Help Deciding on Streaming Service Please

Good point! My ranking is based on usability and customizability. Sound quality wise it is difficult to say because I had native support for Qobuz and Tidal (via upmpdcli) but not for Idagio (which I war replaying via Chromecast Audio) when I did the comparison. Under these conditions, the sound quality of Qobuz and Tidal was better than the sound quality of Idagio. I have not seriously compared Spotify to the others because I did not like the Spotify UI from the very beginning.

That was the same for me until I got a streamer/pre that supported Qobuz natively. I couldn’t see the point when I had all the music I (thought I) wanted readily available. Then I decided to take out a subscription – not really that expensive relative to cost of Naim gear and … Well now I don’t think I could live without it. My non-radio listening is now about 30% local and 70% Qobuz and I wouldn’t want to lose the latter. It has broadened my listening and my tastes immensely. I particularly enjoy looking at various threads in the Music Room and if something looks interesting I can usually stream it immediately.

Hope you find the same

Roger

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Amazon Music app and streaming that using Chromecast seems easy enough?

Chromecast is not supported unfortunately:


“At this time Amazon Music HD is not supported on Chromecast.”
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I think that info is out of date

Once again, thanks to all for their input. There seems quite a lot of Qobuz fans and that’s definitely worth a look although may be even better with the Nova as will have native support.
Amazon is also worth a look, it seems to get favourable reviews on the catalogue and SQ, but mixed reviews on the app. Not sure how that would work on the 172 either.
Decisions decisions :thinking::grinning:

I’ll throw my head wear into the ring and say Qobuz works best for me.

Like others here, I’ve tried Tidal for a year or so, and Spotify years ago, Apple, Amazon too recently, but it’s Qobuz for me.

Mostly, it’s SQ is the best in my set up, but also I like that Qobuz’s offerings of new and new to me music is much more closely aligned to the music I like to explore.

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I’m a new Nova user and recently set up Qobuz and Amazon HD trials. The latter was so I could control music via Alexa and Amazon Echo Link (I’m that lazy…). Not sure exactly what constrains the quality to CD quality on Amazon HD - probably the Echo Link setup with Ethernet connection to router (input) and Digital Optical (Toslink) output to Nova. Price for Amazon HD is slightly better for me in UK (£12.99 per month with Prime, cheaper annually) than Qobuz (£14.99 per month, cheaper annually). Once I decide then I will say goodbye to Spotify with some fond regrets and synchronise my playlists to the new service. Have to say, from pure listening pleasure it’s likely to be Qobuz for me.

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I subscribe to Spotify for the family and Qobuz for myself because they care little for the improvement in sound it offers. I use Spotify for playlist curation and it does offer a wider choice overall but Qobuz is getting better all the time.

Does the Nova have native support for Qobuz? Specs on the Naim site don’t list it…if not how would the Nova accept it?
Will say Qobuz looks appealing.

It does have native Qobuz support, it wasn’t there at launch, but was added via a firmware update. Unfortunately the Naim website isn’t a totally reliable source, it had a tendency to not be updated.

@Eoink
Thank you for the clarification

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Top of the Nova web page!

Well spotted, and if you know the Qobuz logo you’ll see it in that section. But sadly the streaming section of the specifications hasn’t been updated, so if you go to the specs to check you’ll be misled.

Yes, they are not thorough when it comes to maintaining their website.

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Agreed! I have often heard Spotify sound quality criticised but it sounds pretty good to me and the catalogue is really comprehensive

Welcome to the club @Thruster04, it was starting to feel pretty lonely here!

I used to use Tidal and then added Qobuz then unsubscribed from Tidal - kids have Spotify (my account).

Tidal and Qobuz are for most people mostly interchangeable with regards to content - you’ll find a few things on one that are not on the other. If you use Roon then you don’t see their interfaces either, so it’s much of a muchness. If you use their apps, then if you want lots of rap recommendations, get Tidal, else get Qobuz. Both interfaces have their merits and drawbacks, but I think Qobuz has better curation, but again I use Roon so it’s kinda moot.

Spotify is useful as our playlists don’t ge mixed, and the kids keep introducing me to new music too… might look at a family subscription to Qobuz, but the hifi of that and the loft of Spotify for the kids’ phones works fine.

Or put it more simply - if you’re over 40, Qobuz - under, Tidal :slight_smile:

Never tried Spotify.

I find Airplay of Apple Music content (family sub mainly for my daughter) to Nova very good but for serious listening use Qobuz and Tidal.

I’ve had Qobuz longer but have a legacy CD quality steraming Sublime subscription with discounts on many HD downloads. Signed up to a long Tidal trial last yaer and always find something that sounds better than Qobuz especially when using Roon which allows 1st MQA unfolding from Tidal.

If I had to choose it’d be Qobuz and I really ought to ‘upgrade’ to a hi-res service but it’s actually quite interesting how sound quality varies on any service depending on the streaming release - original titles for me often sound better than remastered re-releases versions with extra/bonus track, but not exclusively. It’s actually pretty hard to compare as the files they stream are provided by the content providers and can sound very different from one release/re-issue/remaster to another.

Qobuz and Apple Music also offer music videos which may be of no interest, but with Apple Music I’m frustrated that many music videos I purchased via iTunes are available to stream in far better quality on Apple Music.

Do some free trials, see what works for you.

Do look at Roon, it works for some not for others.

I prefer playing Qobuz/Tidal via the Naim app - Qobuz app uses Chromecast and cznnot deliver gapless audio which is crucial for many concept albums or classical. Not tried with Tidal.

Nova now up and running and started with Qobuz trial…War on Drugs sounding proper tidy :grinning:

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