qobuz Qobuz USA launching soon!

[rickca]

8 hours ago, sandston said:

Boy do I wish the microrendu /ultrarendu would support cast as well. There are quite a few instances where it would be useful. I hope they are listening!!!!

They are not.  Already proposed and rejected.

[Musicophile]

1 hour ago, #Yoda# said:

You are right, I've downloaded less newer false HiRes albums in the past two years, but the older ones are still in their catalog. And yes, there is a pattern. Not all, but most of my upsampled albums are well known Rock/Blues/Folk albums from the 70s, rereleased as HiRes version between 2012 and 2015, usually by a Universal Music Group division.

I've downloaded not so much Classical or Jazz from Qobuz.com because until I subscribed Sublime a view months ago, Highresaudio.com usually had the better prices and the better HiRes catalog for this genres anyway, not to mention the guaranteed quality.

Makes sense.

 

In any case, the prices you get with Sublime are really hard to beat. Especially it seems like recently they've increased some of their regular download prices a bit, but with Sublime you're really getting excellent value for money. 

One thing to keep in mind for Qobuz pricing is that they sometimes have different prices per country (which I find quite annoying). Luckily I'm on the French store which seems to have the best prices overall.

[wklie]

17 minutes ago, Musicophile said:

One thing to keep in mind for Qobuz pricing is that they sometimes have different prices per country (which I find quite annoying). Luckily I'm on the French store which seems to have the best prices overall.

 

Tidal subscription pricing is different for different country, too.  I've read someone saying Qobuz account for France has access to the largest number of albums (compare to Qobuz for other countries), can anyone confirm?  I believe Tidal for US has access to the most albums, especially Tidal Masters.

[#Yoda#]

1 hour ago, Musicophile said:

One thing to keep in mind for Qobuz pricing is that they sometimes have different prices per country (which I find quite annoying). Luckily I'm on the French store which seems to have the best prices overall.

 

If you want to see a "nice" example for different prices:

 

https://www.qobuz.com/gb-en/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/it-it/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/fr-fr/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/de-de/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

 

Interesting to compare the first three with the last link.

 

It is not a joke and it is not the fault of Qobuz, the price differences at HDtracks are similar as far as I know. The prices are largely determined by the labels. 

[Musicophile]

35 minutes ago, #Yoda# said:

 

If you want to see a "nice" example for different prices:

 

https://www.qobuz.com/gb-en/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/it-it/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/fr-fr/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

https://www.qobuz.com/de-de/album/the-complete-studio-albums-the-doors/0603497933105

 

Interesting to compare the first three with the last link.

 

It is not a joke and it is not the fault of Qobuz, the price differences at HDtracks are similar as far as I know. The prices are largely determined by the labels. 

Wow, I knew Germany was essentially paying for the rest of Europe (sorry for the political pun), but I didn't realize it was that bad even for music...

[Musicophile]

1 hour ago, wklie said:

 

Tidal subscription pricing is different for different country, too.  I've read someone saying Qobuz account for France has access to the largest number of albums (compare to Qobuz for other countries), can anyone confirm?  I believe Tidal for US has access to the most albums, especially Tidal Masters.

I've seen examples (but don't recall them). Unfortunately this is really out of the control of Qobuz, this is the 19th century mentality of the record labels.

[Fridolin]

Shocking!

[#Yoda#]

This is the most extreme example I've ever noticed. Obviously Rhino/Warner Music Group avoids to sell this collection in German speaking countries, Switzerland and Austria shall pay the same brazen price.

 

When I'd noticed this irrational discrepancy in 2015, I sent several emails to Rhino - Elektra but have never got any feedback. Finally I bought 3 "must have" albums in 24/96 for not even € 45 and the rest now as 50th anniversary remasters.

 

By the way, we will see many Patti Smith HiRes remasters reissued tomorrow. 

[rando]

How successful have any of you been at tracking down the "best masters" on Quobuz?  How about obscure high quality recordings?  It appears label control would interfere with curation.  Pricing, whew!  If the US post-launch looks too ugly I might have try posing as Signor Rando.

[Musicophile]

8 minutes ago, rando said:

How successful have any of you been at tracking down the "best masters" on Quobuz?  How about obscure high quality recordings?  It appears label control would interfere with curation.  Pricing, whew!  If the US post-launch looks too ugly I might have try posing as Signor Rando.

It´s far from perfect. It is really good for purchasing new releases, but for older remasters you'll often have to do some digging to find out which remaster is worth purchasing. 

 

One more thing to keep in mind: they have a lot of what looks like high-res recordings but are marked BNF for Bibliotheque Nationale de France (the entire digital music library of the BNF has been digitized and can be bought via Qobuz), which can be very confusing.

