Sore point

I suppose this depends on who you ask.

From my perspective, anything above a cd3.5/72/hi/250 is poor VFM in the Naim line. But, this equation changes for people (and, I assume, even for me) as salary rises.

I used to think that I would happily drive a $6,000 used Civic and own a CDS2/52/SC/active/135's system. Now, I'd much rather have a BMW and the more modest system above. Whereas I think the more expensive system is something like 5-10% better than the less expensive one, the BMW is 200-300% better than my Civic. AND, the BMW is even more fun to drive. The more expensive Naim systems (in my experience) have NEVER been more fun to listen to (quite the opposite, really).

Judd

Naim has raised the game with the new gear though - check out the 52/500 vs. 552/135's thread.

Putting the 552 and 500 together leads to a 'multiplicative' increase in performance so VFM and diminishing returns concepts get a bit of a beating if you are in a position to consider kit at that level.

- GregB

Insert Witty Signature Line Here

John

Good point and nice to see the lovely word 'denizens'.

To spend £500 on a complete system from Mr Richer would be obscene and ludicrous to someone starving on the other side of the world.

I reckon people start bleating about poor v.f.m. when they can't afford it.

If you have £50,000 and choose to spend it on a Hi-Fi system, that gives you pleasure; it's excellent v.f.m.

John

VFM is as personal as speaker choice, with as many different opinions.

I'm about to audition a Naim system tomorrow and VFM is quite high on my agenda. I am thinking in the same way as I do about quality wine. Is a £20 bottle four times as good as a £5 bottle? Maybe not. Is the difference sufficient for me to justify spending the extra at the moment? Generally, yes. I've also tried a few £50 bottles and for me, with my current palate, income and other variables the extra wasn't worth it. Yet people do buy bottles costing many hundreds of pounds.

The system I am thinking about is CD5, Nait5 and Intro2's. Will this be a justifiable step up from my current surround system (which I do enjoy and is noticeably better than an all in one)? I expect so. Will I prefer Naim to other price comparable manufacturers? I don't know, personal taste again, that's why I'm going to listen

Back to VFM, if I do like Naim (I hope so, I want to become a 'proper' member of this forum) I will then listen to the Flatcap 2 and decide whether, for me, it represents a big enough upgrade. Same again for the 112/150 over Nait5. I'll stop there because that is where the budget runs out! However, in the future, if I have more spare money and 'upgraditis', these values may change.

In absolute terms selling the wife, children, house and car, moving to a dedicated caravan (on a mana/hutter/fraim), 300m from the power station, with dedicated feeds directly from the generators into CDS3, 552, 3 x 500 and DBL's maybe a little on the obsessive side. But I'll bet it sounds fantastic, and for someone with enough music, a refined ear and plenty of spare time it MIGHT be value for the money and other sacrifices.

The rest of us live somewhere in the middle, exact location? Back to personal choice!

Seth

ps

quote:

---

In this sense, to me my system is value for money. To others I may have a rare and dangerous mental illness...

---

All my work colleagues think I'm mad even to be considering £3k on Hi-Fi!

I agree with Justin, The distortion in the lower naim range can be quite pleasing to the ear. I,ve read a few threads on people downgrading there sistem and prefering it. but there are also people who prefere a more refined sound.

Great responses and fun to read.
I have friends here who play golf every weekend at about USD200 per time and they love it .... but when they need to see a Doctor and come to my clinic they complain we are too expensive at USD50!

VFM is in the eye of the beholder.

John

I was going to suggest that one should have a sore point seen to by a doctor... but clearly you can take care of that yourself.

The whole value question can be a difficult one, provoke nearly as much argument and insult as "Stand Wars" tm. You can read more on this subject in this historical Naim Forum thread

Whether via rationalisation, justification, delusion, or just plain living the "big boys toys" dream, those with the kit stashed in their lounges are usually happy with it. Strangely enough, people are more likely to question the taste of a Rolls Royce owner than to wonder why said person would outlay such a sum on a mere automobile. Same goes for real estate, decent televisions, cookware, kitchen knives, steak, wine, oysters, champagne, diamonds, drugs, beer, and the minuitae of goods and services at the disposal of one's ready cash.

Rather than ask "how", perhaps spend a week with (say) CDSII/52/135's/SBL... enjoy, listen to music, ask no questions until you've returned to what you've had before. The great thing is you should indeed be happy with your current Naim system, but instead have a greater appreciation of "why" those with 552/500 class kit have stumped up for it.

Besides - who needs to chase a little white ball around a manicured lawn?

YMMV.

