Naim does it again...

Well, here's my summary of my day in London, Ontario (Canada) and an evening with Naim.

Vuk was gracious enough to allow me to listen to his system before the show. Great system, I just think it's a little too Flat Earth for me. I asked him if he had tried moving his Tannoys out a bit more and knowing Vuk, he did tell me that he has tried many different positions (speaker positions that is) and this particular configuration was optimum. I wonder if it would improve if he moved the electronics out from between the speakers to elsewhere. Vuk, give it a try maybe??? Thanks again for the audition, love the new floor.

I'm a digital man myself, but Vuk's P9 stomped all over his bare CDX. There just wasn't any competition. For the first time, a record player didn't sound like one. There were no pops or crackles at all! Not sure if it was the cartridge, prefix or the Mana. But I can see why his P9 has permanent residence on the Mana.

Now, let's get this Mana thing out of the way. It made an amazing and immediate difference on the CDX. I'm sure it does great things for the P9 also, but I brought along my own CD that I was very familiar with so I'll discuss the differences in reference to that. Everything just got better - that's all I need to say. Vocals, PRAT and overall musicality. Indeed surprising! I truly wasn't expecting it and I even warned Vuk not to jump all over me if I didn't hear it. But that was too obvious to miss. Impressive. No more on that matter though. I still think the XPS is the first upgrade to a CDX, then of course the CDSII is the ultimate.

Regarding his analogue source, I must admit that I've never heard Depeche Mode and New Order as I did on Vuk's P9. Truly something special, even I could live with a record player if it sounded like that. If I had not known what was playing, I would have assumed it was his CD player and not his record player.

Okay, now the Naim evening. It was nice to see Joe Pellazari, Randy, Jean-Luc (I hope I got his name right) and Terry Richardson again. It was also nice to meet the Target Hifi people. Naim had a CD5, Nait5 and Flatcap2 going through Intro IIs and it was really nice. Not sure if it was the room, lack of warm-up time or the Intros, but the overall sound was a little thin. But these Intros sounded better than the original ones for sure and Vuk was very impressed with their finish. Otherwise everything that you'd expect from Naim was there. Great beginner system and easily better than a Nait3/CD3 combo so I hope Naim sell a bunch of them. Most likely it will be my first Naim system.

Now the beast. Wow! The system was a CDX/XPS, 52 supercap and of course the 500 into NBLs. I wish the source was a CDSII, but hey I came for the 500 didn't I??? When Vuk and I first got there, it was better than passive 135's into NBLs but Vuk and Joe thought that the system could sound better, they even suggested that better equipment racks were in order and of course there's always the room variable. Well after Vuk and Joe left, I got a chance to have the beast to myself and I played everything from pop to rap and then to jazz and the system did improve to where it sounded orgasmic! I wish I could have stayed longer because I know that by 11:00pm (I left at 9:00pm) the power would have been near optimum. But anyways, this amp is incredible. The control, PRAT, power, attack, lack of noise, black between notes and tracks was phenomenal. Real music baby, all the way. It destroyed the Krell CAST amp with bass so tuneful that I think a lot more people would listen to rap if it wasn't for the foul language. The bass was incredible though, that's what really got me. The 135s couldn't give the NBLs what they needed, but the 500 does it perfectly. Finally I'm impressed with the NBLs. I can't wait to hear DBLs. I haven't heard active 135s into NBLs, but for some reason, I think the 500 would be better. It was just that good.

To show you how much this system was better than Vuk's I'll give you an example. I brought along the Corr's latest CD and one of my favourite tracks is the first one, "Breathless." On Vuk's system, it sounded terrible. On my Onkyo/Kef system it sounds wonderful but as we all know, a good system needs good software. It was so bad on Vuk's that I almost wanted to cry because I really like that cut. Vuk didn't want to hear it on the 500/NBL system but after he left, you bet I played it. Ah, the world made sense again. The 500 handled it perfectly. Maybe it was the XPS, who knows? But let me tell you, it sounded great and I was a happy audiophile again. Not a happy student though. This system is just so expensive in Canadian dollars that I think we should celebrate when someone finally does buy one! The Canadian dollar sucks! Naim is awesome! Enough.

Joel Benford must be the happiest Naimophile in all the world! Congrats and enjoy.