[bobbmd]

@#Yoda# price aside- I just listened to Doors 'break on through'... on all the Qobuz links you listed all sound harsher especially the bass and the bass section at the beginning and electric piano plus they were all in my left ear on my Sennheiser RS-195's via my ancient but very worthy Yamaha rx-v2500 AVR in 2 channel. Now I have always felt Qobuz via its desktop app or via A+3 was superior to TIDAL HiFi/'Masters'. Out of curiosity I went to TIDAL desktop app and played the 'Master' Doors album and the sound was much smoother and now the bass and electric piano were coming from my right ear on my phones!!? Now I am neither an MQA positive or negative person I take or leave it but why do you think are the  albums different in separation and harshness/smoothness? MQA black magic or different master recordings/tapes?

I just listen to streaming I do not download except a few HiRes recordings from Qobuz and used ME2 DAC for the above listening and didn't listen to non MQA/HiFi TIDAL albums but will now. And... with either A+3 or Qobuz desktop app same thing happens bass and electric piano are coming from my right ear but are much smoother like the TIDAL 'Masters'/MQA (both are the hires/remastered 50th Anniversary album). I am not making any kind of statement ie on MQA just asking a question- do you think it is just the links but why do you think the separation changes and why do they sound harsher to me?

bobbmd

[#Yoda#]

@bobbmd The sample tracks of an album, you can listen to in the download stores of any HiRes provider, are not HiRes. They are usually mp3 with 256 or 320 mbps, what may explain your listening experience. 

 

I don't know if the ME2 DAC is switching the filter mode automatically when you listen to "regular" formats after you listened to MQA encoded music. When it's not switching, the DAC still uses the MQA specific filter to playback regular FLAC and you shouldn't wonder when the regular files sound worse then. I've made the same experience with a Mytek Brooklyn.

[bobbmd]

@#Yoda# Thank you very much did not realize that about the format of sample tracks but they did give me a choice of choosing HiRes or mp3 in any event the second paragraph is a logical reason for what I was hearing.

Thanks for taking the time to explain.

[rando]

If the server is in France and you, as an example, are on the Western US coast.  That is a lot to negotiate with no degradation of quality you will notice.  As opposed to downloading a small pdf in the same situation.  Or even better, using their desktop app as you have done with Tidal.  The product as delivered in the US will be the only test.

[left channel]

32 minutes ago, rando said:

If the server is in France and you, as an example, are on the Western US coast.  That is a lot to negotiate with no degradation of quality you will notice.  As opposed to downloading a small pdf in the same situation.  Or even better, using their desktop app as you have done with Tidal.  The product as delivered in the US will be the only test.

I'm using a UK account in the US and it sounds great!

[rando]

Good to hear.  Being logged in implies higher priority access to their servers.  There a lot of unknown factors besides this.  For streaming purposes the UK would be a very good choice due to the Apollo North OALC-4 SPDA cable being a major banking link.  

[left channel]

Then thank you, Apollo North OALC-4 SPDA cable!

[woodford]

22 hours ago, rando said:

Good to hear.  Being logged in implies higher priority access to their servers.  There a lot of unknown factors besides this.  For streaming purposes the UK would be a very good choice due to the Apollo North OALC-4 SPDA cable being a major banking link.  

 does the Apollo North cable sound better than the Apollo South cable?

[rando]

Depends on how much you like the sound of money, woodford.  Suffice to say the link to the world's banking center is considerable during off market hours.  If not packed in with it.

 

Bit too subjective for my blood.  Do report back with your evidence one way or the other per SQ.  Happy hunting.

[gddctr]

On 12/11/2017 at 4:38 PM, left channel said:

I just ran this news through Google Translate and it does indeed say what I thought it says: the Qobuz hi-res streaming and download service is preparing to launch in the USA next year!

https://www.rtbf.be/culture/pop-up/detail_qobuz-prepare-son-arrivee-aux-etats-unis?id=9772232

Many have signed up from outside the current service area via VPN (then streaming without VPN once set up), but this will make it official.

 

Do they not ask for a UK address when signing up? I work overseas and have VPN and would love to demo their service to see how good it is, however my CC billing address is in the states.  I had issues trying this with SKY online streaming.

[rickca]

1 hour ago, gddctr said:

however my CC billing address is in the states

That won't work.  Pay with PayPal.

[left channel]

13 hours ago, gddctr said:

 

Do they not ask for a UK address when signing up? I work overseas and have VPN and would love to demo their service to see how good it is, however my CC billing address is in the states.  I had issues trying this with SKY online streaming.

 

12 hours ago, rickca said:

That won't work.  Pay with PayPal.

 

Correct, if you sign up with PayPal you won't have to enter an address (and you will also avoid possible forex fees on your credit card). I am in the US and I have a Sublime+ account. If you've already been to the Qobuz website, make sure you clear your browser cookies and cache before returning via VPN because Qobuz will have tagged your browser with your location. After you've signed up and downloaded the app, you won't need VPN to enjoy the music.

[left channel]

ICYMI:

 

[steveoat]

Any update as to when this will come to USA?

[left channel]

I've seen no update. Usually anything announced at CES in January appears on the market by October, often after missing a target of August/September. Somewhere I read a rumor Qobuz would try to launch by July, so fingers crossed, but software seldom cooperates.