AV3?!?!

You're the second person to tell me that about DTS. Must be something to it.

I have phono to XLR at the moment, and we've bodged two female phono to din add ons for the connection to the AV2.

Unfortunately the rear channles are humming like mad, so am popping back there tomorrow to see if we can whip up some din to xlr leads, even if they only just reach, just to be sure there's no fault.

Otherwise no problems.

There is a guy on the avforums called Mark Grant who will make up top quality interconnects etc for a good price with any termination. All Canare stuff etc. I already have other leads from him and they are first class, so I'll end up buying from there I think. I believe in top quality for sensible money when it comes to cables. I've been through and come out the other side of exoticly priced leads etc.

Greetings all

Neill Fergusson said:

quote:

I am not really a features man, I like a simply life. I don't care about Jazz hall effects etc. The tag was cutting edge at that time when it came to specs. However it always just sounded cold to me. I just never found it as special as the reviews said. I dropped the AV2 in and yes the emotion and drama was there. Half the gadgets that I never used were also gone.

We have chatted about this before, but here in the UK at the price point nothing is coming close to the performance of an AV2, yes certain products have more whistles and bells but the AV2 just wins on outright sound performance. We have a similar problem to you in that highend Krell products costing say $4,000 dollars cost £4,000 here its a straight switch $=£ only the exchange rate is $2 to almost every pound. So a bit of Krell kit at $4,000 is worth about £2,000. I think thats why we stick to our UK built audio equipment.

For me surround sound is just that surround. Its not about hearing the plane fly over head all though that is pretty cool. Its about the speakers disapearing and feeling like your in the cockpit of that plane flying the swine!!!!. Like I have stated before, certain systems kit I have heard have that amazing ability, to make the sound appear to be coming from way behind the speakers. Thats what I like but each to there own. Its the same reason why people love there Naim two channel kit. Its the same reasons why you have a two channel Naim system as it just has that something special that you like. Just guessing here.

I can understand you liking the sony HT stuff but can I ask have you home demo'd the AV2 how long did you have it for??. And last point your Sony kit costs more than an AV2 here.

Neill, thanks for your thoughts, and I pretty much agree with all of them. Especially the unnecessary bells and whistles, and the emphasis on sound quality. The AV2 most definitely does something quite special in movies, as does Naim with 2 channel music, and heheh, yes that is the major reason I own Naim 2 channel kit.

As I explained in my 'original' post re my thoughts re the new paradigm of digital amplification, in my case with the all digital Sony, I did A/B comparos with my existing 2 channel Naim kit for music, and for movies with it in synch with the Sony doing procesing duties only, and with the Sony doing everything, aka driving all the speakers including the SBL's with the Naim out of circuit so to speak.

I also explained that I was not able to do a back to back with the AV2 v's the Sony at home. I have had four extended and indepth listens to the AV2/175/150 combo at my dealers in combo with ruark, def tech, and naim loudspeakers, with REL, and Ruark subs. All these demos were lengthy, involving the best part of an afternoon. As we both know, memory is often unreliable, and were I to do a back to back with the all digital sony, I MAY wind up with a clearer preference, one that would most likely favour the Naim, as I am a Naim fan, and appreciate what the AV2 brings to the HT party.

However, as you point out, we are in different markets/parts of the world. You suffer price disadvantages with US manufactured goods, and for us it is with UK manufactured goods.

Knowing how good the AV2 is, even IF the Krell you mention had a performance edge, (which it might in one or two areas, but most likely not 'overall') - it'd have to be a pretty big one to justify going for it over the AV2 given the price difference, yes?

Same here really. I can really understand why you like the AV2, and would agree; it is a very fine processor. However just like your situation with the likes of Krell etc, I have a hard time justifying huge differences in cost, for small differences in presentation, which to my mind add up to more just plain 'different' rather than better OVERALL (personal preferences not withstanding) - whilst I haven't done an exact A/B at home, I think I'm well familiar enough with the naim 'house' sound, being an owner, and having had extensive and lenghty auditions of the AV2 to form a possibly flawed, but otherwise firm conclusion as to performance differences/balance of presentation. I would suspect the Krell and the AV2 would be in a similar league of performance, apart from cost in the UK; to my ears a similar scenario applies here with the AV2 v's the likes of similar performing, but cheaper kit by virtue of my particular geographic location, such as the digital sony av amp. Which is why I suppose that most folks here stick to the US and Japanese brands.

Thanks again for your thoughts, and continue to enjoy the AV2; it is a very fine machine - BTW, I also find DTS a lot better than DD - I think the higher bit rate has a lot to do with it. Also, if you can get them in the UK, try some of the superbit titles - they have no extras etc, but the sound and picture are recorded using the highest bit rates in the space available on disc, and pretty much always with DTS sound. They are a noticeble jump up in sound and picture quality over their 'normal' brethren.

