Official Qobuz Issues Thread

[jaynyc]

@David Craff Back in November there was mention that Qobuz was supplying Roon with volume level metadata (ie: EBUR128, ReplayGain).  Is this metadata available exclusively to Roon or can other companies (like Lumin, Melco, etc) access this metadata should they choose to offer volume leveling in their player producs?

 

 

[David Craff]

11 hours ago, jaynyc said:

@David Craff Back in November there was mention that Qobuz was supplying Roon with volume level metadata (ie: EBUR128, ReplayGain).  Is this metadata available exclusively to Roon or can other companies (like Lumin, Melco, etc) access this metadata should they choose to offer volume leveling in their player producs?

 

 

 

Hi

 

All our content is now scan for volume leveling. We are in progress to add this information on our API for all partner 

 

Regards 

[thyname]

I find the lack of the following two distinctly separate genres under Qobuz categories pathetic:

 

1) Folk / Americana

 

2) Metal

 

I have requested these a few times since back in November 2018. I get the usual “will add to the list of requested features “, and nothing has happened

[al2813]

I just signed up  to Deezer Hifi on a promo. In the past it was a no-go for me as mobile apps were not supported on hifi. I just discovered this barrier was removed in November last year. In the next days I will compare it to Qobuz on my different setups and use cases, but after a bit of testing I already think I will stop my Qobuz Studio subscription and retain Deezer. All the catalogue gaps (some of them very specific to my background and culture and probably not missed by most users on this forum, others probably more of an issue to many here) are resolved. I could port my Spotify playlists (containing everything I could not find in Qobuz) and merge them with my Qobuz playlists into one app with all my streaming music. I think that Qobuz is still the best service on SQ, but to my non-audiophile (and a bit aged) ears the gaps are not very noticeable. 

 

 

[bobbmd]

@thyname I couldn't disagree more with you about folk/americana metal I could care less about.

I lump/choose folk/american with country& western and almost anything I search for comes up even obscure people like Pat Guadagno a Jersey Shore saloon/bar singer who covers Dylan comes up-A Bob Fest on his birthday(check him out) plus covers of Waits, Cohen, Dylan(Barb Jungr for example) etc almost ALL the Dead plus loads of their covers almost all Dylan and his covers, guys i never heard of Jerry Jeff Walker and Ray Wylie Hubbard the Del-Lords etc and check out JazzDoc post #19 in Music in General under country western. ALL anybody would want and more of Kingston Trio PP&M search Bakersfield Sound or Nashville and there are just pages and pages of artists under americana  alone. There is a lot there and half the fun is just looking for/searching(and reading different threads/topics on this august body of work) sort like what it was like at Sam Goody's or Tower Records-just put anything into search and click... and when you request do it to @dmackta or @ David Craff you might get better results on this thread.

@al2813 you could keep Qobuz by transferring all your Deezer/Spotify playlists to Qobuz via Soundiiz Premium I did this for my Deezer and Spotify and my TIDAL playlists and retain the SQ you like so much on Qobuz... just a suggestion OR get ROON I got the 'lifetime' subscription at 499$ and it has paid for itself( my CFO wasn't happy she said "what is 'lifetime' at YOUR age?''

bobbmd

[thyname]

1 minute ago, bobbmd said:

couldn't disagree more with you about folk/americana

Every single streaming service has Folk / Americana as a separate genre. Including Tidal. To say they can all be lumped in Country, is simply wrong

 

How hard is for Qobuz to implement such simple changes?

[bobbmd]

@thyname  I didn't say that READ what I said--- I said I (me personally) lump folk/americana/country&western/country together THEY to ME are all Americana/Folk( and I click the specific box(es) in the genres drop down).