Rico - SM/Mullet Audio

I visited Washington DC last summer and went to the library there, you know, the big one. Within its walls there is a room that has a number of Stradivarius violins and such. An endowment was set up by some very forward thinking women to purchase these instruments and have people write new music works to be played on them and to have the Juliard (i think)musicians come in regularly to play them. At any rate, one of the violins belonged to a famous early twentieth century musician who had a penchant for violin collecting and gambling. He also avoided paying taxes on his gambling winnings. To pay his taxes, when cornered by the IRS, he traded his violin which by now is worth over two million dollars. Not to me it isn't though. I couldn't play it well enough to make it worth 50 bucks.

A lovely naim system, worth a fairly small fraction of that amount, can bring you pretty close to the magic that an instrument such as that is able to make at the hands of the worlds finest musical interpreters.

It ain't live, but it can come alive, and touch you in a way that a Rolls Royce, Parcel of land, or cut of mutton cannot.

But there are also greater pleasures. Sun on your face, perhaps. But do you know how expensive it would be to manufacture a ball of gas the size of the sun?

I love music, and naim provide access to what I think is the source of that magic. It is not sound stage or bass slam or value for money, it is connection with music, with humans, with myself.

VFM, what does it mean?

Connon

John,

I am no psychologist but IMHO VFM is totally subjective.

Getting VFM means that you are optimising a limited resource, money.

Since the price of Naim gear roughly doubles with each upgrade that means that prices rise exponentially. Whether performance rises exponontially is hard to argue as performance can not be measured in numerical terms.

However with most of us there comes a point where what we desire exceeds what we can comfortably afford and so we need to justify those expenses.

Having those choices brought to question by arguing that Naim, or high end Naim, is not VFM would then make many of us uncomfortable.

So VFM all depends on how rich you are. The less money you have, the less VFM expensive products are, as their purchase forces you to loose value in other aspects of life.

cheers
Gus

I have enjoyed reading this thread and seeing how we all - including myself - justify to ourselves the "toys" we spend our money on.
But, interesting as all the responses are, I was thinking more along the lines of a quote I just stumbled across today in an old Stereophile review of the Nait 2. by Sam Tellig and Robert Harley.(Sorry I don't know how to cut and paste into the forum but the article is under the Stereophile Archives, August 1985.

I quote "The Naim looks very cheaply made, inside and out - like it took $40 worth of parts and $40 worth of labour to build" (Listed retail at that time in USA was $395 according to the article)

That's the kind of basic angle I was trying to get at by alluding to by VFM ... especially for an old design like the 250 which must cost diddly squat to build.

JohnMak,

I see your point. Your original posting was interpreted as is it worth spending this much on HiFi rather than is the kit worth what I paid for, it terms of the cost of manufacture.

I have my doubts about this second point. About 12 or more years ago I bought a pair of Lambda Electrostatic Headphones and an energizer (a small amplifier and power supply for the headphones). The energizer cost 240 GBP.

After a few weeks use, I had reason to think that the energizer had failed. I thought that I would open it up myself and fix it (I probably wouldn't do that now).

I would say that the components would have cost about 5 to 10 GBP, in quantity, very much less. The quality of construction was about cheap transistor radio quality. Cost of manufacture, maybe 15 to 30 GBP at most.

So poor VFM in terms of what you get. But good VFM in terms of how well it works. The headphones do sound good.

I try never to pay more for a box of electronics than about 6 or 7 times the likely cost of what's in it.

I remember from my days as an electronics engineer, a good rule of thumb was that the factory cost of a piece of electronics was about 3 times the component cost. So allowing for retail mark-up, say 6 times.

Perhaps we can allow a little more to cover R&D, bringing the price up to, say, 7 times the component cost.

I have recently bought other units where I suspect that the factory cost was much, much less than half of what I paid.

Regards,

Paul.

JohnMak,

I agree with you as well. I am a physician as well and find it amazing how people value money differently. People deem medical care as secondary to other things. For instance, people will spend money on going to restaurants, but they will whine and complain about spending 50 bucks on health measures that can prevent much pain in the future. many people dont value health care and complain about it incessantly. People expect health care for whatever reasons and they expect it cheaply.

Go figure. We all spend money on things that make us happy. If 10k on a stereo makes you happy in this crazy world, so be it. There is no price on happiness.

quote:

---

That's the kind of basic angle I was trying to get at by alluding to by VFM ... especially for an old design like the 250 which must cost diddly squat to build.

---

You know how much labour it takes to make a 250? What the parts rejection rate is? Which components are hand selected, and at what cost?

People just make these assumptions (the HiCap was in vogue a couple of years ago - "oh thats just a coil, recti bridge and a couple of 317's - I can knock that up in an afternoon"... yet were unable to build better)... that its just a few parts slung together in a case. Production engineering is a different science altogether.

Under this argument your 250 would clearly be poor VFM and you're better off with Sony ES (oh whoops, often badge-engineered Sony product).

I'm off to listen to some music. Try *that* on your ES!

Rico - SM/Mullet Audio