Best Regards

John...

Well, I'm buying it.

Like it a lot.

Excellent bit of kit, even if bass management is a bit different to what I'm used to.

Overall, I believe it's worth the money.

Now, a good ex dem DVD 5............

General Skanky

Did you get the chance to try DTS with it. What is it you liked about it most. I love mine to be honest. I hope once I get the firmware updated it makes it better yet.

Which movie did you watch, and how do you find it as a pre-amp ???

Neill

Well, as soon as we slotted it in, it was very apparent that it was a lot more musical than anything we'd had before. Only a Primare SPA20 we used for a while as a pre was even close.

So straight away, CDs (most of them anyway) sounded better. TBH though, a mix of stereo and direct modes were needed depending on how the CD sounds.

We have a very broad range of musical taste from 'Chuck Mangione' (my wife likes him) right across to rock with the likes of 'AC/DC' etc.

Female vocals and 'nice' music. ie 'Lighthouse Family/The Carpenters' all sounded very good indeed.

I particularly liked my wife's albums from 'Jamiroquai', as they sounded exceptionally rythmical and foot tappingly good.

What sounded poorer, was The 'Fun Lovin Criminals' which had previously been good. Odd.


As for film, at first I wasn't too sure. It didn't seem to be night and day better.

I tried quite a lot of DVD and Sky films/progs as that's what we watch to see how it fared.

I believe that the AV2s abilities lie in the dynamic swings and conveyance of detailed sound above everything else.

Ie, 'The Others' is very atmospheric which came across very well/creepy, which was excellent. But there are some sudden loud moments that did make us leap. I know it's not blind listening with direct comparisons, but it certainly impressed more than say the Arcam AVR200 or the Primare.

We used other films like 'U571' for the DTS tests. All I can say is Oh My God! It was crazy stuff. Really put me off any thoughts ever of being a submariner.

As for Sky films, we watched 'Open Range' that was on the other night. A DD film, and even though the shootout was awesome, what I also noticed was the wind blowing across the open land throughout the film. The rain storms were also very good sounding pieces.

My personal system tester moment is the plane crash in 'Castaway'. It is the perfect example of all the frequency range with just about every swing and sound in there. You go from talking in a plane to a storm to an almighty bang as it goes down. A good system should imho shock the hell out of you if you don't know what's coming. The AV2 does this very well indeed.

I hope that helps. I'm not particularly good at converting what I hear into words, but I hope that gets it across ok.

FLC is Come Find Yourself.

Maybe more tweaking with small vrs large speaker options is in order.

We use ATC SCM 10-2A x 4 speakers with an Arcam DV27A and a Velodyne SPL-1000 Mk II sub. No centre at the moment.

We used to have a pair of ATC SCM 20-2A actives, but had to sell them as we needed the cash a while back. Miss them for sure.

Having used ATC passives in the past and KEF Ref 2 and Ref 1 series peakers, these actives are great.

The only amplification to equal better the ATCs imho is from Naim or Densen.

The DVD 5 is a very good player indeed. It is fantatsic to be able to add a scaler and HDMI in the future. But, tbh, at £2350 just for the base model + upgrades it is very expensive. With a constant churn of new formats always on the horizon, it's a bit of a leap of faith for me to commit to something at that price level right now.

The AV2 will always be able to decode to at least DD/DTS level for along time to come. A new format would, in theory, be unplayable in a DVD 5.

Considering I bought the DV27A for £950 brand new, I'm quite happy. But I do admit, if possible, I'd love to have a DVD 5 ontop of the AV2.

One thing to add about the AV2. A lot of the time we've been using just stereo to listen to Sky as I've been fiddling with rear speakers and cables etc, in between films and CDs etc.

It sounds bloody good just doing run of the mill stuff just to watch TV.

I noticed a bigger 'envelope' of sound rather than just the flatter presentation of the Arcam AVR200.

Not a deal clincher I know, but it certainly hints at the underlying abilities of the AV2.

General,

You need a centre. The best would be another 10-2A which would be the perfect match, but I don't know if ATC would supply a single. The difference the centre makes is quite remarkable, although I'm not surprised the system sounds rather good as it is.

I know.

Yes, you can buy a centre 10-2A singly, but a C4Ca would be much better.

The only reason for not having one is domestic harmony as it would have to go slap bang in the middle of the fireplace!

I always used to be a 100% advocate of full 5.1, but as our current 4.1 is due to living harmony agreement, it hasn't been too bad.

With a lot of toe in, the two fronts do a sterling job of placing sounds in the right place.

The best centre I've ever owned was a KEF Ref 100. Went up to a 200, but the 100 was always my favourite. Had others but not yet an ATC one.

