Qobuz vs Tidal

joecoulson

So I just signed up for the trial with Qobuz in the top tier (streaming not the one with purchase discounts). I am curious of what I have been reading about the quality of music albeit a lesser offering of albums.
I’ll be doing some a/b comparisons with the same song over the next couple of weeks and will post my opinions here.
Please feel free to add if you have experience with both, would love to hear your thoughts.
For reference :
Auralic Vega G1
Stellar stack with monos
Elac Adante’s
Audioquest wires and power conditioning.

verb

Ya know Joe, following your journey, well, is fun! Looking forward to the thoughts!

Dang dude, I just got Tidal!

kharp1

I'm very curious on comparisons between the two. Interface, selection, SQ and equipment used.

joecoulson

Ok so here is my first in depth comparison between the two with a track I am quite familiar with.



To make it a fair comparison, both were played at 44.1. The 32bit depth is something the Auralic does to the 16 bit file but both tracks were advertised as streaming the same quality.

The best way I know how to compare with regards to describing differences is to tell you what was added to it with one vs the other. In this case it was Qobuz adding.

In the Q version, I had the addition of the following:

The beginning of the song starts with two guitars strumming. The right guitar is closer than the left. And the left is further off center than the right. This is accentuated with the Qobuz track. To the point of giving a greater sense to the size of the recording space.

The other detail I can hear in regards to the guitars is the actual instruments lowest tone when the strings are struck. I can hear the space inside the guitar like soft percussion or “thump”. This is not anywhere near as noticeable on the Tidal version

When the piano starts in softly, it’s off to the left of center. The song starts in with one chord, then adds a double. In that double there is a reverb between the piano strings that I have a hard time picking up in Tidal.

Lastly the singing is slightly right of center. The main difference I hear is the space around the singer. I get more width and front to back depth of recording space. Especially behind me. Amazing how much detail is here in the decay of the voice.

More to come.

kharp1

Great info, thanks Joe. Look forward to more.

Clipdat

I think that upscaling/upsampling feature that it does to go from 16 to 32 might be something you can temporarily disable, just for the sake of comparison.

joecoulson

Drew I looked through the menus both on the device and in the lightning DS app, couldn’t find any toggle or change for that?

Here’s another comparison which only brings up more questions for me, this time around it’s Mercy Street by Peter Gabriel



This is another track that I’ve listen to probably close to 1000 times over the last 30 years. It’s a fantastic vocal and a light instrumental track that has some beautiful tones and percussion, I find it a mesmerizing song.

Honestly this track was very very hard to find any differences between the two services. The only very slight difference that I could find were some of the spatial background vocals that were meant to be wider then the main front vocal. Those seem to spread just a little wider on the Qobuz version.
But again, very small difference. Not like the first track.

More to come

Clipdat

joecoulson wrote: »

Drew I looked through the menus both on the device and in the lightning DS app, couldn’t find any toggle or change for that?

Perhaps not. I thought I read that it could be defeated but I could be wrong. Shrug.

joecoulson

So here is a good one!

Although it’s good to A/B the similar files (44.1 CD quality) one of the reasons I was intrigued by Qobuz was there higher res (non-MQA) files. Looking briefly over the last couple of days they are readily available in most music styles but I have been disappointed with some specific albums not yet available. That being said, it’s nice to put two of the top file types up against each other.

This time it’s Yes-Changes. Love this track with so much dynamics and imaging. One of my go to reference tracks for sure.

Here I am going to post an image from each company. First up is the Tidal version. It’s an MQA at 48k.



Next is the Qobuz version. It’s a Flac with 96k and because I have seen this file type on another forum with them, I am pretty sure it’s 24bit (upsampled to 32 in the G1)




This one is the opposite of the conclusions regarding Mercy Steeet. The dynamics, soundstage width and height, how far the music expands pas my towers are all magnified with the Qobuz version. Absolutely engaging and really too many details to describe. The height is the imaging extends to almost behind my head. I have no wall to the right of my listening space, but some of the sounds are coming 90 degrees right of my listening position. This one is obvious.

