Yes, Qobuz sounds better and had about 500,000 high resolution albums a few months ago, while Tidal had only around 50,000.

My dealer recommended I switch from Tidal to Qobuz for nearly a year before I tried Qobuz… the comparison was over in a day. Only Qobuz now.

youcan open the quobuzz tab and just select trom there or log out of tidal problem solved

Dave and Troy

Audiointellect nj

streaming specialists 

The short answer is no, Roon does not have a preference setting for search results There are multiple threads on Roon's community forum and it has been a requested feature for years.

Yes, 100% Qobuz sounds better to me. Some notes on my perceptions of the sound quality of various streaming services & of Qobuz vs Tidal specifically:

My subjective impressions of the musicality and sound quality of the major HD streaming services: (as of November 2020)

1. Qobuz

2. Primephonic

3. Spotify Premium (320 kbps Ogg Vorbis which is not lossless)

4. IDAGIO

5. Amazon HD

6 Tidal

-----------------------------------------

Round 2, Qobuz vs Tidal: So far Qobuz is clearly better than Tidal even listening through pretty cheap desktop passive speakers. Tidal sounds very two dimensional and flat in its sound quality but with some harshness in the high frequencies. I'll listen a bit more to Tidal, but so far I'm not impressed at all. Spotify Premium even seems to sound better than Tidal. 

Some additional thoughts about Tidal after listening on higher quality equipment. I think they have applied some equalization to boost the bass and treble. In the process, I think side effects of doing this is to take out some of the presence of voices and instruments and add an artificial quality to voices and instruments.. Qobuz sounds a LOT better. Spotify Premium also sounds better. To my ears at least. (Disclaimer: Your results may vary). I'm currently listening to a track that is a MQA file on Tidal vs a CD quality file on Qobuz. The CD quality file on Qobuz sounds a LOT fuller and more natural. 

Not a big fan of hip hop, but decided to listen to something that is squarely in Tidal's area of focus. I listened to 'The Box' by Roddy Ricch which is a MQA file on Tidal and CD quality on Qobuz. Same results. The Qobuz file sounds fuller and has more presence. Almost sounds like two different recordings when listening on Qobuz vs Tidal.

Thank you audiotroy for the suggestion of logging out of Tidal.

I have replaced many favorites or playlist songs with Qobuz.  Not all of my desired tracks are on Qobuz though... If I like the album, it is worth having Tidal for it.

I fixed this bu unsubscribing to tidal.  Never look back.  

Never was a fan of Tidal but did compare it to Qobuz years ago, and preferred Qobuz. But I think tidal really shot themselves in the foot when they increased their pricing and you need their highest tier to get MQA (which I'm not a fan of). So basically they are double the cost of Qobuz, cause why would you want Tidal without MQA?

Okay let's stir the pot. 

1. Roon Software degrades SQ

2. Spotify and Apple sound better than Qobuz or Tidal

3. MQA is a waste of time

4. A Streamer without a Ripper and Storage is not a smart buy.

5. Tapping into a good source of new music is the most valuable goal.

Now if you are going to challenge any of the above statements

please include your scientific evidence. 

I rejected Tidal because my McIntosh D/A doesn't support MQA, so why pay for inferior sound?  But on my system, streaming provides variety, but vinyl supplies the best listening experience.

@jeffseight I prefer Roon with Qobuz as do my ears. My ears & I also don't think Tidal is as bad as others seem too.

No "scientific evidence" required. 

@jeffseight Why is it we have to provide scientific evidence to support our opinions but you do not? Where’s your scientific evidence to support Apple and Spotify sound better than Qobuz, cause I ain’t never seen anyone else on this site say that and there are plenty who’ve heard all of them and all that I recall prefer Qobuz. Perhaps you should bring your statements to ASR as they seem more up your alley.

I use Roon and Innous Sense as my music front ends.  Regardless of front end, I find Qobuz better sounding than Tidal in general, but not by much.  Using a PS Audio DSD DAC, I find little difference between Qobuz HiRes and Tidal MQA. I listen to Tidal most often because I like their playlist much more than those provided by Qobuz.    

For critical music room listening, I use Sense because it’s sounds more natural than Roon.  I’ve created playlists using a combination of Qobuz, Tidal, and songs stored on my Innous Zenith.  Sonically, all of the music sounds good to me.  As is the nature of digital music, some songs clearly sound better than others.

Agree. Qobuz sounds best. 

I agree that Qobuz sounds better than Tidal, but in my opinion not a huge difference. I don’t quite get the negative comments on Tidal. Tidal sounds good, has more albums, and better personal playlists. I kept both for over a year, but finally did just keep Qobuz due to having more high resolution albums.

I stream both Tidal and Qobuz through Roon and honestly despite the Tidal haters it sounds fine!

A bit off topic, but after months of using Quobuz to Roon (which sounds better than Tidal to me) I finally compared to my old setup, Audirvāna into DAC via usb. Audirvāna was substantially better. All going into Chord Qutest, Roon via Ethernet with server in other room. 

