Using NDS AND nDAC?

You will see this discussed on the main NDS thread.

Caifornia Jim

The general concensus was that the NDS is much better than the DAC - one dealer suggested that the NDS with a XP5XS was better than a DAC with a 555PS, so an NDS with a 555PS DR must sound pretty fine indeed...!

As a nds 555ps owner who was previously a ndac 555ps owner. I can't help noticing in the manual for the nds, under the specs it lists the hiline and dac as upgrades.

With the demo I did, the current ndac was outclassed by the nds. Perhaps yet another reason not to read the manual! Unless there is a higher level dac on the cards?

Hi Dave I suggest you listen if you haven't already - I dont want to pour water on the bonfire, but that clearly was not the case for me in my listening expierience - and I was suprised - and then not when you look at the unerlying technology - at best I found them similar with a slight differnt audio presentation. But true the NDAC does appear sensitive to what is feeding it - but the  NDX with the newest firmware (that more closely matches the NDS) is truly stellar with an NDAC/555PS and RFI chokes, but the NDS reduces the box count which is probably its major advantage for many.

Simon

I get what you are saying Simon, but from the limited time I have spent listening to the NDS it seemed a little more fluid and organic than the DAC. Certainly not night and day, as at this level there is always the law of diminishing returns to contend with. 

I have a DAC with a 555PS DR, a DC1 with ferrites fed from a Transporter (which despite its age still seems to give newer Streamers a run for their money - at least up to 24/96) I'll get an NDS at home soon I hope so I can get a more extended comparative demo and then decide for sure if the NDS is a keeper. If not, I'm well on the way to saving for a 552 

Dave great stuff.. I too am looking to have an extended NDS home demo... Just to hear if that difference, if now there,  is sufficiently compelling onmy system or is even a backward step. (been there before with Naim products, and I am not too precious about box count)  I do admit I was totally gobsmacked at the recent performance boost in terms of tonal layering and subtle bottom and top end extension with the latest NDXfirmware when feeding the NDAC (which I understand brings it more into line with the NDS firmware). So much so I wrote to Naim about it enquiring what they had done.