Instead of writing something like that to me why not just say thank you for the suggestions( did you even try them or explore them?) and let it go... instead of acting like a sophomoric member/millennial--sorry I even bothered to respond... and FYI Qobuz DOES under genres have Folk/Americana box to check and you can check multiple genres at once. Do you even know how to explore Qobuz GUI/desktop app? If you type in METAL in 'search' under METAL there is Artists /Releases /Tracks and Playlists the first three are "New in Metal"/"Best of 2019-Metal"/ "Metal from A  to Z : Extreme"---- that isn't good enough for you? Go knock yourself out with that info. And I will save you the trouble and say "You are Welcome" in advance.

[al2813]

1 hour ago, bobbmd said:

 

@al2813 you could keep Qobuz by transferring all your Deezer/Spotify playlists to Qobuz via Soundiiz Premium I did this for my Deezer and Spotify and my TIDAL playlists and retain the SQ you like so much on Qobuz... just a suggestion OR get ROON I got the 'lifetime' subscription at 499$ and it has paid for itself( my CFO wasn't happy she said "what is 'lifetime' at YOUR age?''

bobbmd

 

Hi bobbmd and thanks for the advice! I don't have Soundiiz premium but even with the non-premium version I was able already to do it. 

 

As to Roon, I have been looking at it a lot and the key issue preventing me from taking the plunge is that all streaming services allow offline only via their app (for obvious reasons). As I listen a lot to music on the road and in offline mode, Roon is not an option. For now I use Vox player for my own ripped FLACs and the streaming app(s) for the rest. 

[bobbmd]

@al2813  you are welcome and you are correct I use my iPhone and iPad with Qobuz TIDAL and Spotify/Deezer apps for my offline playlists also but find myself too lazy sometimes and just listen to Sirius especially that Bakersfield Sound station in the high numbers(200s or 300s) which to my ears sounds like they are streaming in higher resolution than mp3(have meridian sound system in my LandRover Discovery). Thanks for the polite response unlike that other guy--- what did you think of his response to my polite suggestions?

[mourip]

16 hours ago, thyname said:

I find the lack of the following two distinctly separate genres under Qobuz categories pathetic:

 

1) Folk / Americana

 

2) Metal

 

I have requested these a few times since back in November 2018. I get the usual “will add to the list of requested features “, and nothing has happened

 

Are you located in the US? I do not think that Qobuz had even gone live in the US in 2018. Perhaps Qobuz is still negotiating access to those niches? Do you know of another streaming service that has better coverage?

 

By the way you might get better results by not using words like "pathetic" when asking for help. Just a suggestion...

[rando]

16 hours ago, thyname said:

I find the lack of... genres under Qobuz categories pathetic:

 

2) Metal

 

I have requested these a few times since back in November 2018. I get the usual “will add to the list of requested features “, and nothing has happened

 

Keep banging your head!

 

 

Quote

How hard is for Qobuz to implement such simple changes?

 

 

[thyname]

27 minutes ago, mourip said:

 

Are you located in the US? I do not think that Qobuz had even gone live in the US in 2018. Perhaps Qobuz is still negotiating access to those niches? Do you know of another streaming service that has better coverage?

 

By the way you might get better results by not using words like "pathetic" when asking for help. Just a suggestion...

I was among those who got one of those Society codes for USA. Pretty sure it was around November 2018. I may be wrong.

 

And you are right about the use of “pathetic”. I should not have used.

 

@bobbmd You are absolutely right. My bad. Apologies 

[bobbmd]

@thyname apology accepted and my apology for being kinda rude back to you. And since you probably had same kind of subscription I had 5 or more years ago with a 'french address' mine was Oneida,New France which is what the Northeast would have been called if the French had won on the Plains of Abraham! pretty cheeky of them,eh?

Did you try any of my suggestions?

[thyname]

Hi @bobbmd. Thank you. I have not tried them yet, as I am out and about, but bookmarked your post for later tonight. I am always in search for new music. Funny thing is, my current favorite artist is from Sweden, Sophie Zelmani. 

