Adding DAC to Naim NDX

IB, I'm sure the various Chord dacs are good options to try, but if you look at your posts you do seem to recommend a Mac Mini, Audirvana and a Chord DAC in nearly every one, unless it's about speakers. And you don't own any Naim at all, which is fine of course, but it shouldn't be a surprise that there's a predilection for Naim on their own Forum. 

Hungryhalibut posted:

IB, I'm sure the various Chord dacs are good options to try, but if you look at your posts you do seem to recommend a Mac Mini, Audirvana and a Chord DAC in nearly every one, unless it's about speakers. And you don't own any Naim at all, which is fine of course, but it shouldn't be a surprise that there's a predilection for Naim on their own Forum. 

Reminds me slightly of 272 and SL2s somewhere...!

of course I understand and fully expect the prediliction for Naim, but sometimes it really gets dogmatic, not recognising even other possibilities.

I agree that when talking about DACs I will introduce Hugo or express my experience, in the hope that it will open eyes (ears) to possibilities that some of us have found to be good. And when talking about store and renderer I do mention MM/A particularly when the thread focuses on ND5Xs which was my precursor, for the same reasons as mentiining Hugo - though there are, I think, as many store/renderer  ones where I haven't mentioned mine, or only very briefly as a statement of fact, but have extolled the virtues of combined source and renderer, citing the likes of Melco and championing the Core (neither of which I have). And when talking generally about streaming and ripping and storage, I usually mention a list of options, which include my choices but also usually a greater number of others. But maybe I am one of the more frequent members mentioning some of these options, having taken the baton from one or two who were around a few years ago.

Innocent Bystander posted:

of course I understand and fully expect the prediliction for Naim, but sometimes it really gets dogmatic, not recognising even other possibilities.

IB, the clue is...  it's the Naim forum.  You just don't need to save us from ourselves on here.

Please take care otherwise pretty soon, it'll start looking like you have an agenda on this.  And I'll remind you of forum rules here.  By all means discuss other brands, but if you perpetually try to push members towards a non-Naim product then that begins to take the p..

Oh, and my take on the DAC thing..  FWIW, I have a Chord Hugo and I also have a Naim DAC with 555PS DR.  They are both excellent but also both very different in their strengths, so reducing things down to one being "better" than the other is a bit silly really.  That and the fact that one is quite a lot more expensive than the other.  The Hugo is remarkable value though.

Richard Dane posted:

Innocent Bystander posted:

of course I understand and fully expect the prediliction for Naim, but sometimes it really gets dogmatic, not recognising even other possibilities.

IB, the clue is...  it's the Naim forum.  You just don't need to save us from ourselves on here.

Please take care otherwise pretty soon, it'll start looking like you have an agenda on this.  And I'll remind you of forum rules here.  By all means discuss other brands, but if you perpetually try to push members towards a non-Naim product then that begins to take the p..

Richard, thanks for the caution, which I will respect. Of course I recognise the clue in the Naim, and respect both Naim as a brand and the freedom given on this forum to discuss other brands quite widely, and apologise if you feel I have overstepped the mark. I hope you will have seen and noted my general attempt at neutral presentation, and hopeful championing of Core. For the record, I confirm I have no connection with, or business interest in, any of the brands I may mention, nor indeed any hifi business.

As for the Core - total waste of space. I'm amazed that Naim didn't just let the idea of their bespoke servers quietly die. All you need is a £400 NAS. 

Hungryhalibut posted:

As for the Core - total waste of space. I'm amazed that Naim didn't just let the idea of their bespoke servers quietly die. All you need is a £400 NAS. 

That's ignoring the benefits of combined store/renderer, feeding a DAC directly and avoiding streaming files across a network, which seems to cause quite a few people quite a bit of grief, if the not infrequent calls for help on this forum are anything to go by. In that mode it may be a viable challenger for Melco et al, which have received rave reviews around here.

Hungryhalibut posted:

As for the Core - total waste of space. I'm amazed that Naim didn't just let the idea of their bespoke servers quietly die. All you need is a £400 NAS. 

You can go on the naughty step as well for dissing something you haven't heard 

I decided to review my own posts, and find that so far this year I have mentioned Core perhaps a little less than I thought (only 10% of posts), while almost 75% of my posts make no mention of Audirvana or Chord/Chord DACs. Just occasionally exchanges prompt further mention, as today. But I shall bear this in mind.

Yes I have. It's perfectly functional, just unnecessary. 

daveyu posted:

I have sort of asked this question before but re phrasing it  I now have a NDX / XP5 XS setup.

I am considering adding a DAC to this setup principally to improve the sound of ripped CDs.

I have a budget of 2-3K and would consider 2nd hand DACs

I have in mind Chord Hugo(2?), Exogal Comet plus, T+A 8 DSD or Moon Neo 280D

I currently use a Synology NAS but may upgrade to a Melco N1A in the future.

I know the best answer is to demo, but I was wondering what peoples thoughts are regarding

getting the best from my ripped CDs

Many thanks in advance

I very much like the Naim DAC because of its many inputs and straightforward design. A second hand device with the latest firmware upgrade from Dec. 2015 is still a valuable proposition in my view. There are more recent and perhaps better alternatives, of course. The crucial question is how you are going to feed the DAC. If this was a Naim DAC, I would probably start trying a Raspberry Pi with hifiberry DIGI+ PRO and BNC connector. I am not a fan of LAN streaming. Best, nbpf

The core may be "unnecessary" in a strict sense but then so also are a lot of other components mentioned in this forum ...

IMO it does fill a gap; it is a ripping engine, music database manager, music store, renderer and server ... all in one box.

