Naim SL2 vs Ovator S400?

Posted by: Khan on 25 May 2018

Hi guys,

I have the ooportunity to purchase a good pair of both speakers, but I cannot audition either of them as both will be shipped from overseas. Therefore, I am looking for advice as to which of these will suit my room.

My room is 3.2 metres by 3. Yes, unfortunately a small square room. It is on the upper floor and has hardwood flooring on top of marine plywood floorboards. All four walls are solid brick. Fyi 3 walls have wallpaper and the wall that the speakers will be up against will have a 3 metre fitted wardrobe, with only a 15cm gap between wardrobe and side wall either side.

I was planning on corner loading the SL2 up against this gap to try and manage the boundary setup required for the SL2. I understand that this is not ideal BUT im wondering if it will work. 

The Ovator 400 can be pulled out into the room about 30cm from the wardrobe and 50cm from side walls but perhaps the flooring maybe an issue with bass boom.

My preference is for the SL2 as Im curious about this speaker and love the look of retro gear.

My new system comprises of Macbook SSD, Audirvana Plus feeding a Berkeley Audio Alpha USB converter.

BNC cable to Schitt Gungnir Multibit DAC

Amplification is NAC 552 pre, NAP 135s using NAC A5 speaker cable. 

All sitting on a Audiphillar rack.

Thanks in advance.

 

 

 

 

Posted on: 17 June 2018 by Chris Dolan
hungryhalibut posted:

The grilles are made in small numbers and have lots of complex shapes, so production is going to be expensive. They are, as said above, very high quality and make your speakers look good as new. Spending £220 to finish off a pair of speakers that would cost over £8,000 if still made today doesn’t seem unreasonable to me. I think it’s brilliant that James at Tom Tom took the commercial risk on this - Naim themselves didn’t do it - and it’s good to support him.  

If I recall correctly, the old school hot wire method of shaping the grills is no longer permitted - which made souring an appropriate and willing manufacturer a challenge. 

Posted on: 17 June 2018 by Khan

How would you describe the sound difference with and without?

The ones I have also have bits flaking off. Also as they are showing clear signs of wear they don’t look particularly nice when installed. 

 

Posted on: 17 June 2018 by S3

Kahn, they definitely sounded better with the grills on but, that said, I only tried it once and they looked a bit crap with no grills so I didn’t bother doing extensive comparisons.

Just get the replacement grills from Tom Tom and be done with it. You are then getting the full SL2 experience both visually and sonically.

Why you’d want to spend this amount of time and - presumably - cash procuring them and then scimp on the grills for a couple of hundred quid is beyond me but it’s your decision.

Posted on: 18 June 2018 by Khan

Thank S3. I’m more curious than anything about the difference in sound quality. As my previous experience with Harbeth speakers sometimes had me preferring the sound without the grilles and sometimes with them. For example the monitor 30.1 sounded more dynamic with the grills off. And the SHL5+ sounded more coherent with the grilles on. 

Regardless I agree that the SL2 look better with the grilles on. And, I will end up there. I still don’t agree that the grilles are good value. Especially as, in a few years I will probably have to purchase them again. But it’s what they cost and nothing can be done about that.

Thanks for your fast response btw  

I will give my impressions soon when the system beds in. ????

Posted on: 18 June 2018 by Sergey72vw

Without grills, the SL2 looks fantastic, on and sounds no worse in my opinion.