Clipdat

Well no surprise there.

codycatalist

I had similar experiences with Qobuz. I felt it's strongest trait was Soundstage, on most songs it put Tidal to shame.

I left due to lack of available music.

kharp1

Great to hear that it's a clearly better than Tidal, but, sux that the selection isn't as good. Hopefully they can expand their library.

joecoulson

I concur with Cody completely. The sound seems to just be step or two above Tidal. I just can’t find any of the Electronic music I love on there. It’s all on Tidal. Might buy one or two months after the trial to further the experience but not sure after that.

The Lighting DS app on the Auralic is so darn slick. I can A/b so easily with it. It culminates all music into one searchable source. My library/internet radio/Tidal/Qobuz all show results from a single search

erniejade

https://forum.polkaudio.com/discussion/185466/qobuz/p1

In that thread, I put some notes on what I found between the 2. Qobuz just seams to have more air and space, a bit more natural sounding vs tidal or even tidal mqa. I have noticed not everything is in Qobuz. Tidal has a lot more. It could be Qobuz is still adding stuff but. My wife is a student so I get to use her student discount for Tidal. Qobuz, I did a year in advance so it was cheaper and have both for now.

joecoulson

This one just blows it out of the park. The vocals are so crisp considering the recording is almost 60 years old! They are well balanced by the percussion, sax & piano across the soundstage.

Stunning

Clipdat

I'm a big fan of Tidal, especially through my CXN V2 using the excellent and snappy Cambridge Connect app. Nothing is more irritating than a slow to respond or sloppily programmed app. Although there is the occasional glitch when adding songs to my one-time playlist, the app as a whole is very nice. The luxury and convenience of being able to control my music listening experience this way has completely elevated and enhanced my enjoyment and the way I listen.

However, I don't think Tidal is a 100% replacement for CDs (or FLACs from CD rips stored locally or on a NAS device). It's close, but it's not quite there yet in terms of consistency, especially for critical listening.

I had an experience the other day where I wanted to hear the "Hideaki Yoshioka Trio - Moment to Moment" (Original by Henry Mancini) from this album that I own: https://www.amazon.com/Venus-Jazz-Wine-Various-artists/dp/B0139QWF2C

I played it in Tidal (labeled as 16 bit FLAC) and the piano sounded harsh, shrill, and unpleasant. Annoyed, I got up, and put in the CD to my cold and just turned on Njoe Tjoeb 4000. Within a few minutes into the song, I was brought to tears by the beautiful sound of the piano.

So I went from being irritated and annoyed, to having a profoundly emotional listening experience.

I guess this just shows that you can't always rely on Tidal's audio quality for certain releases.

codycatalist

Yeah I got a Denon Universal Player from a member here a little while ago. Slowly building up my collection again but if I have it on CD I go for that over streaming 6 times a week and twice on Sundays.

I think I picked up like 40 CDs from my local Goodwill on 50% off day a week or two ago.

Yeah they had THAT many good albums, I was surprised. I use Tidal for the stuff that is harder to find or expensive CD releases from Japan and what not.

Thorton

Qobuz vs Tidal: Two great streaming services for the music lover.

For music selection/library, I found this to be a wash. Some recordings were missing on Tidal and different ones missing on Qobuz. Qobuz had more hi-rez versions of the songs I listened to.

When it comes to overall sound, I found that both services sounded very good. If you never heard them side by side or didn’t have a big collection of ripped Flac and SACD files, you’d be very pleased with the sound from either. In the numerous tracks that I listened to I unanimously preferred Qobuz over Tidal for sound quality. I also thought my ripped recordings sounded better (most of the times) than both streaming options. If I ranked the options, ripped CD/SACD ≥ Qobuz > Tidal. I never selected Tidal as the best version. I do not have an MQA dac which could alter my preference. And I can’t confirm every track I listened to was from the same mastering. If I had to explain the sound differences, I’d say that Qobuz was very good and close to the CD recording. It has a dynamic, true type of sound. One or two recordings did sound a little thin. Tidal while many recordings sounded good, it did sound a little processed (probably not the right terminology). The upper region was slightly missing on a number of tracks giving it a rounded off feel. Bass seemed to be less tight and smooth on some recordings. While some may prefer this, I didn’t. I’m being critical on pointing these out since the overall sound was very close.