Haven't seen a core yet as I will be sticking to my UnitiServe until at least the Naim app software matures and Naim (hopefully) publish a desktop controller. Therefore cannot comment on SQ but it is certainly analogous to the UnitiServe and that is a very convenient and quality component in my system and definitely "necessary" ... yep I could replace it with a computer (for ripping), NAS, network switch(es), streamer with all their connections, RF isolation requirements, cabling, etc ... unnecessary ????

Allan

Hungryhalibut posted:

As for the Core - total waste of space. I'm amazed that Naim didn't just let the idea of their bespoke servers quietly die. All you need is a £400 NAS. 

+1 here. I don't get it either. Playing recently with an HDX I realize how restrictive the "own metadata" Schema Naim uses is. Moreover, the new Core has left out the internet radio part so it cannot be used as a server + digital transport either.

Back to the OP: I am in a very similar situation with an NDX + XP5PS + non NAIM amplification. I have worked a lot on improving my analog source and having seen the benefits one idea that I am from time to time contemplating (and is a potential alternative to what has been discussed above) would be upgrading from NDX -> NDS, keeping the XP5PS  to power the NDS until funds permit a 555. Certainly much more expensive than the Hugo/TT route (or whatever other external non NAIM DAC) so this option assumes one prefers to stay with NAIM. I seem to recall one or two older posts saying that this might not be such a bad idea and that the NDS would be considerably better than the NDX even with the entry level power supply (XP5). Any views on this?

[@mention:32963504873841469] the NDX and NDS although have some similarities at an architecture level, have quite different implementations and componentry and sound quite different. Powersupplies don't change this, they just help optimise the performance at a given level. The NDX analogue output is less accurate and resolving than the NDS irrespective of Naim powersupply used.... however that is not saying you will automatically have a preference for one over the other... though all things being equal I would have thought the chances are your preference would be for the NDS. However to my ears with Naim amplification I prefer the NDX-> Hugo to NDS/555PS (although have  some similar traits) 

i like the ndac because it is a "Swiss army knife" of dacs. Loads of inputs on optical and wired, psu upgrades (I have xpsdr), and a pretty good sound quality. I think its good value and a solid starting point. 

If I was to criticise its sounds, it can be a bit bass wobbly (bloated, almost as if its eaten just a bit too much...) but it produces a fine sound

I dont know hugo well at all, having had limited exposure to one. But I love my mojo which I think is cracking good value for money.

@OP: Naim is likely to work on further refining their DAC architecture. And with the Hugo2 around the corner, I'd not commit at the very moment (though personally I'll stick to my HugoTT, for which the Core is a nice transport, though admittedly without iRadio).

Seems like I have a couple of alternatives to explore

a) NDX => Hugo DAC or Similar

b) Melco or Similar => Hugo DAC or Similar

c) NDS / XP5 XS

I do get the feeling that b) will give the best results as I like the direct connection, removing Ethernet.

However with option b) can I still have Tidal streaming

btw, I discount Naim DAC as I do not have space for 3 boxes.

I would agree with hh just to demo an xps dr on your Ndx. 

It transforms the ndx. I have a melco n1a and connect that via Ethernet from the player port to the Ndx. 

This on its own is good but the xpsdr takes it to another level. The xpsdr is also a good base if you ever move to nds. 

Worth the demo against the dacs. 

DrPo posted:

Back to the OP: I am in a very similar situation with an NDX + XP5PS + non NAIM amplification. I have worked a lot on improving my analog source and having seen the benefits one idea that I am from time to time contemplating (and is a potential alternative to what has been discussed above) would be upgrading from NDX -> NDS, keeping the XP5PS  to power the NDS until funds permit a 555. Certainly much more expensive than the Hugo/TT route (or whatever other external non NAIM DAC) so this option assumes one prefers to stay with NAIM. I seem to recall one or two older posts saying that this might not be such a bad idea and that the NDS would be considerably better than the NDX even with the entry level power supply (XP5). Any views on this?

I cannot provide any first hand experiences here but, at the time the Hugo came out, there was a lot of traffic in this forum on the subject and I remember that, among others, Simon-in-Suffolk posted comparisons between Naim DAC, NDS and Hugo. One obvious advantage of the NDS route is that you can very easily try it out and compare it to your current setup. I think both the Naim DAC and the NDS are solid devices but I personally would not adopt a LAN streaming solution unless multi room replay was a priority. I also would not buy an NDS or a Naim DAC if I thought that these devices necessarily need a 555 to "sound right". But it's just me and there's nothing wrong in doing so, of course!

Just building on NBPF's point - in away adding a 555PS to either an nDAC or NDS shows what those boxes are truly capable of. One does not have to pay an arm and a leg to get them either - thanks to a good pre-loved market for Naim in the EU.

I tried my NDX with either a bare nDAC, with a bare XPSDR, bare 555PS and various permutations of them all. If I had to limit myself to only two boxes I would most likely go for NDX + nDAC. I felt that XPS added too little to the NDX and 555PS took the NDX to an uncomfortable place.  In terms of 'return-on-investment' nDAC seemd to be spot on to me (and I bought it as a less-than 3 year old unit, for 1/3 of the original price).

There are other DAC out there. But since this is a Naim forum I will limit my observations / recommendations to NAIM and to boxes I have actually heard and use.

Adam

thanks all for your replies. 

DrPo posted:

thanks all for your replies. 

Second that

Doesn't an external power supply only benefit the dac and if I add a Naim dac then to get the best out of this requires a ps to be added to that, not a route i wish to take

daveyu posted:

Doesn't an external power supply only benefit the dac and if I add a Naim dac then to get the best out of this requires a ps to be added to that, not a route i wish to take

Absolutely not - it doesn't. See my post above. I wrote that if `i cpuld on;y add add one box to my NDX it would an nDAC not a power supply to the NDX.