Music Streaming Services

1. Yes.

2. As long as you have backed up the Roon database on a regular basis (Roon has a built-in back up mechanism that must be setup by the user) reinstalling the core is not an issue. I did it once to test it.

 

I requested mine on January 11 (I believe?) and I got my invite on Wednesday evening (Jan 29). TIFWIW.

Still *VERY* early (Day 2) into my 30-day-free-trial, but my thoughts so far are:
- I like it. A lot. I had a 30-day-free-trial of Tidal over Christmas break (ending right around Jan 11 or so), which I liked as well... but I like this option more, for several reasons, some of which are probably unique to me but some of them may not be:
1. There's CD-Quality ("Hi-Fi") support for Firefox web player; I need this, due to circumstances beyond my control, for listening at work. Tidal didn't support 16/44.1 over Firefox.

- There's more of an emphasis on Jazz and Classical, and less on "synthetic" sounds.... Don't get me wrong, I've got eclectic tastes and certainly listen to some bass-heavy amplifed-electric-guitar hard rock or computer-sampled-hip-hop from time to time, but I never felt like that sort of music benefitted *substantially* from streaming at CD-Quality the way Norah Jones and Rachmaninoff do... which is the whole point (for me) to paying for Qobuz or Tidal rather than just running with Spotify or Google Play.

- This could be placebo. I could be imagining this. But I think it *might* sound a little better? I always thought that *maybe* Tidal had messed with the Gain just a little bit on their HiFi stuff? I can't A-B compare Tidal and Qobuz (which would be the real/best test), but switching back-and-forth between Norah Jones Burn (first track of Day Breaks album) between Google Play Music (320 kbps MP3) and Qobuz 16/44.1 CD and the difference is STARK, real, and very tangible... the quality upgrade here is fantastic, and I feel like the Delta between GPM and Qobuz is bigger/better than what I remember is was for Tidal (which was also substantial and enjoyable, no doubt).

- Value proposition. $200-per-year for CD quality is a considerably better "deal" than Tidal was offering me ($1 off per month when leveraging my Plex Pass)... and the steps up from there to 24-bit and then "sublime" both seem like pretty small, reasonable bumps, that add value for what they're asking for... 1.5 days in, and I don't know yet what tier I'm going to opt for, but I'm fairly certain I'll be a paying customer after this trial expires.


Fully acknowledging in advance that this is all still in Beta, a couple of things I hope they get ironed out prior to public release (or just haven't figured out yet how to fix/address as-is) include:
1. I was really hoping to stream some "original masterings" of 90's era rock, but to my surprise, the only copy of Soundgarden Superunknown they had available was a 21st Century Remaster... and same thing with the original (S/T) Rage Against The Machine album. Furthermore, having signed up for the free trial on the 24-bit Hi-Rez subscription, I was really hoping to get to listen to the newest (December 2018) Three Days Grace album, which supposedly has a better (less-brickwalled) mastering on Hi-Rez than the CD-and-MP3 releases found elsewhere, but Three Days Grace/label isn't currently allowing streaming of that album via Qobuz.

2. Which leads me to my second question/complaint. I own the original mastering of the RATM album. But I haven't found a way (unsupported?) to upload any of my own music to *fill in some of these gaps* in their library....

3. Thirdly, acknowledging that my internet speeds/connection and Linux desktop at my office aren't *great*, they are "good enough" to stream Youtube at 720p without much buffer time.... but the CD quality bitrate of Qobuz combined with whatever software/thinking is going on with the Web Player, and playback (only at CD quality, not when using 320 kbps) has occassional audio dropouts/hiccups (especially when I'm doing something else with the machine, loading another page, etc). It's something that I haven't experienced when streaming other media (including Youtube video). Note: nothing like this happens to me at home, when I'm on a much faster connection and using much better hardware...

 

GPM is mediocre quality at worst, and pretty good at best. It never seems to compare well to CD quality stuff I've found.

