Sound Quality (SQ) Qobuz vs uPnP

@I've read your others posts:-). I understand better now :-). Congratulations with your new setup!

Hi Simon,

My thoughts exactly. 

The last two CDs I bought were The Decemberists Picaresque (after a fantastic gig at the Bristol Academy) and Kate Bush 1979 TV Special, neither of which are on Qobuz or Spotify. However, I will continue to buy CDs snd vinyl of stuff I really like.

I have been very impressed by Qobuz on Sonos into the NDS. I bought a QED optical cable at the Bristol show yesterday, as a replacement for my old Maplins cable, and that has brought a very nice improvement in naturalness.

By the way, the Naim guy I spoke tried to downplay Naim's lossless streaming intentions, pointing out the financial instability. On the other hand, the guy on the Qobuz stand said integration with Naim would definitely happen this year!

Keith

It’s good to have choice.  If we’ve all got a choice and we’re all happy with the choices we make we are in a good place.

How I look at it is that for £20 a month you can probably buy on average three albums at CD or higher resolution. When you look at the offers and box sets in circulation this could actually be 20 albums, but let’s not get hung up on the minutiae.

Let’s say for the sake of conversation that you’re going to have a collection of 30+ albums a year and 300+ over 10 years. Whereas after subscribing to a streaming service for 10 years you are going to have nothing past memory.

It’s a paradigm shift for the jukebox model of music delivery. 

Hi Goon - very cool!

Sorry I was unclear though...I meant that the ability to choose from the 25M albums in the Spotify library wasn't enough if the have basically no Knopfler and fewer than half of the Dire Straits. I was very surprised. 

As as a classical newbie, however, I did enjoy the ability to listen and cycle through about a dozen versions of the Moonlight Sonata, which I particularly enjoy. I found it very interesting to hear just how different the various artists' interpretations were. I had read about that, of course, but I don't think I really believed it somehow...not thinking the score left as much room as in jazz or even rock. It was an eye-opener, however, to hear so much difference in what a piano sounds like!! Whether it was instrument / brand, microphone technique/ placement, or player touch I could say. 

That at bit of exploration one quiet evening was worth the entire month subscription for me, as it wouldn't even have occurred to me to go out and find and purchase anything like that number of CDs. I will check if there is any Osborne... not Ozzie, I'm guessing... Thanks for the tip!

Regards, alan 

Alan

As you're getting interested in classical interpretation, I suggest you try Gramophone magazine. You might only buy it once, it might not be for you, but it might just open your eyes to how varied interpretation of the same piece can be. I've read every issue for over 40 years!

Paul

+1 (and the Feb. issue contains a free download code for Wagner / Dudamel)

Keith interesting, Qobuz's stability appears a lot better than it was this time last year and seems to be growing its list of partners and growing its customers at an impressive rate.. Meanwhile more and more integrations are appearing for it elsewhere - even open source WebService API integrations such as the Kodi media server software. Additionally  little companies such as Sygnifi appear to be leading with the Qobuz integration in their new streamer products.. perhaps because of its ease of integration.

I suspect the Naim comment was not an official one - and it in itself could suggest a possible weakness in Naim architecture in terms of complexity of integration and limitation of resources - which those of us who have already bought Naim ND players are fingers crossed hoping is not the case..

Simon

Thanks Paul - I will get one today, as I'm off on a travel this Tuesday and it would be fun to have for the plane. My lack of knowledge has always stopped me from getting things like that, as I don't know the music they are describing. With online services to complement the text, however, it is a totally different game. I think I read here on the forum that Qobuz has a Gramophone playlist? That seems like a great idea, to collect the albums dicussed in an issue together so that you can read and listen in parallel. Total change in approachability for folks like me...

Regards, alan 

Not all 'Naim guys' were giving such a negative message, certainly not on Friday at least. 

What I heard was that Qobuz have carried out their side of things (a Connect type of solution) and Naim integration would happen this year. This in a context of a conversation in which I said I would dump Naim before I would dump lossless streaming.This is a major issue for me. I tried to speak to pretty much everyone at the show with a streaming product - they all seemed to have it (integration of lossless streaming) sorted, or were on the case, apart from Naim....

My best guess is that Naim can do it but have other priorities or lack the software development capacity or capability and that if/when it does come it will be implemented in a similar way to Spotify (which in my view is a less than perfect integration as control is spread over 2 apps).

Yes, it will be the same approach as Spotify Connect? Naim has already confirmed this.

I agree with your best guesses.

Keith

Don't want to hijack TOO much, but The Decemberists are my favorite band-that's-still-releasing-new-music (well them, and Guster).  I'm glad you Brits got to see them; we see them every tour and have tix to both Boston shows this spring. 

Hi Bart,

They were  awesome on Monday night. I saw them on the King Is Dead tour and they weren't as good, bit they had just lost their keyboard player to serious illness.

Keith

I thought it might be interesting to compare the available material from DS and MK on the two streaming services I'm using:

https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...e-streaming-services

Perhaps over time we could add additional services to see how they compare.

Jenny had treatment for breast cancer, but she is back on tour with them.  She's really fabulous; I like it when she plays accordion.  I've seen the Crane Wife, Hazards of Love and King is Dead tours, and Colin Meloy solo a few times too. I love their music!