Qobuz integration in Roon?

I signed up and paid through a VPN a couple of years ago. Now I can stream through that account without it. If you do this, however, then your account may be treated as in the VPN server country.

Once Qobuz launches in the US, they will observe something peculiar. A slice of their European customer base will suddenly discover that they are actually US residents. :laughing:

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The Census Bureau may find some drastic population decreases in some small European countries in 2019 lol

I did, too. But it appears I am locked into a French address.

Same here. Adds a certain … je ne sais quoi, n’est ce pas ?

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Gotta be a way to change this. People move.

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Most postings on this (Qobuz) subject have focused on the sound quality issue - but there is another angle. I really like opera and also the chance to explore classical. Qobuz is good on making digital booklets available, including text and translations. Very helpful indeed, and something that Tidal doesn’t offer. Roll on Qobuz in Roon!

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Indeed, Qobuz is great for classical and Jazz music. I find myself very often use their own app and play wirelessly to my Devialet. I do hope Qobuz will be available in Roon.

Are the booklets available on the streaming albums or just the ones purchased/downloaded?

Don’t know, but when i bought recently 2 albums the booklets for both appeared to be just the 2 front covers. I expected more from Qobuz.

Not all albums will have digital booklets available, but if they do, you will see the “Digital Booklet available” message in the streaming client:

I can read a few booklets from streamed albums. Not every single album has a booklet.

As per Geoff Coupe’s reply, they are not always available, but when they are, they are there for streaming not just purchases. Slightly patchy, but more than I’ve seen on other streaming services.

My CEDIA trial of sublime +has now expired and won’t be renewed. Hardly used it and bought only 4 albums with the discount in three months as that’s all I could find that I wanted. To me its just not worth the price of entry.

Same here. I had been working with David of Qobuz to figure out why the Windows app was giving such poor performance on my machine. David is a fantastic guy, but we were unfortunately unable to find a resolution before my trial expired. I was only able to listen to around 4 records total during my 3-month experience.

I will continue to keep an eye on their progress.

I found the windows desktop app truly awful would not Chromecast or upnp to anything. I ended up using BubbleUpnp in the end and finally I got a Bluesound node 2. I also found finding hires and purchases not that easy outside of the web version. Overall it all felt disjointed between platforms.

Thanks for all the replies on the booklets question. I figured only some (few?) albums would have booklets. It’s great Qobuz makes these available with streaming…that’s a nice feature!

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So, that as you said was a long time ago. During negotiation things change, perspectives soften as deals are conducted.
Maybe Roon may concede, or Qobuz does, who knows?
The fun is awaiting the outcome, followed by the expansion of listening capability.

For classical, it seems like:

  • back catalog items, especially from the bigger players (1), usually come without booklets (blame the labels)
    … it seems like they just don’t care; reissues on CD often come with limited information too, so no wonder
    (1) … Naxos seems to be an exception, they do also, at times, provide scans of the original CD booklets (a good place to check this out is the CHANDOS web store)
  • new(er) releases usually come with booklets
    But not necessarily remastered and/or HiRez versions - which I think is quite a stupid thing to do

My rule of thumb from the 3 1/2 years I use qobuz (for purchases): the smaller the label the higher your chance to get a (decent) booklet. It’s telling something, isn’t it?

The biggest effort to equal the digital download experience to the one of physical media including back catalog items I’ve seen so far came from the labels Hyperion and partially CHANDOS. The first really tries to complement their digital downloads with a lot of information. Booklets, embedded lyrics (really nice for opera and Lieder) and commentary - really nice. But then they are not on qobuz.

BTW in the qobuz app it seems you can look into the booklet even if you don’t have streaming subscription and not bought the album (yet). If there is one, of course.

Yes, this does seem to be the root cause. Sounds like Qobuz works like NativeDSD where you can see the booklet prior to purchasing. I find that immensely helpful.