A C4Ca went through EBay a few months back but I didn't have the £750 it cost then.

But, even if I'd won it, there's still the problem of where to put it.

Hi General,

quote:

It is fantatsic to be able to add a scaler and HDMI in the future.

I'm curious about HDMI output on the DVD5, since current output is DVI. Do you know if HDMI is an output option on the new scaler card, or a separate output option as part of a DVD5 update. It was a tempting comment!

Cheers,
Mark.

I don't know.

I think I read it was a separate option to the scaler. But I may well be wrong.

DVI is fine for now. HDMI isn't widely spread yet(UK), so I'd expect a few revisions to come of its spec.

After all, it's the wonder lead that does it all, so I'd expect to find Naim working to that rather than any lesser spec, ie, the HDMI on the Arcam DV79 only passes stereo audio, not the full 5.1. So why bother doing anything less on a Naim when DVI is fine for now?

Thanks.

When the DVD5 came out, I was slightly surprised to see DVI on the back, given that the majority of new gadgets now sport HDMI. I'm guessing that the combination of HDMI 1.0 not available at design time, together with a product release delay resulted in DVI in the production unit.

I agree that we'd be hard-pressed to see any difference of 480p output between HDMI and DVI. However, doesn't HDMI also offer other video benefits over DVI, rather than just being a single conduit to shove all sound and video down e.g. YUV as well as RGB? I think the ability to provide 480i over HDMI would be advantageous for those wanting to use an external scaler solution, for example. However, that would mean changing/upgrading the DVI output to HDMI, and I'd wager that that is unlikely to happen.

It will be interesting to see where Naim takes its DVD players, given the pace of change in that part of the AV industry.

quote:

Originally posted by Mark R:
I agree that we'd be hard-pressed to see any difference of 480p output between HDMI and DVI.

There are no differences. DVI is the digital video transport/protocol of HDMI. HDMI just can also transport digital audio.
There are no interest to have an HDMI output on the DVDP other than to plug it to a TV (audio and video) or a receiver doing the switching.
This is not the market targeted by the DVD5. The regular coax is still the prefered channel to send digital audio. And as Naim does, it is always a good idea to separate Audio and video, be they analog or digital.
I see HDMI as a cheap and convenient plug and play A/V wiring, just like your SCART was in the analog domain.

Hi Manu,

quote:

There are no interest to have an HDMI output on the DVDP other than to plug it to a TV (audio and video) or a receiver doing the switching.

From a mass-consumer implementation perspective I agree with you, but I respectfully disagree on this being the only application of HDMI. I see HDMI giving video options to those wanting to optimise their AV environments.

Barring SDI modifications, the 480i output option of HDMI is a better feed to an (HDMI-enabled) external scaler, if you need to scale to a high-resolution digital display (480p will most likely be pass-through, unless you have something like the iScan HD+). Adding an additional colour space of YUV over HDMI gives people another option to optimise.

The internal scaler of the DVD5 is great if all you want to scale is the DVD signal. If you have other devices that you want to scale e.g. satellite tv, video, etc., only having a SCART input on the scaler card will not do the job, IMHO.

I'm just commenting on what appear to me to be idiosyncratic design decisions by Naim (shock, horror!). Yes, the DVI thing is relatively minor, and was time-dependent I think, but the SCART thing threw me. Don't get me wrong, I'd love a DVD5, it's just that my ideal DVD5 would have had HDMI out and a scaler option with more inputs that just SCART.

Maybe the DVDX2 or DVDS3 will have some of that. :-)

Agree with you about the SCART. And more, it is an unknown connection our side of the ocean. It looks rather archaic on such a player as the DVD5.
I don't see me telling a prospective purchaser of the scaler card: you will have to use a very special adaptor to plug your sat/cable box and i'm the only one to sell it in town. Come on Naim, give us a worldwide standard connector.
On the other hand, more and more set-top boxes in North America are of the HD type, already doing the scaling from 480i to at least 720P, so the need for an external connection will be limited. A modular video switch box linked to the AV2 has IMO more chance of success here.

Emmanuel
Euphonie

Indeed, I wonder what happened to the VS1 project?

All

Just my 2p worth here. When the DVD5 was reviewed in HI-FI Choice there was an interview with Steve Sells from Naim think that was his Name. He said that HDMI was to expensive to put in at the start but would be available with the scaler option. However the scaler option details posted by Adam look very poor. This came as no suprise to me. I tell you for why If you look at the back panel of the DVD5 it would have meant changing this full back panel to give you inputs and then adding the scaler card. This seemed like major work for the upgrade.

The VS1 seems to be on the back burning for now, however it maybe easier to have this as a video/switcher/scaler, with multi HDMI inputs. I don't know Naims plans. However sales of the DVD5 seem to be very good. So lets hope much r&d goes into it to make the scaler option work.