[al2813]

3 hours ago, thyname said:

Hi @bobbmd. Thank you. I have not tried them yet, as I am out and about, but bookmarked your post for later tonight. I am always in search for new music. Funny thing is, my current favorite artist is from Sweden, Sophie Zelmani. 

Sophie Zelmani is great. Try others from Scandinavia (if you don’t know them already): Stina Nordenstam, Agnes Obel, Fredrika Stahl, Christel Alsos, Elvira Nikolaisen. Many great female singer song writers in the Nordics. 

[Stereo]

5 hours ago, al2813 said:

 

Hi bobbmd and thanks for the advice! I don't have Soundiiz premium but even with the non-premium version I was able already to do it. 

 

As to Roon, I have been looking at it a lot and the key issue preventing me from taking the plunge is that all streaming services allow offline only via their app (for obvious reasons). As I listen a lot to music on the road and in offline mode, Roon is not an option. For now I use Vox player for my own ripped FLACs and the streaming app(s) for the rest. 

Have you tried looking into Plex? https://www.plex.tv/ Don’t know if it works with Qobuz but it does work with Tidal. @dmackta @David Craff Any idea if Qobuz is in talks with Plex to offer this?

[Tinnitus Andronicus]

Six weeks ago I posted here about issues I was having with the Qobuz desktop app for Windows. I don't know how many updates to the app have been made since then, but the same problems remain. I would love to see them figure this out and fix it. Am I the only one using the Qobuz app for Windows that is having this issue? To review, I quote my original post:

 

Even though I am using WASAPI exclusive output to my Rega DAC which supports up to 192kHz audio (works fine with files of that rating when playing local library via JRiver Media Center USB exclusive WASAPI or ASIO), I cannot get proper playback of anything above 96 on the DAC. With 192 or 176.4 files in Qobuz, the sound is slowed down and mangled with digital noise. I tried changing my Qobuz output to the same DAC via ASIO and although it does play the files properly, it is not stable and the program keeps crashing and opening JRiver. So that won't work. It should work as long as JRiver which also has exclusive access to the same DAC is not running in the background, and I have verified that it is not running unless the app is launched and open on my Windows 10 desktop. I would like to be able to listen to the highest res files on my Qobuz app in their native bit depth and sampling rate, but for now I must set my Qobuz playback preferences to 96kHz so that if I play a file with higher sampling rate it does not sound like crap.

 

The other issues relate to playing playlists with varying sampling rates. Some songs in the list are 44.1, some are 96 or 88.2, and when it switches between different songs with different rates, it either upsamples or downsamples and does not play the file at the listed rate. Whereas the same file will play at the native resolution when playing it as part of the album. This needs to get fixed. While I most often like to listen to a full album, I would like to be able to listen to favorite songs or playlists with each track playing at the correct sampling rate. [edit: it works correctly in Audirvana, and plays 192kHz as well]

 

I was in private email contact with one of their tech support people and we exchanged all the details including OS and specs, etc, he seemed responsive and eager to help but he either dropped the ball or the whole tech support team is stumped on this bug, or maybe I am the only one having these issues so it was considered unimportant. At the time I was in contact with this guy, Sebastian I think was his name, he asked if I wanted to be on the list for beta test users and I said yes, I later withdrew my wish to be a beta user but I am still using beta versions so I guess I cannot change that now. I am on JS version 5.4.0-b013 Desktop version 5.4.0-b009.

 

I stopped complaining because I bought Audirvana for $75 for the sole purpose of using it to stream Qobuz and it solved both of the issues I reported. However, searching Qobuz in the Audirvana window often gives me annoying results, e.g. searching for Kate Bush, I then click on the name under artists and it pulls up a list of 81 albums including every other so and so whose release is tagged with the name of Kate Bush because maybe they cover a song by her or sound like her, with actual Kate Bush albums scattered down the bottom of the long list of titles. So now I use Audirvana as a Qobuz player, and have to open the Qobuz app if I want to search for an artist and get only the most relevant results.

