Official Qobuz Issues Thread

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, Lebouwsky said:

It would be interesting to share the songs that sound so mono. 

I do have a TASCAM recorder that can record up to 192 (IIRC) and DSD64 from analog sources or digital.

[One and a half]

1 hour ago, MarcelNL said:

you can however share title, version and bitrate....

 

I have a hard time believing digital stereo can become mono just like that......sure a rip can be done incorrectly, or some processing done by a hamfisted audio 'engineer' at a studio (as far as I'm aware the files do not reside on Qobuz servers, yet I may be wrong), but having a stream transforming  from stereo between source file and home user is a stretch for me.

 

Try a EUR2 printer USB cable and a favourite USB cable, digital stereo it still is with bulk noise, ruins the soundstage.

[MarcelNL]

Just now, One and a half said:

Try a EUR2 printer USB cable and a favourite USB cable, digital stereo it still is with bulk noise, ruins the soundstage.

believe me when I say that I did that, I came quite a ways before arriving at the sound quality level things currently are ;-)

 

Still, I have NEVER experienced anything causing streaming audio files to become mono, and I have tinkered around a lot.

Not saying that your observation is wrong, I'm just pretty hesitant to attribute it to the streaming provider.

[111MilesToGo]

Expanding the Sophie Millman, In the Moonlight, So Sorry tests:

 

I listened on my Cayin N8ii via UAPP with Qobuz integration: Same positive result.

 

Next thing is my desktop setup:

Same ISP, DSL, router, WiFi as above > HP EliteBook 8560w laptop (from 2011) with Windows 10 > Roon with Qobuz integration > USB output > USB-A to USB-C cable > Cayin N8ii used as USB DAC.

Same positive result.

 

And finally:

Same chain to Win 10 laptop, now original Qobuz Windows app > same output to N8ii.

Of course 😉, same positive result.

 

Remark: No special power supplies anywhere. The N8ii DAP runs on battery only.

FWIW: I also have some other desktop audio equipment like Chord Hugo2 DAC/amp and Violectric V281 headphone amp. When I use this with my laptop, I use a miniDSB USB-to-Optical converter in order to electrically decouple the computer from the audio equipment. Except, of course, for the fact that all equipment ultimately uses the same line voltage power to the house and room.

 

EDIT and ADDENDUM: I should mention I also have a Sennheiser HD 800S full-size headphone, which is regarded a soundstage king, regardless of how one might perceive its tonality.

[Lebouwsky]

This morning I listened to "In the Moonlight" by Sophie Milman where the soundstage collapsed to mono in @One and a halfhis setup. I played the song from the Qobuz app with asio output, 24 bit HD quality on a windows 10 ltsc server. I downloaded the song and the download que said 115mb. Then I took notes on where her voice and the instruments were placed:

• voice: centre
• bas: centre
• percusion: centre
• violin high notes: left
• harp: left
• accompanying violin low notes: right
• guitar: right
• piano: between centre and right
• harmonica: between centre and right

It was on a cold system (tubes are in dac, preamp and mono blocks) directly after start up. It takes a few hours for my system to sound fully harmonious. My brains don't like listening to music in the morning and also take a few hours as wel to get fully adjusted to the sound. The speaker distance is about 3,5 meter and at full potential the soundstage is wider than 3,5 meter and instruments can be placed where the engineer likes them to be. I wouldn't rate this recording as top notch but it's not bad eather.

 

"Man Alone" from Tindersticks, now this is what I call soundstage.

[Savolax]

4 hours ago, Lebouwsky said:

It would be interesting to share the songs that sound so mono. 

In my case they replaced their original version (standard edition) to one I extracted, (2CD limited edition) and their original is not available to compare anymore.

[111MilesToGo]

By the way, listening to Sophie Millman‘s So Sorry from In the Moonlight again: What we called a harmonica (left) actually sounds like an accordion to me … 😉😉

[Lebouwsky]

1 hour ago, Savolax said:

In my case they replaced their original version (standard edition) to one I extracted, (2CD limited edition) and their original is not available to compare anymore.

Ah, sharing can be interpretated differently, my bad. I ment sharing the artist, song and observations like @MarcelNL kindly  suggested before.

[bobbmd]

HI YOU ALL (above)—I can not believe all the problems you have or think you have with Qobuz—did you ever think your systems might be TOO complicated ie too much ‘stuff’?

