I fgind the sound completely different in some ways. Both excell at PRAT and involvement, but in a different way. Spectral gear for me is far more cerebral. It gets me to consistantly think about the music that is unfolding around me. It is exceedingly neutral, in the best and worst sense. With Spectral you will know instantly if your cables, room, speakers, CD's or LP's are bright
I find Naim gear far more involving. I boogie and party when hearing Naim, but I also get a bit worn down by the pace at times. Its FUN. Whether its accurate, I am not so shure, but it is oh so engaging.
SPECTRAL does PRAT, better than most American gear, but is inferior in this area to Naim.
Like Naim, its hard to mix/match pre-amps and amps. Spectral needs interconnects that are MIT/Spectral if the Interconnect is connecting a Spectral pre-amp and Spectral amp or a Spectral CD playback system with a Spectral pre-amp. The results of other IC's vary depending on what you are tryong to connect to the pre-amp. Spectral requires MIT speaker cable. Other speaker cable will void the warrantee.
Unlike Naim, MIT/Spectral IC's and Speaker cable is very COSTLY--like buying another component. Unlike, Naim, Spectral requires the use of MIT power conditioning to achieve its best, which is also VERY expensive. Generally speaking on the other hand, Naim does not get along well with most power conditioning. I have my Naim CD 5/highcan plugged into the wall.
Spectral is ultra high bandwidth which makes it very sensitive to most CD player line noise (oddly Naim has been the only CD player that does not seem to freak-out Specvtral gear), RF,EMI, the Linn Lingo. Naim has its own sensitivities though.
Equipment racks are soooo importasnt to the performance of both Naim and Spectral. Spectral performs optimally with Zoethecus racks which like Mana or such are very costly.
People who like Spectral/may not like Naim and the other way around. When I say that Spectral is more cerebral, I do not mean to state that it is uninvolving for me.
I guess I have the best of BOTH worlds. I love the involvement with the music that only NAIM can provide (Naim CD 5/Highcap/Headline/NASPC. I also love to be able to step back and reflect upon the performance WITHOUT being bored, which Spectral Excels at. Although I have raised the question on this forum, I gues that is why I resist selling my Spectral gear and going all Naim.
I suspect it will involve more effort to get Spectral gear to perform optimally, rather than Naim. A Spectral system, setup wrong can be all "detail" and nothing less. I also find it less confusing to assemble a Spectral system, since whjile Spectral gear may have external power supplies, there are not different levels of power supplies to get compulsive about. Both manufacturers need to be looked at as a system and for both the Total cost of Operation to achieve optimal performance other than at entry level (for such things as cable, power supplies, racks, power conditioning etc) will pust the Total systems cost well beyond the initial expenditure. However, the stratup costs for an entry level Spectral system would likely be MUCH higher than for an entry or mid level Naim system.
Hope this helps.
Jay