Neill

HT-Naimee

Your wrong on the no other DVD player lets you scale external sources. The Merididan g series allows for this and the new Denon models also do this as well.

The player was given the editors choice badge and scored 87% overall. The review was very positive, as am I about the player when I have seen it in action I have been impressed not just because it has a Naim badge either.

My only down was on the scaler option which so far does not look good, however naim will work on this and I am sure they will get it right. they normally do.

Neill

HT-Naimee

They seem to prefer the Meridian machine, but the award winner was the Towhnsend machine. But that was awarded before they reviewed the naim, Meridian and the Arcam. So to be honest I don't really know which they prefer.

Neill

HT-Naimee

The DVD5 comes in at £2.6K and the Meridian G98 at £3,3K with the Scaler. You have to do this like for like test once the scaler price is confirmed. Then a head to head on DVD pic/DVD sound/DVDA sound and scaler pic. Oh and almost forgot the CD sound. So its hard to tell who makes the best DVD player.

Neill

quote:

However, the DVI, as far as I know, is capable of suppling exactly the same resolutions as the HDMI. No matter whether progressive or interlaced and not matter which resolution.

Firstly, apologies for sounding like a broken record, but there is a bandwidth limitation of the DVI spec that essentially does not support a 480/576 interlaced signal to be output over DVI (some devices have firmware hacks to enable input of 480/576i over DVI). HDMI has the same specification, but does some doubling to enable 480/576 interlaced. I agree that copy protection is a strong driver for HDMI-enabled devices.

Neill: Thanks for the info on the HiFi Choice article. Just have to wait and see what the scaler looks like (and costs!) now. I wonder if it'll have "dial-your-own" resolutions ...

Hi HT-N,

I think we're getting our wires crossed, and maybe I wasn't clear enough in the other posts. I was not referring to what resolution can be output over DVI, but whether the signal is interlaced or not. HDMI can output an interlaced signal at 480/576 resolution, but DVI cannot.

If all conversions within the DVD player are of high-quality, the need for 480/576 interlaced (480/576i) output is moot. However, some may want, or already have, a separate, high-quality scaler that has, among other things, their de-interlacer of choice, through which they route all video signals. A scaling hub, if you will. In this instance, 480/576i output would be beneficial. Having HDMI output on the scaler card won't provide that much in this situation, apart from some connection future-proofing, and perhaps the ability to send YCbCr if you prefer your (digital) display's RGB conversion.

In the interests of full disclosure, I do not use DVI or HDMI (ironic?). I've tried it, with the Arcam DV79, but I didn't get the "Wow! Look at that!" factor. For me, it was "slightly different" than "better". Additionally, I didn't get access to callibration tweaks that I can get when using component. (Maybe that's the point?) Note: these were not the only factors considered!

The DVD5 is already a compelling single-box solution for current technologies, not least for its trademark Naim sound abilities. However, going forward we'll see more HD resolution TVs being sold, more HD TV being piped in and, maybe, a need for scalers better than ones in the displays. The Naim scaler may turn out to be excellent, but may provide limited external support ... we don't know yet.

A Zen moment: this is all boll*cks. I cannot retro-actively hope for a different design solution, nor project what the scaler solution will be. I want the DVD5 to do it all well. Shorten the signal path. Get more digital inputs in the display, or, better still, a good video switcher.

Cheers,
Mark.

Naim

As I already own an AV2 which i am more than happy with. I would like to know as this post started if there is an AV3 on the way or not. If this is going to cost a lot more than the AV2 I can not see it putting anyone of an AV2. So come on some info please, after all the two channel guys are busy talking about the 555 so give us something over on the AV forum to talk about.


Neill

Adam,

Time has passed on a bit now. Would it be possible to share information regarding processor roadmaps, with select existing AV2 customers.

An idea of if there is an AV3 on the horizon, pricing range, possible features ?

Cheers,
Roy.

quote:

Originally posted by Frank Abela:
General,

You need a centre. The best would be another 10-2A which would be the perfect match, but I don't know if ATC would supply a single. The difference the centre makes is quite remarkable, although I'm not surprised the system sounds rather good as it is.

I have recently ditched my centre and improved the sound. I use ATC SCM50ASL (active speakers) for the front left and right. The speakers are 7 feet apart and the screen onto which I project the films is exactly 7 feet wide and I sit 11 feet away from it. I think that a centre is essential for a plasma or conventional TV in order to locate the dialogue properly, but when you get to a projector screen of a decent size then the integration advantages of a phantom centre outweigh the localisation advantages of a centre. In fact a centre might be over-localised in some ways when the screen is that large and the actor is off-centre.

Anyway, the matching active ATC centre is huge and very expensive!

Andrew