I have never had problems with Qobuz that couldn’t be fixed easily and I ALSO (way back when— a long time ago in a galaxy far far away-2007/08) had a ‘French address’ because I was in was in the USA(it was ONEIDA, NEW FRANCE  which is what the northeast USA would have been called if the French/Montcalm had won on the Plains of Abraham)

I can’t speak for Australia or Europe but I have no ‘noise’ ever/the SQ is outstanding and I can’t say enough about Mr @dmackta / @David Craff who guided me through the transition from France to my current USA address/format.

My system is quite simple all Schiit-ragnarock 2(just the amp) Yggdrasil 2020 GS new Mac mini M1 chip 16GB RAM and Apple Time Capsule WiFi and Spectrum audio video service with Legacy Audio Studio HD monitors— could using non Apple products be the source?

I also use Qobuz in Audirvana Studio and AS kicks SQ up another notch and @damien78 or his community always solves  problems quickly.

 

[athegn1]

9 hours ago, johey said:

@athegn1 You can change the download path via (Qobuz App) > My Qobuz > Settings (the cog at the top right) > Storage.

Thank you. I suppose there is no way I can batch download all my PlayStation in one batch? I have rather a lot, over 400; I treat each album, mainly classical or classic e.g. Songs for Swingin Lovers, as one new playlist. The download is going to be long

 

 

[David Craff]

On 12/1/2022 at 3:27 PM, johey said:

Currently Qobuz doesn't have an app for LG WebOS. I don't know if there are any plans for this?

 

As a workaround I tried to use the web browser. The site is working very well on my LG television (OLED65B8PLA, an OLED TV from 2018), however the music does not want to play. It just keeps loading forever (infinite spinner). Any idea what's going wrong? Could this be looked into? 

 

Anyone else has tried on a WebOS? Is it working for you or not?

 

Thanks for your feedback and hopefully future fix!

 

Hi this is not plan yet, we need to work on more important application like Android TV or Apple TV.

 

About using the LG Browser, I think that this browser can't work with ou secure audio file and maybe can't play Flac File.

 

Regards

[David Craff]

On 12/4/2022 at 7:57 AM, Audio Audio said:

@David Craff would be nice if one could favour / follow labels, not only tracks, artist and releases.. 

 

Also: 

 

Light In The Attic Records

 

Light In The Attic

 

This is the same label, but does have two instances on Qobuz..

Light In The Attic Records

 

 

This is planned to add this feature to follow label.

 

Regards

[anjobape]

Hi @David Craff I'm a new Qobuz subscriber and newer to the forum.  There is something I was missing a lot and in fact I have reported it to Qobuz customer service.  But honestly I don't have much hope.  I come from Amazon Music and there every time you enter the artist you have a button that says library and in it you can see the songs that you have selected as favorites and it allows you to download them all at once.  In Qobuz I don't have that option to download them all at once unless I make playlists for each artist.  At least I don't see it.  And of course having to make playlists for each artist can mean the creation of 60 or 70 artists in my case.  Another thing I see is that many of the artists have discography in their other section and honestly I see it as not very organized.  Now it is true that its clean interface, its sound quality and the fact that I can listen to different albums and artists without being told every time what I have to listen to or select, I really like.  I prefer to listen to what I want without being bombarded with podcasts or reggaeton artists that I don't listen to normally.  Any way to sort the music library

?

[Brantome]

Hi, just managed to get my hands on a WiiM Pro and have been testing it with Qobuz and Chromecast. While the WiiM Pro can support Chromecast up to 24/192 as evidenced by my use of BubbleUPNP (even with Qobuz itself inside BubbleUPNP), when I try to chromecast from the native Qobuz app itself, it drops 24/192 tracks to 24/96. 

Does the Qobuz app query the target device and decide to drop the resolution if it doesn’t get confirmation of sorts from the target device that it can support Chromecast at 24/192, or is some other mechanism involved?

 

I’ve bug reported it to WiiM but I’d be interested in any insights from the Qobuz end of things. Perhaps @David Craffcould comment? Thanks

[loop7]

Once Qobuz Connect is launched and usable on some gear, I'll return to using Qobuz.

[RichardSF]

7 hours ago, Brantome said:

While the WiiM Pro can support Chromecast up to 24/192 as evidenced by my use of BubbleUPNP (even with Qobuz itself inside BubbleUPNP), when I try to chromecast from the native Qobuz app itself, it drops 24/192 tracks to 24/96. 