 

Is it possible to get the Qobuz app fixed, so I can use Wasapi exclusive output to my DAC and stream music without the issues I've reported. Please???

[rando]

@Tinnitus Andronicus What is the result of using the Qobuz browser based player in both WASAPI exclusive and ASIO? 

 

You appear to be caught in a loop of attempting fixing one issue by adding complications resulting in the creation of further ones.  "Strict" limiter in Qobuz search appears to have made a difference for many who's searches incurred too broad a spectrum of results.  Every one of the secondary programs handles Qobuz differently.  A+ for Windows has been a challenging software effort for the developer if memory serves. Security based API changes have not made implementation easier on anyone.

 

36 minutes ago, Tinnitus Andronicus said:

Is it possible to get the Qobuz app fixed, so I can use Wasapi exclusive output to my DAC and stream music without the issues I've reported. Please???

 

I'm not informed enough to determine if Qobuz is where the issue lies.  Nor the extent to which you have investigated Rega's DAC driver or a unique factor existing on your Windows machine/faulty cord/???.  WASAPI exclusive related issues have come up before in this thread without any one determining factor rising as the culprit.  

 

Installing Qobuz app and ASIO driver on at least one other W10 computer might help.  A clean install with perhaps some items impacting audio turned off, ideally.  Simplifying is no guarantee of success.  It might add clarity allowing the layers to be built back until source of the error(s) can be confined to at least a general area.    

[PAR]

1 hour ago, Tinnitus Andronicus said:

 

Even though I am using WASAPI exclusive output to my Rega DAC which supports up to 192kHz audio (works fine with files of that rating when playing local library via JRiver Media Center USB exclusive WASAPI or ASIO), I cannot get proper playback of anything above 96 on the DAC

Yes, I have had what seems to be an identical problem in the past using Qobuz Desktop with Win 10 into my dCS hardware. After talking to the dCS guys in Cambridge they suggested that I switched from WASAPI to ASIO in " Audio Devices" in the Qobuz settings. An immediate cure. No problems at all now with <192 files from Qobuz. So I suggest that you try the same .

[Tinnitus Andronicus]

4 hours ago, rando said:

@Tinnitus Andronicus What is the result of using the Qobuz browser based player in both WASAPI exclusive and ASIO? 

 

You appear to be caught in a loop of attempting fixing one issue by adding complications resulting in the creation of further ones.  "Strict" limiter in Qobuz search appears to have made a difference for many who's searches incurred too broad a spectrum of results.  Every one of the secondary programs handles Qobuz differently.  A+ for Windows has been a challenging software effort for the developer if memory serves. Security based API changes have not made implementation easier on anyone.

 

 

I'm not informed enough to determine if Qobuz is where the issue lies.  Nor the extent to which you have investigated Rega's DAC driver or a unique factor existing on your Windows machine/faulty cord/???.  WASAPI exclusive related issues have come up before in this thread without any one determining factor rising as the culprit.  

 

Installing Qobuz app and ASIO driver on at least one other W10 computer might help.  A clean install with perhaps some items impacting audio turned off, ideally.  Simplifying is no guarantee of success.  It might add clarity allowing the layers to be built back until source of the error(s) can be confined to at least a general area.    

 

I started by setting the Qobuz audio output to Wasapi exclusive Rega DAC. Then I tried changing it to ASIO Rega DAC to see if that fixed anything. I was not trying to do both at the same time. I figured I would try different output settings to see how that affected the playback issues. I will discuss my most recent findings on that in my following post in reply to PAR's above suggestion.

 

It would be pretty difficult to isolate all the variables to prove that my issues are the fault of the Qobuz app and not due to some particularity in my Windows 10 setup or my DAC. However, I am reasoning that if I have my Windows PC connected via USB to my Rega DAC, and I can get any local audio files to play at the correct sampling rate using JRiver MC24 (using either Wasapi exclusive or ASIO, both work, I have it set to ASIO), AND I can stream Qobuz via the same USB path to Rega DAC using Audirvana as a player (output Wasapi exclusive to Rega DAC) instead of Qobuz, and that gives me no playback issues. Then it is therefore not a problem with my DAC or cable, it is something in the Qobuz app.

