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High Infidelity

I’m unapologetically old school. I own rather than lease my car and not because I think it drives better that way. I own my music and not because I think it sounds better than streaming. I’m puzzled as to why it’s cheaper to buy a CD, have it shipped home and rip it rather than downloading it from a popular digital audio store. I’m disappointed that artists who bypass the CD process seem to only offer MP3 downloads. But I digress…

I recently purchased music for download on Qobuz. The website identified the download as CD quality 16 bits, 44.1 kHz. The downloaded files turned out to have varying bitrates between 756 & 938 Kbps rather than 1,411 Kbps. I contacted Qobuz through their help messaging. They thanked me for bringing this to their attention and stated they would request a corrected copy from the record label. They unfortunately could not give me a timeframe as this would be up to the record label.

I requested a refund on the basis that I purchased CD quality tracks for immediate download per their website description and the prospect of potentially getting them at an undermined time in the future was not acceptable. I was told that Qobuz does not provide any refunds on purchased music in any circumstance. There are no exceptions to this rule. I asked to speak to a supervisor but my request was denied.

I’d like to get feedback on:
-     whether others have encountered downloads that weren’t as advertised or if this was truly an exception
-    what you think of their refund policy
-    any possible recourse

Thanks
 

rpmpam

Showing 3 responses by ghdprentice

ghdprentice
6,398 posts
 

@czarivey 

 

The reason everyone flocks to Qobuz is because it has well over half a million high resolution albums… and the number is growing fast, it sounds a little bit better than Tidal and a lot better than the others, and if you have a good enough streamer / system can sound as good as vinyl. 

ghdprentice
6,398 posts
 

There was purchasing physical media… ~pre-2005 (around there), then there was ripping, then purchasing downloads. The world moves on… horse and buggy to automobiles. 
 

I’m not a young whisper snapper… I’m 71. The age of buying media is over. Qobuz knows it to. They’re not going to waste a lot of time on a download… which is a legacy product. Just offered for a few folks into nostalgia that will pay a huge amount of money to do it. Vinyl was the media for 100 years, CDs for 35 years and downloads for 5 years. Streaming is overwhelming all physical media markets and is the future. 
 

Just stream. It just makes no sense to buy downloads at this point. A lot of money for little value. At least vinyl has the tradition of pulling one out… cleaning it, putting it on the turntable. 

Time to let go.

ghdprentice
6,398 posts
 

Just a note on Qobuz when you have favorite tunes or anlbums and put them in your library. Occasionally, you will click on them and you get an error message… something like no longer available. But, frequently that only means the URL has changed. The cut is still available… but the adress has changed (your streamer stores the address). You only need to look it up and store it in your library again.

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