Chromecast itself does not support higher than 24/96. Something is not right if WiiM or BubbleUpnP is reporting 24/192.

[Brantome]

6 hours ago, RichardSF said:

Chromecast itself does not support higher than 24/96. Something is not right if WiiM or BubbleUpnP is reporting 24/192.

The Chromecast Audio device may not have supported more than 24/96, but I’d guess the protocol does as per my experience with BubbleUPNP and this article

https://stereo-magazine.com/review/chromecast-audio-review

[David Craff]

16 hours ago, Brantome said:

Hi, just managed to get my hands on a WiiM Pro and have been testing it with Qobuz and Chromecast. While the WiiM Pro can support Chromecast up to 24/192 as evidenced by my use of BubbleUPNP (even with Qobuz itself inside BubbleUPNP), when I try to chromecast from the native Qobuz app itself, it drops 24/192 tracks to 24/96. 

Does the Qobuz app query the target device and decide to drop the resolution if it doesn’t get confirmation of sorts from the target device that it can support Chromecast at 24/192, or is some other mechanism involved?

 

I’ve bug reported it to WiiM but I’d be interested in any insights from the Qobuz end of things. Perhaps @David Craffcould comment? Thanks

 

Hello,

 

Our Google Cast receiver application is locked at 24/96. Even though Google Cast can support more, depending on the DAC provided, we have encountered many problems beyond 96kHz. We believe that the Google Cast protocol is not able to handle an audio bitrate higher than 96kHz. That's why we block the quality at 24/96.

 

Regards

[Brantome]

1 hour ago, David Craff said:

 

Hello,

 

Our Google Cast receiver application is locked at 24/96. Even though Google Cast can support more, depending on the DAC provided, we have encountered many problems beyond 96kHz. We believe that the Google Cast protocol is not able to handle an audio bitrate higher than 96kHz. That's why we block the quality at 24/96.

 

Regards

Thank you for your response and explanation. Perhaps in the future, Qobuz might allow the user to choose the maximum Chromecast resolution (perhaps with a caveat) in the same manner that they can limit it over wifi, mobile etc.

[David Craff]

2 hours ago, Brantome said:

Thank you for your response and explanation. Perhaps in the future, Qobuz might allow the user to choose the maximum Chromecast resolution (perhaps with a caveat) in the same manner that they can limit it over wifi, mobile etc.

 

Maybe we will, but there is some risk during audio listening. For now, we prefer to focus on Qobuz Connect which will replace Google Cast in most cases.

[David Craff]

On 12/8/2022 at 1:30 PM, anjobape said:

Hi @David Craff I'm a new Qobuz subscriber and newer to the forum.  There is something I was missing a lot and in fact I have reported it to Qobuz customer service.  But honestly I don't have much hope.  I come from Amazon Music and there every time you enter the artist you have a button that says library and in it you can see the songs that you have selected as favorites and it allows you to download them all at once.  In Qobuz I don't have that option to download them all at once unless I make playlists for each artist.  At least I don't see it.  And of course having to make playlists for each artist can mean the creation of 60 or 70 artists in my case.  Another thing I see is that many of the artists have discography in their other section and honestly I see it as not very organized.  Now it is true that its clean interface, its sound quality and the fact that I can listen to different albums and artists without being told every time what I have to listen to or select, I really like.  I prefer to listen to what I want without being bombarded with podcasts or reggaeton artists that I don't listen to normally.  Any way to sort the music library

?

 

 

Hi.

 

I understand your feedback. I will send it to the product manager in charge of this feature.

You need to know that we are working on a new way to manage your library in our application. Import only favorite track of a artist must be easy to done with this new library management.

 

Regards

[One and a half]

Qobuz critical listening - update on 'mono-ish'

 

For the initial listening tests, was using the control point in the Lumin App. Raising a question on Lumin pages here at AS, the reply was to remove any other services from the app to optimise Qobuz (or general streaming) services. This wasn't easy to do, since I need to compare directly with streaming and local files. Now why should a control point affect streaming service like that? Oh wait, it also configures the Lumin, so removing services, reduces the amount of processing, Ok I get it.

