I'm just canvassing views here, mainly to gauge whether these thoughts are truly sacreligious.
Let's say your main system is Naim. In my case it's an HDX + DAC + Nait XS with associated power supplies and it all sounds very good in the room where it's located.
But you'd like a multiroom solution (simultaneous playback in two or more rooms), and you also like streaming in CD quality from Qobuz and similar.
What's the answer?
Leaving aside NaimNet, the Naim solution is the multiroom option in the Uniti series. This, however, will not give you direct access to Qobuz and, even if it did, Naim will only give you 320kbs for multiroom which rather defeats the purpose of subscribing to Qobuz for CD quality. Also, in my case, the Uniti range is incompatible with my HDX for multiroom.
Alongside this, Sonos starts to look pretty attractive. Qobuz is fully integrated; it will play everywhere in CD quality; and the Sonos control package is a dream to use.
In my main system I have a Sonos Connect plugged into my DAC and (maybe my ears aren't what they used to be) when played through the DAC I really can't hear a difference in quality between Sonos and my HDX. I no longer use my HDX all that much. Ripping CDs, obviously, though dBpoweramp does as good a job at that - arguably better, actually, as it tags wav files (which I still use out of habit) in a way that things other than the HDX can read (Sonos etc). With a Qobuz subscription, of course, I no longer buy quite so many CDs and maybe one day soon I will lose altogether the feeling that I need to own music rather than just have access to it. Otherwise, I generally don't trouble myself to switch the DAC from its Sonos input to HDX unless I particularly want to listen to one of the small number of hi def downloads that I have.
So here's my possibly sacriligious thought. I can't imagine what (existing) Naim streaming product I would want to include in the scenario I have described above, and I seriously question whether I can justify keeping (except that I already own it) a very expensive HDX just for the benefit of occasional CD ripping and occasional listening to hi def files. Every way I look at it (price; quality of mutiroom playback; access to Qobuz and similar services; ease of set-up and use) Sonos seems to win the battle of the streamers hands-down.
Of course, Sonos amplification leaves a lot to be desired compared with Naim but why would I not use each one for what it does best - Sonos for streaming capability, plugged into Naim for DAC and amplification capability? Sonos Connect plus a second-hand Supernait (the old one with a DAC) for example, or Sonos Connect plus a second hand DAC and Nait XS which would not cost much more than a Unitiqute and arguably sound better?
It might be a different story if Naim produced something that allowed true hi-def multiroom. Not even NaimNet offered that but perhaps it's the next big thing around the corner...
Posted on: 15 April 2014 by Simon-in-Suffolk
Hi I currently stream my iPad / iPhone directly into the Apple USB connector on the NDAC when using Qobuz and the overall effect is good.. although I believe there might be some RFI/EM issues to address.
I also stream Qobuz via Apple TV ensuring I am using 24 bit for a good playback - though not as detailed as the top option via the Apple interface but more convenient.
Funnily with 16bit on Apple I hear very soft quantisation noise - that vanishes at 24 bit for Airplay into AppleTV. I have not investigated this further, but is probably due to the core Apple audio system.
However I would love to have direct Qobuz from my Naim without relying on AppleTV/Airplay, I have this elsewhere on non Naim and it sounds fantastic.
Simon
Posted on: 15 April 2014 by endlessnessism
I would love to find a Naim solution to these issues but for now there are some serious things lacking and, for multiroom, I feel I can get more from Sonos for less money.
For both ripped music and Qobuz, Sonos amps at about £350 a pop will let me stream throughout the house in CD quality. Unitiqute, say, at four times the cost, will sound great locally but will only achieve 320kbs for multiroom. My HDX cost at least ten times as much as any Sonos kit but it doesn't sound ten times better when both are plugged into a DAC and, unless I take the very esoteric path of NaimNet, the HDX won't do multiroom at all.
For Naim really to compete they must achieve Sonos-like capability with Naim-like quality:
Unify the servers (HDX etc) with the streamers (NDX etc) so that they can all play multiroom together in CD quality or, better still, hi def. I'm sure the latter would only be possible on a wired network but so be it - I've got one and network cabling is neither complicated nor particularly expensive.
Unify nServe and nStream so one app controls everything.
Add IP control to preamps and integrated amps and give the unified nServe / nStream app the facility to control volume to the unified app. If the servers and the streamers can have an IP port why not an amp as weel? (My Nait XS has the option for RS232 control but, instead of developing this into IP control for the XS-2 the whole idea of network control seems to have been ditched and there are only knobs and an IR remote).
I probably agree with you about Qobuz - for the moment I'm seduced by having so much great music readily available but the quality is not as good as local files, esp hi def files, played locally. There's also something intangible lacking - it's harder to engage with a piece of music when you haven't taken the trouble to go out and buy it, perhaps because you first heard the piece live or in a particular situation and felt you had to have it, and when it's just one of a dozen or more new things that you've heard for the first time that day (I always had a rule of not buying more than two records at a time for just that that reason). Still, I think streaming from external sources is going to be a way to go in the future, if not necessarily the way to go, and the quality is bound to improve.
Maybe I'm dreaming about some kind of hi fi utopia but I don't think so when I see Sonos delivering everything I want, minus only the top-quality DAC and amplifier capability that Naim have been delivering for years. Naim ought to be able to deliver the whole package and it's hard to imagine why they wouldn't want to.