It's an interesting observation about the gain. I think it bears testing out more.

I'm willing to overlook that considering it's a beta.

What concerns me more is Tidal's tendency to just remove some songs from their library without warning. If qobuz does this too, I'd be more than a little miffed, although that will probably mean it is due to record labels screwing with shit.

Thanks, nice write up.

 

Awesome thanks for the responses. A couple follow-up questions:

3. I know Roon has some intelligence/ability to automatically downsample/downconvert files for "optimized playback" on a particular device. And that's great.

But can you *manually* tell it to treat a certain type of device a certain way? I'm having a terrible time with the current firmware version on my Chromecast Audio's borking 24/96 FLAC playback (supposed to be supported; previously worked fine on older firmware). Would I be able to tell Roon to downsample all files being sent to one of my CC's to 48 kHz (or 44.1) kHz?

4. Will Roon work on-the-go and outside of my home network the way Plex does? Kind of like a "port-forwarding" capability to access all content outside the local network? Some google-searching seems to indicate the answer is "no" but those responses are often more than a year old and just (unofficial) RoonLabs forum posts...

 

Agreed. Google Play Music is, for me, is about a lot more than just Sound Quality.
- I like the way it conveniently supplements it's library with 320 kbps MP3 cloud-saved versions of my FLAC library.
- I ("we") like the family plan. I have my wife and both kids on it. And I "shared" it to both my sister and my sister-in-law as a "Christmas gift" a couple years ago, and they love it to, but not so much for the music streaming as for:
- Commercial free youtube is great. Youtube isn't just for cat videos anymore. A lot of really solid, well-produced content can be found on that platform anymore. Lots of Network TV (late night TV, etc) and Cable News segments, put up officially by the owners of said content... etc.

I echo your sentiments regarding it's sound quality on "good gear".

Yep agreed. Just to reiterate, I'm 1.5ish days into this free trial, and I'm fairly certain I'm going to keep this... which means I completely agree with your statement here.

 

3. Roon has this concept of zones. For example, my 2 channel setup in my Library is one zone. My office setup with nearfield speakers and a headphone amp is another zone. Each zone can be configured differently and can be configured to do what you want to do with your misbehaving Chromecast Audio device.

4. No. But, it is on the roadmap with an unknown time frame.

 

Messing around more with Qobuz:

*PC App still buggy and crashes on me.
*Qobuz streaming runs best when using Third Party Apps like UAAP and Bubbleupnp. I do believe running it in Roon is better than Qobuz own PC App.
*I should try the Qobuz Andriod app, but I had a lack of a need to do it due to I prefer UAAP interface (I never feel like "downloading" files on the official apps).
*Hi-Rez streaming works quite well, but honestly I don't really notice a difference between 16/44 to something like 24/96. Mastering > Hi-Rez.


But damn, the download store is just fing amazing. I just spend another $85 on stuff that I wanted. I just love that there's a Hi-Rez version and a 16/44 version of the same album. If an album was on HDTracks, they normally force you to get the Hi-Rez version. I do believe in choices, and I like that Qobuz has an excellent selection in the download store and it just f'ing works well. Now I don't have to worry about not buying CDs due to I'm closer to running out of space for them.

 

Uri try logging in to your Qobuz account and use the web player instead of the desktop app. I had to go into sound settings for my PC and increase sample rate to 24/192 to enable the web player to play back at highest resolution but so far the web player is stable until they fix the app.

 

Maybe it's just me, or Qobuz UK, but I just checked a couple handfuls of albums and everything is about 25-30% more expensive (for 16/44) than a CD on e.g. Amazon. Maybe I'm a dinosaur, but I just don't get it.

 

I'll try that and see if I'm ok with it. Thanks!

P.s.: Is Audirvana+ overrated?

You are right. For newer releases on CD it is cheaper to get the CD than the download. This has always been the case. You do the download store due to convenience and it you are lacking space for CDs (like me).