As far as the overall use/app, finding new music and playing; I found both to be comparable and very easy to use especially with Roon. I played (a little bit) with the Qobuz mobile app which was also easy to use.

joecoulson

Yes but being critical with the source is definitely the point. Even slight gains are to be recognized and welcomed. I prefer Qobuz for best streaming sound quality but Tidal for library. And my own rips for best sound quality.

Thorton

I agree. Except for the library for me is close based on what I listen to. If tidal was the only option, I’d still keep buying CD’s and not pay for tidal. Yes, it’s great to find new music but there are cheaper ways. So far, Qobuz has me deciding: do I keep buying CD’s or completely switch to streaming. I will still buy some CD’s for the quality.

joecoulson

I just know I’m missing my G1 like crazy. I’m wearing out my vinyl. Hurry up Auralic!!

gudnoyez

Thorton wrote: »

I agree. Except for the library for me is close based on what I listen to. If tidal was the only option, I’d still keep buying CD’s and not pay for tidal. Yes, it’s great to find new music but there are cheaper ways. So far, Qobuz has me deciding: do I keep buying CD’s or completely switch to streaming. I will still buy some CD’s for the quality.

I agree to some extent, let's say your collection of physical media is huge a d you pretty much have all the stuff you already need? As far as new releases from your favorite artists. when was the last time you heard a well mastered non compressed CD? If you got a large collection I'm going to play from it, before I would Stream it.

I do have Tidal the Wife Spotify, I had Quboz, and agree that it would be the one to choose if your lacking as far as a music library goes. I will keep Tidal as I only stream the new stuff, or something obscure that maybe I'm missing. If your Library is limited than Quboz HI Res would definitely be the route one should take.

Thorton

Good points Steve. It’s great that both of these music services offer higher quality with good libraries for the main music system. There are many good services now based on quality and price. Everyone’s situation, needs and price point are different and it’s great to have so many good options. A couple of years back I didn’t think I would be paying for a music streaming service and instead would just keep buying CD’s.

verb

joecoulson wrote: »

I just know I’m missing my G1 like crazy. I’m wearing out my vinyl. Hurry up Auralic!!

I must've missed it Joe. What's happening with your G1?

joecoulson

Screen issues. Got a new one on the way.
Very weird and non common screen failure.
Like Drew said, prob the least expensive thing on the Auralic.

joecoulson

Sucks too because I’m burning up most of my free month on Qobuz waiting for the replacement.

txcoastal1

Not to railroad your thread Joe, but the latest Tidal update included a "My Mix" feature that accumulates "as likes" and creates mixes due to listening habits. I know others have this type of feature.

So far I like the new feature. It also shows that Tidal is progressively making changes which is a good thing as time goes.

One out of ten songs I may not care for in these mixes, but not bad. I am a mood music guy. At any given time I can go from rock to Jazz to classical. This feature has built out 6 "My MIX" playlists incorporating my moods/genre.

https://tidal.com/mymix

joecoulson

That’s a good feature that’s lost in some proprietary apps for gear.

joecoulson

Bump

rooftop59

So I have been running both for a couple months, and I do have to agree that qobuz is ever so slightly sonically superior, especially well recorded hi-Rez material. Unfortunately they are missing a number of albums we regularly listen to, and I think my wife would lose her mind if I switched services again. She’s finally gotten to where she regularly uses Tidal during workouts and long drives. She would probably like Spotify better, so perhaps I’ll keep qobuz and get her a Spotify account...

joecoulson

I agree completely
The selections in Tidal make it a winner overall.