[Digeeedad]

I've spent almost a month now, trying to decide between subscriptions to Amazon Music HD or Qobuz streamed through Audirvana. I really should make a decision as to which one to keep because paying for both seems pretty silly. That acknowledged, to me there seems to be a noticeable audio quality difference between them. Amazon Music HD sounds terrific and it's user interface is MUCH better than the often frusting Qobuz/Audirvana. To my ears, Qobuz/Audirvans has a consistently more pleasing audio quality.... slightly better bass response/punch and overall a slight but noticeable "aliveness" and more open/floating/bigger soundstage. Pretty tired comparing the two and more than a little embarrassed admitting that I have spent hours doing so. No doubt whatsoever that Amazon Music HD is much easier and fun to use and has a larger music library, including more 'Ultra HD" offerings. Has anyone else compared Amazon Music HD and Qobuz/Audirvana before making a choice between the two? Your findings? Certainly NOT an expert but do wonder how one service could consistently have a noticeable sound quality advantage. I realize it just comes down to my personal choice but would really appreciate any replies as to your comparative experiences and choice. Thanks!

 

[yolosauce]

I've always had issues with Qobuz crashing and skipping on the desktop app. I'm currently using Tidal+ Audirvana. If you already paid for the Audirvana license i think it would make sense keep using the software with qobuz or tidal integration. Another thing to consider is the music library of each service. Are their songs on amazon music that aren't available on quboz? Does amazon have bit perfect playback or does it upsample/downsample?

 

[Digeeedad]

Thanks for the informative reply and suggestions! Yes, Amazon definitely has a larger music library but I'm going to stay with Qobuz for now, as I do find that its sound quality is slightly but noticeably better than Amazon. Quality over quantity? lol When I did a free trial of Qobuz several months ago, using it's own player, I too was having skipping problems on my PC. Currently using it with its own player for a few weeks, I've not had any recurrences of the earlier glitches. I previously was subscribed to Tidal and Qobuz, playing them through Audirvana. I chose to keep Qobuz and am not finding any advantage to using it with Audirvana over its own player. Thanks again...

 

[RONJA MESCO]

I think Amazon is sooooooo good...the issue was I had too many subs and had to cut back. I had a sirius/xm sub with the app on a deal...and surprisingly, the app audio quality is top notch, along with its extra pandora channels (Sirus/xm bought Pandora awhile back). Not Amazon levels good, but decent. I think for me, if I kill this sub in 2021, I will return to Amazon. I havent tried Qobuz yet, but need to soon tho.

 

[almarti]

Just suscribed to the 3-month Amazon Music HD trial, I love the UI, but I don't see any integration with Audirvana that I use with Tidal - do you know any plan for this to happen?

By the way, I have read that Amazon is not really HD neither HD nor Ultra HD, that is oversampling, is this true?

 

[tumpux]

You cant integrate Amazon music with Audirvana. It only works with Tidal and Qobuz.

 

[JES]

I chose Qobuz after a trial with Amazon HD. I found that during every listening session with Amazon HD over a week, at least once there was some sort of bandwidth limit that pushed the file down into a lossy format. Per their terms and conditions, they are permitted to do this. It was a classic "Oh hell no!" moment for me. I have 800 Mbps down, so I know it wasn't an issue with my speed. I also had a lot of problems with their Android app. Overall I had high hopes, but was ultimately disappointed.

I'm very happy with Qobuz at this point. I also like that they pay the artists more per stream (although I haven't seen this quantified anywhere lately).

 

[tumpux]

I find the sentiment of using a certain streaming service due to it’s bigger contribution to the artists is …

All these streaming services never publishes the amount of royalties they paid to each artist so we dont know how much does the artist actually received from each company.
I doubt that minor streaming company such as Qobuz could pay more than the Big Green one.

 

[JES]

I find the sentiment of using a certain streaming service due to it’s bigger contribution to the artists is …

All these streaming services never publishes the amount of royalties they paid to each artist so we dont know how much does the artist actually received from each company.
I doubt that minor streaming company such as Qobuz could pay more than the Big Green one.

The sentiment is .... what???

According to this review of Qobuz, $.04390 per stream for Qobuz vs $.00331 per stream for Spotify.

https://www.soundguys.com/qobuz-review-50100/

It also seems that they made an effort to assist artists during COVID

https://americansongwriter.com/royalty-exchange-qobuz-acting-to-aid-artists-during-covid/

 

[almarti]

Currently suscribed to Tidal.
What about the classic and progressive rock and jazz guitar catalogue?

 

[Uebelkraehe]

Seeing that Qobuz has now recommended tracks and a very comfortable offline mode, that it is the only app that manages to stream bit perfect from PC, DAP and Android smartphone (with UAPP) and that i have increasingly come to like their curated content, i have now ditched Amazon HD and gone full Qobuz. Amazon HD's only adavantages at this point for me are a somewhat larger catalogue and lower price, but the latter imo reeks of even worse exploitation of artists.