Nap250dr with proac d40r

The D40 is far too good for the poor old SU and it's no surprise that it's struggling. That's the thing with getting speakers that are too good - you have to improve the electronics to feed them and can end up spending far more than you wanted to. I'd suggest borrowing a 250DR to try, and while you are at it borrow a 272 to replace the SU. A 272/250 will be far better than an SU/250 biwired, which is largely a waste of time and money. Alternatively, keep the SU and get less demanding speakers. 

+1

I have the D40R with a 500 and it works well. I have heard lesser ProAcs struggle with lesser amps.   They seem to require more power than you would think.   It sounds great at my house and I hope you find the right combination for yours. 

There you have it: CD555, 552 and 500, with the D40. Perfect. SU and D40, not so much. £60,000 on electronics? Maybe changing the speakers is a better bet. Something like the Focal Aria 926.

Thanks for the replies.  I do plan to upgrade the Amp and eventually replace the SU or keep it as a second room setup.   Plan to audition the SU with 250dr and also 272 + 250dr. Will report back! 

Hi Rohan

The 250dr is more than sufficient amp to drive the Proac D40R.  

But it does need a pre-amp that is up to the job as well, with the 272 probably being an excellent start point.  Above the bare 272, the sky is the limit.

Hope this helps, FT

If you are thinking of keeping the SU for a second system anyway just go for the power amp for now. The SU will sound totally different, you could try bi-amping but you're using two different amps then which surely isn't going to be right?

My SU is running through a 300dr for the time being and I'm living with it happily. I love upgrading but like to do it bit by bit, I find it more exciting that way

D40R with 282/250 here.

My amp will be DR'ed very soon...

The 250 is very capable with the D40r's. Loud or quiet.

A 272 would be minimum as far as a pre goes.

For those interested, D48R reviewed here -

http://www.toneaudio.reviews/#...25320cf226b8e686b6bf

Hi Rohan,

I recently upgraded my PROAC D20R speaker to a showroom owned PROAC D40 unit (without ribbon tweeter version).  I driving this new speaker set with NAC202+HCDR+NAPSC+NAP200DR system combination.  

My listening room is 4 meters x 5 meters,  It sound greats to me even with low volume,  I set 9'oclock on playing CD and 10'oclock on playing LP record. If i push up the volume to 11'oclock, I feel very loud.  I guessed my room is too small to handle it.   As I read from reviews, this speakers needed an ample room size to have great sound.

Thanks all, looks like the 250dr is likely to be  viable option ( with 272 later on) . will audition and revert.  

Cheers

Rohan,

The SF venere3.0 look great on paper...

Why no good?

Just heard the D40R on the end of a 500 this past weekend at my Naim dealer in a large room. I am sure anything "down" to a 250  would be fine, maybe a 200, but anything less in a room that size would probably be a struggle. Agree with the comments above.

Hi James,

In my setup The SU plus SF Venere3.0 lack bass and the highs and midrange were 'Ok' . Not very transparent at lower volumes .  Not much else was available at the pricepoint when i auditioned SF and it wasnt possible to audition proacs or PMC's.  WAF factor for the venere was very high as they look great. 

Despite finding optimal placement in my room, i was still not happy with the SF sound . Also my refernce was my friends gear - 17 year old Naim Proac setup which still sounds awesome. I recently auditioned PMC24 and my friends old Proac 2.5 at my house with the SU. Although the highs and mids on PMC24 were better than the SF and 2.5, the PMC lacked the bass of the 2.5  Overall, the  Proac 2.5 still sounded better  and much more 'musical' than the pmc or SF on my SU. 

I then looked for proac 18, 20R and then decided to buy  new Proac D30R 'blind' based on my experience with the 2.5's . Then stumbled on the 3 year old preowned d40R at the same price as the d30R and couldnt resist! 

So there you have my story.

Planning to audition 250dr this weekend.

I don't have any experience with Proac, but I have heard 272/250 DR drive the big Sonus Faber Olympica 2 which is available to audition at Dubai Audio, and it sounded very fantastic to my ears, what a system,  and I even hooked up my 250 DR to my friends big (and these speakers are the Rolls-Royce of speakers) Sonus Faber Stradivari. It drove them well. The grip on those twin 12 inch Stradivari bass drivers was quite good, we both didn't expect it from the 250 DR.

He drives them with a 552/500.