 

I like Audirvana+ a lot IMO is not overrated. The Windows version does not yet have all the features of the one for Mac but getting there however neither has the metadata you get with Roon. I might try the free trial of Roon to see if it is worth the extra cost to me now that Qobuz is integrated.

 

Thanks for the suggestion. Currently the Windows app is a disaster. It isn't so bad to simply start an album and let it play through (although I've sometimes had the player freeze up in the middle of a track). However, while music is playing, trying to anything else (like browse the catalog) is so unresponsive that it is almost unusable. When I had a Qobuz trial last year, the Windows app was fairly usable and didn't have the issues I see now. In contrast, the Mac app works much better.

Haha, love this comment. There are people on Head-Fi noticing the app problems and thinking that it is related the US launch which is now in beta. However, the player app problems are worldwide and the US being in beta mostly involves setting up US based accounts and getting licenses from the music labels for streaming in the US — nothing to do with the app.

 

Re: A+
Not overrated, an excellent player. Have been using it with their Tidal app for a couple years; sounds good and I haven't experienced the glitches I've seen posted about the Tidal app. A+ also shows Qobuz in my menu, so when it's rolled out in US I could change horses if I had a reason to.

 

Might as well get my third time on a trail with Roon, do my first trail with A+, TIdal app just cause, and my current Foobar2000-DNLA/Bubbleupnp streaming solution.

Will see which one of them works for me the best. I don't have a streamer hooked up to my Ayre due to the Ayre is picky on Linux-based OSes. Best to use Mac or Wins for the Ayre.

Will do impressions on all of these solutions soon.

 

I need to type up the crap about my previous post, meh.

If anyone following Qobuz in the US, it officially launch tomorrow on V-Day. Now the real battle between Tidal and Qobuz begins.

I'm still sticking to Tidal due to more stuff that I want on the service. I did noticed however that Qobuz added the rest of George Clinton 80s albums to the download store, mmmm...

 

Tidal is ok this far. Nice minimalistic interface. Hope to see proper Linux Client or Plugins for player in the future. Webrowsers are unreliable, Ffox keeps having errors with loading the player at times. Not my cup of tea. Great service never the less. Going to try some flavor of BitPerfect playback when I have time.

 

I got an invite to the Quboz US beta earlier this week (though it may have officially launched since ) and started a free month. When going back and forth, It does seem to sound a bit different than Tidal (a bit more dynamic, a bit harsher perhaps), but I need to do more A/B testing. ATM, I'm pretty sure to cancel at the end of the month because just a few spot checks show massive dealbreaking gaps in their library. (The email invite stated that the beta library was incomplete and would be filled out; we'll see.) I've only checked around two or three dozen artists at semi-random and huge gaps of music I listen to regularly include some albums by Richard (also Richard & Linda) Thompson with all the gaps of Tidal still missing, most of Aimee Mann, key albums by John Hiatt, my favorite Peter Case album, about half of Trip Shakespeare's (unfortunately small) output, Syd Straw's classic (but almost unknown) Surprise, which I had been delighted to see added to Tidal only recently. (Err, I guess Its pretty obvious that I am not listening to contemporary pop, hip hop, or dance music. A lot of this is real niche music, but it is all on Tidal.) A few checks also showed that almost all material missing on Tidal is still missing on Quboz; a major exception was a decent Four Seasons compilation which is inexplicably absent from Tidal (I'm almost tempted to keep Qoboz just for that). That's a whole lot of missing releases given the fairly small sampling of artists I checked. Unless this gets substantially filled in fast (and I am betting it wont't--not a great demand for this stuff), I can't see switching from Tidal.

 

My experience so far is close to yours. I find that it generally sounds a tiny little bit better than tidal for the bulk of my library, with the exception of some of the 24 bit material which does seem to sound clearly better vs the "master" quality mqa stuff which sounds very clear but has a sense of unnaturalness when closely compared. (I don't know how else to describe it.)