I am going to differ from many here. On my setup, tidal $9.99 hifi sounds better than qobuz $12.99 plan. It gives me way more depth and a little more width in soundstage. Can't speak of Tidal MQA or qobuz upper plan since they are not feasible on my android through wifi feed.

I can't quantify it, but I felt Qobuz sounded better to me than Tidal.  For lack of a better description, Qobuz sounded less digital.  Tidal has a few, more obscure, artists I like that Qobuz doesn't, but in the end the cheaper price and better sound quality (whether real or perceived) won out.

I have Spotify Premium and Tidal Hifi with Roon. Qobuz is not available in my country. My DAC is Musician Pegasus. 

Spotify Premium sounds more compressed and slightly grainy when the music gets loud and busy. 

Tidal Hifi with Roon sounds more spacious and cleaner. 

Spotify Premium sounds better when I am using my TWS, Tidal/Roon sounds better when I am using my main speaker setup. 

I tried using DSP Upsampling in Roon. All the PCM and DSD upsampling options come at the cost of loss of details, smaller dynamics range, and more 'digital' sound so I keep it off. I actually like the MQA tracks, they seem to have better dynamics compared to non MQA ones. 

Interesting responses thanks.  I feel Qobuz definitely a bit better; most do. But I still value selections on Tidal which are not available on Qobuz.  

Great info on this topic. I use Bluesound with Tidal as my service, but this has made me interested in perhaps a trial of Qobuz... I've built up quite a collection of "favorites" in Tidal which I would hate to rebuild on another service. On the Qobuz site it says:

Yes, you can import your playlists created on other streaming platforms thanks to the Soundiiz tool.

When you click the link it takes you to a page in French, with no option for English. Can anyone relate their knowledge or experience with particular optionality? 

There is info on Qobuz and Soundiiz along with tutorials here.

I have extensive playlists that I made in the pre-streaming era. I tried Soundiiz to export to Qobuz, but it really didn't work well and I gave up on Soundiiz.

Infuriated by MQA two years ago, I switched to Qobuz from Tidal and never looked back. Agree that Apple sounds better than it's given credit for, and anyhow my old iTunes/Apple Music playlist can never be replicated. But that plays only on my backup system. Some rainy day (or pixie dust day, which seems no less likely) I'll get around to loading that playlist into Aurender for comparison with Qobuz and good streaming radio sources.

On a side note, I learned that you can export your Roon playlists to Excel.  My Nucleus crashed, and I was not able to recover from my backup due to 'corrupt database'.  So I later learned that in addition to a back-up, it is good to export your playlists.  You must 'select all' to allow the export tab to appear in Roon.  A great idea in case you loose your Roon data and need to rebuild you obscure favorites! 

I agree that Qobuz sounds better than Tidal. I also really like the option to buy hi res downloads at a discount with the Studio Sublime subscription.

I was not aware QObuz had a larger library than Tidal.  I have a BluSound Node 2i and like the layout of Tidal.  I believe Qobuzz does not have MQA.  I wonder what the resolution is for Qobuzz?  

@larry5729 you are correct that Qobuz doesn’t offer MQA, but most people feel that’s a plus for Qobuz as MQA requires multiple unfolding and, as I understand it, MQA alters the original content to what some sound engineers think it “should” sound like.  No thanks.  Throw in that most people here prefer Qobuz’s sound quality, offers a ton more hi-res tracks, is cheaper (or at least it was when I subscribed), and to me has a better user interface.  You can try it for free so why not?  I did and never went back to Tidal and their silly MQA total sham.  Just my experience FWIW. 

Best app to transfer playlist from all the streaming services 

Thanks Sonic.  One quick question.  What is the highest resolution Qobuzz offers.  I know when I hooked up my BlueSound to my amp by way I gave up the potential of hearing up to 24/192.  If Qobuzz doesn’t limit their customers then I will give Qobuzz a try.  I was told Qobuzz was not as easy to use as Tidal.  I think MQA is most likely just a gate keeper.  I am just here to learn.  Thanks.

@larry5729 Qobuz is just as easy to use as Tidal. I don’t think I came across anything higher than 24/192 on Qobuz. 

FWIW, my DAC doesn’t do MQA so I had disabled it in my Lumin streamer and I am just letting the Roon core decode and render for my Tidal streaming. Sometimes Roon radio queues up a great song that’s only available on Tidal. 

my take

qobuz sound infinitesimally better than tidal... both are very very good

tidal has a larger library than qobuz at least for nonclassical music but qobuz selection is hardly limiting

mqa music on tidal has very high variability in sound quality, some are really excellent though

i use roon, like it alot, don’t think it degrades sound quality

Totally agree jss49.  I think I started the thread something like that..only to endure the lectures….  Now can Roon be set to point to Qobuz vs.Tidal by preference? [without eliminating Tidal]?  It does seem to default to Tidal selections in Roon Radio.  Happy 4th everyone!
🎇

Totally agree jss49.  I think I started the thread something like that…Now can Roon be set to point to Qobuz vs.Tidal by preference? [without eliminating Tidal]?  It does seem to default to Tidal selections in Roon Radio.  Happy 4th everyone!
🎇

@fastfreight 

And happy 4th to you and yours.

