I never encountered the issue you mentioned.

 

[Richter Di]

Hmm, do you have any evidence to support this? It could've been a bug that later got fixed in an update. If you go through @Richter Di's posts in this thread, he also faced a similar issue where his hi-res purchases were getting downloaded as 16 bit. This issue was fixed in the latest update. I unsubscribed just 3 months back and in the time that I was subscribed, I never encountered the issue you mentioned.

I never encountered this problem.
Sometimes when the Android App on my Sony NW-ZX2 auto-updated (which I now have stopped) it also changed the settings to MP3 streaming. I only find out when I saw the MP3 symbol while streaming. So I had to change back.

At the moment my iOs version is relatively stable with the exception of the playlist function "import rest" when it starts to import everything new and gets a hick up. Also deleting then the download que does not work properly. I have to delete each track by hand because the function abort the rest of the downloads does not work.

Since I re-downloaded an older Android version for my Sony I am quite happy as it works flawless.

 

[animeismylife]

I never encountered this problem.
Sometimes when the Android App on my Sony NW-ZX2 auto-updated (which I now have stopped) it also changed the settings to MP3 streaming. I only find out when I saw the MP3 symbol while streaming. So I had to change back.

At the moment my iOs version is relatively stable with the exception of the playlist function "import rest" when it starts to import everything new and gets a hick up. Also deleting then the download que does not work properly. I have to delete each track by hand because the function abort the rest of the downloads does not work.

Since I re-downloaded an older Android version for my Sony I am quite happy as it works flawless.

Thanks for the update, Richter! Sooo tempted to re-subscribe, but I need to wait till I upgrade my gear

 

[kasimodem]

I switched from Qobuz to Tidal about a year ago when I noticed that not all the Qobuz albums were lossless and sometimes just a few tracks were lossless on an album shown as lossless and the rest mp3.

That's true, but it seems to be more a right problem than technical. I've seen it on some tracks, when playing it displays something like "we don't have the rights to play this in hi-res" and it plays cd or mp3 instead, or even sometimes it only plays a 45 sec extract with the same rights message.
However, it appears more on very new albums, and rarely on the classical section I listen personnaly. I wouldn't say it's annoying enough for me to think of changing my streaming service.

 

[dougi555]

4. The Qobuz android App is unseless for my Sony NW-ZX2. It crashes all the time. And using Qobuz was the sole reason for buying the Sony NW-ZX2 and not its successor. So this really is hard to chew on.
.

HI..... I'm running QOBUZ on my ZX2 successfully, its a bit slow, but when it plays its gorgeous. However, I just upgraded to Sublime+ and the 24/96 and 192 hi-res are "impossible to play" so it says...... Very annoying.

 

[Mark Dirac]

Here in Europe Qobuz is the first and only provider to let stream hi-res 24/192 music, even Tidal don't have this I think.

Tidal do offer (some) 24/192, compressed into MQA (marketed at "Masters", for $20/mth). Tidal's hi-res albums are more likely 24/96 (also MQA) - not so many at 192k.

Can anyone give an indication as to the current relative availability of hi-res streaming (not downloading) at Qobuz and Tidal?

 

[Left Channel]

Tidal do offer (some) 24/192, compressed into MQA (marketed at "Masters", for $20/mth). Tidal's hi-res albums are more likely 24/96 (also MQA) - not so many at 192k.

Can anyone give an indication as to the current relative availability of hi-res streaming (not downloading) at Qobuz and Tidal?

I've seen 1,000,000 hi-res tracks claimed by Qobuz and by one count I see ~100,000 hi-res MQA tracks on Tidal, with hi-res defined as 24 bits and/or 48 kHz and higher. (Many have argued MQA is not true high-res. I'm not going there now.)

Qobuz:

A recent Qobuz press release says:

"Qobuz offers an extensive music catalog with 40-million tracks. It has the rights to an entire range of major and independent record labels around the world. It always offers this content in a quality that is superior to most other platforms, at the very least in FLAC Open-Source format in 16-Bit/44.1 kHz quality, similar to CD quality, and far superior to your typical Lossy (such as MP3) streaming music service.

"Qobuz has unparalleled expertise in the field of Hi-Res music and offers music lovers a huge Hi-Res (24-Bit up to 192 kHz) catalog of one-million tracks (80,000 albums). All of it is available for either streaming or downloading, without any up-sampling or re-encoding."

Tidal:

There is an unofficial list of "Tidal Masters" albums in a .csv file here [link], last updated March 12, 2018 as of this post. I sorted to get these approximate numbers:

Albums/Singles/EPs
~3,200 @ 44.1
~775 @ 48
~300 @ 88.2
~4,100 @ 96
~1,875 @ 192
~100 @ 352
plus 5 in @ 176
and 10 in unknown

~300 of those are EPs
~ 1,300 of those are singles

So assuming all are 24-bit including the 44.1 tracks, and assuming an average of 12 tracks per album gives us ~104,000 tracks. Then adding 1,300 singles and EPs with about 1,200 tracks gives us ~106,500 tracks. Due to the many duplicates and uncertainties, I rounded down to ~100,000 ...though were I in Tidal marketing, I'd round up to ~110,000. Yes?