AM, Good to know the 250dr is up to it!  ithink the olypica are a bit out of my league and so were the d40r till i stumbled on them preowned... 

There is a test track I always use from Nickelback "follow you home" from their album all the right reasons when auditioning Naim equipment.

I have heard this song performed live by Nickelback (whatever you think of Nickelback, they are a Superb Live band) , and the Proac D28 (driven off NDAC/XPS2/282/HC/250.2) is able to reproduce the kick drum very well indeed with that speed and ferocity of the live sound ! I can't imagine how good the D40R is. 

The olympica 2 has also jaw dropping bass too, I am impressed, I need to go back and hear this song on the Olympica 2 (I haven't so far). I did hear the Depeche mode remixes and the bass was really superb.

Congratulations on the new ProAc.

Cannot go wrong with a pair of ProAc. Naim & ProAc seems to b a very good match.

I would recommend going 300 with D40R. This speaker, while slighly more efficient than most ProAc's, still requires high current capability to control its low end. FWIW I had to upgrade from 250.2 to 300 to correctly drive my D28.  

Chag - 

Chag I heard 282/HC/250.2 drive D28 very well. what is your source and preamp?

Also 250DR is much better amp, as I said earlier, I hear it drive the huge Sonus Faber Stradivari very well. No issues.

If you look at impedance curve of D28, it is quite stable compared to demanding speakers from other companies (I will not mention)

For example, Dynaudio has reputation (not true) of being hard to drive, but it presents stable load (4 ohm) to Naim amplifier compared to other companies that say 8 ohm  but at certain frequencies goes down to 3 ohm, so Dynaudio and Proac are not so difficult to drive for Naim amplifiers. Remember that the model number of any naim amp comes from the power output rated at 4 Ohms, so NAP 250 really is the 4 ohm output capability into watts into 2 channels, basically Naim are very confident their amps can drive 4 ohm loads, and they were pioneers in this regard.

Of course 300 is a much superior amplifier to 250.2 so that is of course the big improvement you are experiencing, rather than 250.2 being unable to drive it.

I doubt very much that 250.2 struggles to drive D28, but of course your mileage may vary, and we all have different sources,  preamps, rooms and most of all different expectations.

analogmusic posted:

Chag I heard 282/HC/250.2 drive D28 very well. what is your source and preamp?

....I doubt very much that 250.2 struggles to drive D28, but of course your mileage may vary, and we all have different sources,  preamps, rooms and most of all different expectations.

I too auditioned a 282/Hicap2/250.2 driving a pair of Proac D28 (and a pair of PMC OB1i during the same demo) and the amp was more than capable of driving the Proac D28, easily.  This should not be a cause for concern.

Hope this helps, FT

Interesting weekend!

Got a 250dr and 272 to audition. 

First Out , Added the 250 dr as external amp to the superuniti. The difference was immediate . Some of the bass boom I had noticed earlier was gone .The 250 had no problems driving the Proac240. SQ was better at lower volumes. I Then cranked it up with 'Razor' (Foo Fighters) , Dave Mathews, Derek Trucks and  some of the Fink classics. The finish on Razor is complex and there is a lot going on. Lost some transparency with the SU on the crescendo .

I then took the SU out and hooked up the 272+250 DR to the d40R . Big improvement over the SU+250dr .Much much better control and clarity . Soundstage was much better. Much better transparency on the crescendo finish to  'Razor' . DMB, and co sounded sublime! D40 also dug deep on the bass. Awesome!

Was planning to biamp the SU and but didnt bother, in the end .

Went back to return the kit to the dealer this morning , wife was pleased to see 2 boxes going back , should have seen the look when 2 new boxes turned up !

All setup and running in now. Never knew penury could be so enjoyable.

Thanks all for your comments !

Brilliant, that should sort those speakers out! Did you get brand new boxes from stock, or did you buy the demo ones? Either way, they will take a few weeks, or even months, to show what they can do, so if you think it's good now, there is a lot more to come. And don't forget that, once the finances have recovered, an XPSDR will raise things to a whole new level. I love my 272/250, it's just fantastic value for what you get. 

New boxes from stock!

Analogmusic, Foot Tapper; I would concede that room acoustics play an important role in the possible issue. Nevertheless, the 300 allows for more definition and tighter control of the lower part of the spectrum that the D28 is capable of reproducing. I often wonder how is the D30 presentation in that respect.

Chag -