I used soundiiz.com to copy some playlists from tidal to qobuz, and about 20% of my library is unavailable on qobuz. For example, I transferred the first 50 tracks of my "Blues Guitar" playlist, and the following were unavailable (sorry for the terrible formatting):

title;artist;album;isFound
Rock Me Baby;"B.B. King Eric Clapton";"Deuces Wild";1
Let My Guitar Do the Talking;"Guitar Shorty";"Rare Blues Rock";1
Deja Voodoo;"Kenny Wayne Shepherd";"Ledbetter Heights";1
Move;Keb'Mo';Bluesamericana;0
Miss Ida B;"Buddy Guy";"Buddy's Baddest: The Best Of Buddy Guy";1
T-Bone Shuffle;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Blues Rock - Guitar Shredders";0
The Moon Is Full;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Essential Sleepy Blues";1
Lion's Den;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Blues: Famous Families";0
She's into Something;"Albert Collins Robert Cray and Johnny Copeland";"Texas Blues Gems";0
Bring Your Fine Self Home;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Lonely Man Blues";0
Black Cat Bone;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Hoodoo Blues";0
Albert's Alley;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Best of Electric Chicago Blues";0
Blackjack;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Five Star Modern Blues";0
Something to Remember You By;"Albert Collins Robert Cray Johnny Copeland";"Blues Guitar";0
Am I Wrong;Keb'Mo';"Keb' Mo'";1
I'm A Hero (Album Version);Keb'Mo';Suitcase;1
Born Under A Bad Sign;"Albert King";"Born Under A Bad Sign";1
Bright Lights;"Gary Clark Jr.";"Blak And Blu (Deluxe Version)";1
Tin Pan Alley (AKA Roughest Place in Town);"Stevie Ray Vaughan Double Trouble";"Couldn't Stand The Weather (Legacy Edition)";1
Voodoo Child (Slight Return);"Stevie Ray Vaughan Double Trouble";"Couldn't Stand The Weather (Legacy Edition)";1
Scuttle Buttin';"Stevie Ray Vaughan Double Trouble";"Couldn't Stand The Weather (Legacy Edition)";1
Little Wing;"Stevie Ray Vaughan Double Trouble";"The Essential Stevie Ray Vaughan And Double Trouble";1
Pride and Joy;"Stevie Ray Vaughan Double Trouble";"Texas Flood (Legacy Edition)";1
Riding With The King;"Eric Clapton B.B. King";"Riding With The King";1
Riding With The King;"Eric Clapton B.B. King";"Riding With The King";1
Fire On The Floor;"Beth Hart";"Fire on the Floor";1
Blues Deluxe;"Joe Bonamassa";"Blues Deluxe";0
Hey Joe;"Popa Chubby";"The Essential Popa Chubby";0
Sloe Gin;"Joe Bonamassa";"Sloe Gin";0
Fire On The Floor;"Beth Hart";"Fire On The Floor";1
Damn Right, I've Got the Blues;"Buddy Guy";"Damn Right I've Got The Blues";1
The Bluest Blues;"Alvin Lee";"The Anthology";0
St. James Infirmery;"Hans Theessink";"Songs from the Southland";0
Rock Me;"Great White";"Once Bitten";1
I'll Take Care Of You;"Joe Bonamassa Beth Hart";"Don't Explain";0
Don't Look Back;"John Lee Hooker";"Don't Look Back";1

The SRV legacy edition failed as there is no legacy edition on qobuz, but the normal edition is there. The rest I haven't been able to find the same masters/tracks that I'm used to listening to. If they are going to fill out the library, great. I'll have to reevaluate when they do.

 

Tidal has some strange software issues. Sometimes you randomly cannot play a track. It annoys me to no end.

I will continue to pay for the regular Tidal service. Their FLAC library is good. If it was not for that library, nope bye bye Tidal...

 

I read Tidal app is BP. Like where...!?

320kbps CBR should be fine on everything but the uber highend. Flac is more for the peace of mind in many cases. I can detect differences on acoustic and other high fidelity recordings only...