Linn Majik DS v's.....

Try search  ............  https://forums.naimaudio.com/to...ly=44225917243960175

Have you searched the Linn forum, then if you put that on the end of the balance scale with this forum at the other,  then you might get an more unbiased picture 

Then you need to differentiate the Naim "Streamers",  they have variable levels of SQ. 

Yes. When I came back to proper hifi after over a decade in the wilderness, my first task was to determine if I was going down the Linn or Naim route. I had been a source to speakers Linn user in the 90s.

Majik DS vs. Uniti. Both were excellent but the Majik was a tad laid back. I wasn't feeling the conviction of percussive strikes or the same degree of seperation I heard on the Uniti. Vocals on the Uniti seemed to be more in the room and overall it just held the rhythm better. It was a bit surprising to me because back in the 90s (I was very familiar with both the Naim and Linn sounds working for a hifi dealer) Naim was the more upfront sound but a bit dry sounding and 2D wheras Linn was still laid back but had texture and soundstage going for it. I now found that the basic Naim character was retained except on the Uniti it was doing texture and soundstaging better than the Linn.

I still thought the Majik DS was outstanding but my wife really did not get on with the sound from it. I merely preferred the Uniti whereas she loved what it did and actively disliked the Linn. 

Ultimately I didn't buy the Uniti either since my dealer then sold me up to the system on my profile.

A number of years ago, I auditioned 3 streamers when I began to consider a move to steaming. These were the Naim ND5 XS, Linn Majik DS and the Marantz NA7004 which at that time was being heavily discounted as it was about to be discontinued.

My immediate impressions were:

1) I found it difficult to choose between the ND5 XS and Majik DS, but was a little underwhelmed by the Majik and had a marginal preference for the ND5 XS.  

2) The Marantz (discounted from £750 to £350 was astonishing value for money and almost as good as the other two, but the IOS app wasn't nearly so good.

I had a subsequent demo where I compared the ND5 XS with XPS power supply or nDAC against the Linn Akurate and preferred the Akurate.

I ended up buying a bare ND5 XS and a Marantz NA7004 for a bedroom system.

Later, I added a power supply and external 3rd party DAC to the ND5 XS which greatly refined the sound and I also had an opportunity to purchase a Linn Klimax Renew from a friend which was significantly better yet. Unfortunately, I haven't heard either the NDX or NDS.

One word of warning. At my second slightly more upmarket demo, I heard and was pretty impressed by the Linn Sneaky which should not be anything like as good as the Majik. I think the moral of this is that the matching ancillary equipment used is very important, and so you should ideally demo your options at home if that is a possibility.      

Make sure you listen to both streamers (preferably in your own system). There really is no 'better' of the two - they just sound slightly different. For what it is worth, I would recommend that you look out for a used NDX or Akurate (preferably DS/1) or even a Klimax Renew DS/0 at roughly the same cost as the ND5 or Majik. These (and especially the Klimax Renew) will sound much better than the ND5 or Majik.