 

Checked there is a DX filter between DOCSIS modem and the main router, between file server and Audio PC. There's another filter on the direct connection to the EtherRegen. As as far noise reduction goes, the only thing left are linear supplies for the modem and router, which could swing the pendulum the other way. Just can't get my head around IT equipment needing such a good power supply where the load inherently is full of HF hash noise. Might look at DC EMC filters for these two instead.

 

Alternatively looked to Audirvana Studio as a client. Bit of rigamarole to setup the accounts for Qobuz and Audirvana, so tried 'So Sorry' again. This time a lot of improvement, not so mono-ish at all, guitar in the right, accordion (yes, was confused with multi language harmonica) was easy distinguishable now. The soundstage is back, the KEF LS50 on a desk are hobbled by height, so can't comment, but the spread is now there, wasn't before. So that's some good news.

 

The time lag is reduced by 90% now compared to before. An Audiogon user had to change IP addresses at the ISP to 'reset' the time lag/cache/whatever and this worked, but I didn't have to do that.

 

There are very distinctive differences between the local files:

- Sophie's breathing can be detected locally, not so much streaming

- Sibilance in parts is worse for streaming

- Don't hear the voice vibrato as much.

- Guitar plucks are missing

 

Changed genre to Thom Rotella Band DMP masterpiece of pioneering digital engineering. 

Track 10, Little Chubby has a percussion drum solo, the attack is not quite there, close to hitting paper, but not quite there

Track 8 Summers End at around 2:00 the very fine cymbal detail is closer to a tick, there's no 'decay' to listen too.

 

So overall Qobuz is listening really to a different type of DAC in a way. Totally depends primarily on the client, then the network topology, then tweaks.

 

As for discovery, hmm, dunno just yet. Spotify is very good, easy to navigate with good suggestions. If the album is good on Spotify, it will also sound good on Qobuz, or as a CD/Hi-Res source even better. Subscribed for a month, see what happens.  The library is getting close to 8TB spread over two 9TB disks which aren't cheap to replace. Economically, streaming is way cheaper, but at a cost to SQ, probably not used to justifying that retrograde. 

 

[One and a half]

Set the Lumin app to remove all extras like Qobuz, even another library, no indexing etc, but kept the Internet radio stations. Disabled the Lumin App and let Audirvana Studio do its work with the remote on an iPad.

 

Compared Fiona Apple's 'Slow Like Honey', Jefferson Airplane 'Triad', Linda Ronstadt 'Easy for to Say', 'Ohh Baby Baby', Wendy Carlos Main Title (The Shining), Bernard Herrmann Prelude (1963 Psycho). Each track was bettered, especially the dark orchestrations, sharper. Qobuz is not bad, far from it. When it came to Triad, and Slow Like Honey, Triad was the MFSL version, 'Slow like Honey' the Japan Epic CD, local files blew away Qobuz, big differences. Qobuz is not ready to take over local files by a long shot, I'll give it until a month, then probably stop. 

[Cebolla]

17 hours ago, One and a half said:

For the initial listening tests, was using the control point in the Lumin App. Raising a question on Lumin pages here at AS, the reply was to remove any other services from the app to optimise Qobuz (or general streaming) services. This wasn't easy to do, since I need to compare directly with streaming and local files. Now why should a control point affect streaming service like that? Oh wait, it also configures the Lumin, so removing services, reduces the amount of processing, Ok I get it.

 

 

5 hours ago, One and a half said:

Set the Lumin app to remove all extras like Qobuz, even another library, no indexing etc, but kept the Internet radio stations.

 

Just to be clear, the "services" mentioned by @wklie (Roon Ready, Lumin Streaming, AirPlay, Tidal Connect, Spotify Connect, Multi-Room, etc.) in his reply that you linked to, refer to separate processes located in the Lumin player/streamer device itself, not in the Lumin app - you are simply using the Lumin app as a remote control to disable them on the Lumin device.

[One and a half]

5 hours ago, Cebolla said:

 

 

Just to be clear, the "services" mentioned by @wklie (Roon Ready, Lumin Streaming, AirPlay, Tidal Connect, Spotify Connect, Multi-Room, etc.) in his reply that you linked to, refer to separate processes located in the Lumin player/streamer device itself, not in the Lumin app - you are simply using the Lumin app as a remote control to disable them on the Lumin device.

Yes that's agreed. The library listing's, management and what's on the screen belongs to the management Lumin app. 

 

Now the Esoteric app can be used the same way, looks strikingly similar to the Lumin app but has rudimentary config for Lumin equipment which is understandable.