 

I would further assert that this is so because I have the exact same issues when I use a different DAC as the Qobuz player output. I tried it with my OPPO 205 which is also connected to my PC via USB (I use the OPPO as an alternate DAC when playing DSD files which the Rega cannot decode). Qobuz app misbehaved playback in exactly the same way when selecting the OPPO as the DAC, and I tried it in both Wasapi exclusive and ASIO, alternately.

 

My Rega DAC driver is up to date. My Windows OS is up to date. As is my Qobuz app which I just did a clean reinstall. I do not have a spare Windows PC that I can use to troubleshoot with, to see if I experience the same problems using Qobuz with a different computer.

 

My conclusion is that this is a bug or compatibility issue originating in the Qobuz Windows desktop app.

[Tinnitus Andronicus]

4 hours ago, PAR said:

Yes, I have had what seems to be an identical problem in the past using Qobuz Desktop with Win 10 into my dCS hardware. After talking to the dCS guys in Cambridge they suggested that I switched from WASAPI to ASIO in " Audio Devices" in the Qobuz settings. An immediate cure. No problems at all now with <192 files from Qobuz. So I suggest that you try the same .

 

I tried your suggestion. Originally I found that using ASIO was unstable, probably because I have the ASIO driver as the default audio output to Rega in JRiver (it caused crashes even when JRiver was not running in the background). Today I tried it out again and I did not experience any crashes or instability when selecting the ASIO output option to Rega, And it DID correct the problem with 192kHz files which stream without issues. However, it did NOT correct the problem with playing tracks of varying sample rates in a playlist, which continue to be either upsampled or downsampled, and always play at the wrong rate when played within a playlist, yet play at the correct rate when played from the album display in the app. Strange.

 

I went so far as to try setting the Qobuz audio path to Rega using Wasapi first and then ASIO. And then I set Qobuz output to the OPPO DAC, first with Wasapi exclusive and then ASIO.

 

The Qobuz player will not stream 192kHz files correctly using Wasapi exclusive output with either my Rega or OPPO DAC. The Qobuz player will stream 192kHz files correctly using ASIO to either the Rega or OPPO DAC. However, the Qobuz app WILL NOT play files contained in a playlist at the correct sampling rate in either of my two DACs, whether I select Wasapi exclusive or ASIO as the output option.

 

NONE of these two issues occur when I stream Qobuz thru Audirvana thru the DAC of my choosing, with either Wasapi exclusive or ASIO. So this is why I must use Audirvana to stream my Qobuz music without playback anomalies. If I can figure out how to narrow search results within Audirvana when searching for artists in Qobuz, then I won't have any need of using their buggy app.

 

I will say that I am committed to keeping my Qobuz subscription, despite my dissatisfaction with their Windows player app. I tried a free month of Tidal Master and decided for a few different reasons that I prefer Qobuz (and it's cheaper).

[bobbmd]

The problem(s) you guys are describing is the reason in 2012 that i switched to an Apple Mac mini and still use it with OS being El Capitan have you reached out @dmackta or @David Craff or Damien at A+ for help/suggestions? best of luck 

[Tinnitus Andronicus]

Pardon my ignorance, but what is this "A+" people are mentioning? Is it shorthand for Audirvana (I'm guessing)?

[bobbmd]

sorry yes it is audirvana+3.5+ or whatever version you have

[AudioDoctor]

I don't know if this has been brought up in this thread before or not, I have not been following it.

 

I just found out that the files that the Qobuz desktop app downloads to a cache file to play, without adding them to any offline files, are not deleted when the program closes, when I went looking for what the heck was taking up 25GB of space on my boot drive suddenly. It was not happening before the last update, as far as I can tell.

 

This is on macOS Mojave.