Speaker advice for Uniti Atom

The problem with speaker recommendations is that the crucial thing is getting them to match you room. The only way to find a good match is to try speakers for yourself, and a good dealer is invaluable for this. As a starting point, I would look for dealers who stock some brands that are popular with other Naim users. This might include Kudos, Neat, Dynaudio and Proac for starters. 

Good luck!

Thank you Chrissu for your advice. I agree that room size and placement are very, very important for speaker sound. Our living room area is a little difficult to work with in regards to speaker placement, so that's a challenge. After the speakers, I will be looking into decorative acoustic treatment next.

I have taken a quick look online on the speaker brands you mentioned. I haven't found a dealer which has 2 or more of these brands in stock - and the dealer where we got our Atom doesn't have any of them. So if I decide to put any of them on my list, it will mean some travelling. Luckily our country is the size of a postage stamp

Yes, it can take some time and effort to find the right speakers. The help of a good dealer is almost as important as the speakers themselves. Alternatively, look for used speakers, try them at home for a while, and you can sell them with little loss if you don’t like them. Speakers often depreciate a lot, so this can be an effective route to take. 

I've looked into the four brands you've mentioned Chrissu. Thanks for bringing them to my attention. 

Kudos doesn't look like an option for me - the base model X2 is already close to my max budget and the reviews I've found of it, aren't very good.

The Neat Motive SX2 look interesting but they have low sensitivity (86dB) and the minimum required power is 35W. I doubt the Atom can make these speakers come alive.

Dynaudio - the only set that seem to fit my criteria are the Excite X38 but the reviews I've found make me doubt if they are the right ones in our room.

Proac - To be honest, i like the looks of our Yara set better than any of the Proac.

I will revert back to our dealer and set up some listening appointments. 

Like you I was looking for a pair of floor standers to go with my Nova.

listened to most of the usual candidates up to £4,000 before deciding on Dynaudio Special 40s.

Although they are stand mounted they are difficult to beat at their price level of £2,500.

Thank you John, I will look into them. Although they are slightly above my budget

My gorgeous Classic 10's are yours for only €900   

My gorgeous Classic 10's are yours for only €900 

You mention the Kudos X2 but I use my Atom with the Kudos X3 which I'm pretty sure is within your budget (I think they're about £2,200 or less if you fight for a deal).
I find them to be a great match to the Atom and enjoy them.
However, I now kind of wish I'd paid an extra £1000 and bought the Neat Iota Xplorer, which I thought absolutely stunning but somewhat over budget.
I should have re-thought my budget!

I feel that getting speakers to match your room and your personal sound preferences is very much more important than the paper specifications (which, in practice, don't actually tell you very much about how a speaker will sound with any particular system).

Try taking the Atom (and a memory stick with your demo music) around to a load of audio dealers, and see what speakers they come up with!  (One advantage of the Atom is that it's pretty much self-contained and relatively portable!)

???? Naim_Newbie,....Naim Allae,..88-89db,6 ohms.

You can buy them preloved for £ 700:-,cost new around £ 3800:-
An underrated Naim speaker.

/Peder ????

The Allaes cost around £2,500 when they were discontinued. 

Thanks everyone for your help! I've made an Excel sheet with the speakers we would like to test, with pricing, specs and stores to find them. I have a list of 12 speaker choices across 9 different brands, so that should keep us busy for a while. Saturday is our first appointment to test Golden Ear, Sonus Faber, ELAC and Monitor Audio. Next week we will go to a different store to test Focal, Dynaudio, KEF and Audio Physic. And a third store for the Neat. I am very happy that I've been able to locate all the types in only three stores.

There is one set of speakers in my list which is €1000 above my budget but I'm just so very curious to hear them: Sonus Faber Sonetto III. They look absolutely beautiful.

I will of course update this thread with my findings. Please if you have any more advice for me, I'd love to read it.

hungryhalibut posted:

The Allaes cost around £2,500 when they were discontinued. 

???? Hungryhaligut,....Ok..In Sweden,they cost around £3800:- the last year they where produced.
It is always good to live in the same country as they are produced in,it always becomes a bit cheaper ????.

In any case,it's not a bad speaker.
I think it was 2013 that they stopped being manufactured.?

/Peder ????

Peder posted:

In any case, [Naim Allaes are] not a bad speaker.

They are bloody excellent speakers. Then again, I'm biased :-)

Christopher_M posted:

Peder posted:

In any case, [Naim Allaes are] not a bad speaker.

They are bloody excellent speakers. Then again, I'm biased :-)

???? Christopher_M,.....I know you are????????.

/Peder????