@fastfreight

have a happy 4th!

as answered earlier the only sure way to not have tidal cuts chosen by roon is to deactivate tidal... i know, goofy -- and for such a purported superman software like roon you would think they would code in this feature...

Thanks @jjss49 

i guess it is a feature request for Roon, to have a preference for which service to pick first.  Roon will even default to a lower resolution Tidal version over a higher resolution Qobuz track.

Thanks @jjss49 

i guess it is a feature request for Roon, to have a preference for which service to pick first.  Roon will even default to a lower resolution Tidal version over a higher resolution Qobuz track.

@fastfreight - It's a bit of a pain but you can select Qobuz on Roon via the "versions" feature. Problem is you have to click on "versions" & select Qobuz each time you choose an album to listen too. 

I listen to mostly TIDAL even though I have Qobuz. The TIDAL MY MIX feature is killer and for me both services sound good enough.

BTW - Maybe this was figured out in the posts above. When I want to filter TIDAL or Qobuz in ROON I go to MY ALBUMS and select FOCUS. Scroll to the right for STORAGE LOCATIONS and select the location(s) that you want. A very useful feature for me since I have 5 locations, including TIDAL and Qobuz.

EDIT: I seem to have misread the question. It was about defaulting to Qobuz. Though my filter approach may work. Filter first with only Qobuz and if you cannot find want you want, expand the filter to include Tidal.

@lordrootman 

Thanks for the link re Apple Music transfer app. Eager to try it.

Doesn't Deezer provide "bit-perfect" data?  At least at CD quality? I'd rather have CD quality that way than higher resolution files that have snake oil done to them. Is there anyway for us to know?  Has anyone with proper equipment ever done a comparison between the steaming services to find out?  We know Spotify's lossy streams are obviously NOT CD quality. I wasted all last year on their lossless service to roll out.  Ended up quitting them in February and will NEVER go back due to their lying. Do any of the others advertize "bit-perfect"? Qobuz? 

@moonwatcher Yes Qobuz supports bit-perfect. and it's high-res files 24/192 are lossless. as opposed to MQA lossy snake oil 

Now the can of worms is how do we know the 24/192 version is not a resampled 16/44 file, etc. the industry as a whole leaves a lot to be desired regarding transparency on this. 

I think some have analyzed files bought from Qobuz to show they are legit. 

too much trouble/work honestly, just enjoy! (at least Qobuz)

@kray thank you. I may have to give Qobuz a try then. Just wish there was a "Qobuz Connect" app that streamers could have. Such an app makes life much easier when you can pass off the stream.  Maybe one day...

@moonwatcher

I have made direct comparisons between red book CD, the same Qobuz recording, files located locally… exact same sound quality… however Qobuz is frequently better because the have 1/2 million high Rez albums. My DAC is my CD player… and my preamp allows volume leveling between sources.

Having said that… the streamer and DAC make the biggest difference in the sound you get. My system is very good, so I can hear subtitle differences in sources. But of course if you are not changing your equipment, tyou are going to get the best sound from Qobuz.

@ghdprentice I read a posting on another forum by a guy (a musician) who had uploaded his files to Deezer and then downloaded them and he found they were indeed "bit-perfect" without any mumbo-jumbo changes.  Perhaps Qobuz is the same. 

I like Tidal's interface and catalog just fine, (and the Tidal Connect app which is being supported by more streamers) but I've read where the Hi-Fi tier of CD quality often gets you files that had MQA but with it stripped out. They sound OK, but are not "bit-perfect". 

I love my CD player and will always use it as long as it lasts, but streaming is a great tool for music discovery and general listening.  Would be nice to know exactly what we are getting for our money from the various services - and if they are altering the music in any way. Thanks. I'll give Qobuz a try soon. 

@moonwatcher 

😊👍

I am new to streaming. Have a Good Dac And Music player.

Was using Qobuz sounded Hifi with the treble turned way up, almost gave up on the streamer.

Decided to download Tidal- 100% Better Sounds Like a good audio system.

Not saying anything bad about anything, This boy is enjoying tidal

Bryston DAC Player

I have had Tidal and Qobuz… with streamers that unfolded MQA and not. To me what this revealed was that the quality of the streamer is of the highest importance. When you have a true audiophile streamer it will produce sound quality equal or better than red book CD and analog… MQA can sound good, red book can sound good… higher resolution and analog can sound good or great. 
 

There is a point with really great equipment that it all sounds pretty great… then one versus the other is splitting the difference between really really good and really good.