4 Days of no ’Bells and Whistles’ but a concentration of sound

Posted by: Jasonf on 16 October 2012

Chaps,


Thank you all for your very sound, sensible and intelligent advice over the past two and a half months. In kind and to your keen ears here is a summary of my first four days in possession of my new Naim audio equipment (UServe + ND5 XS + NAC152 XS + NAP155 XS).

I picked up my new Naim equipment on Saturday from the dealer here in Oslo, when I pulled up outside I could see the dealer and his colleagues demoing a Naim system to a prospective client. I opened the door and was immediately confronted by a wall of Naim sounds emanating from a black box in the middle of the room, it looked like an NDS and then my attention turned to the Ovators 600’s standing there in a very imposing manner. To my left I saw my boxes by the reception desk but walked past to investigate the demo in more detail and to say hello to my dealer who was standing tentatively with an IPad, the client sitting on a couch with a grin on his face but no foot tapping yet. A brief discussion with my dealer informed me that the client was in the market for a NDX or NDS, I left them alone…..


I arrived home and met my wife in the front garden planting bulbs, she looked at me and smiled knowingly, “Har du lust pÅ te” I asked her, as I excitedly walked into the house. My first thoughts were “put the kettle on, read the manuals and see whats what”. The ND5, NAC and NAP were to be situated on the ground floor living room/office on a Fraim Lite with four shelves, which I managed to get at an excellent deal on.  However, at this point the Lite had not been delivered, so to the horror of the Forum no doubt, I have positioned them on top of each other as a temporary measure. The UServe was to be positioned by the modem and router on the 1st floor where we have the main living room and kitchen. Our broadband is fibre optic and delivers excellent rates into the house, our contract is currently set at 40/40 Mbit/s). The router is a 2tb Time Capsule delivering simultaneously on both the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands, allowing all the devices on the network to use the most efficient band automatically and uses the latest 802.11n wireless technology. The UServe is connected to the router with a Cat 6, the router is connected to the modem with Cat 5e. I have one Ethernet port left and that will be for the ND5 when I decide on how to thread the cable from the ground floor up to the 1st floor, at this point I have been using WIFI to stream.

 

After about  1 and half hours the whole system was set up and I turned on the power to all boxes…wow! The UServe was on the network in a click of a finger, the ND5 found the network no problem. I had already downloaded the Nstream and Nserve apps for the I Phone…..I was ready to rock and roll. Firstly, to get used to the Nstream app on the iPhone, I checked out Naim’s suggested IRadio stations….and went for radio Paradise @ 320kbs. To my delight the ND5 picked up the stream almost immediately, a little buffering but very quick none the less. The sound was underwhelming, at this point I did not know what to expect as I had never streamed radio on anything and I was still using my old Eltax 400 Xtreme speakers wired up with banana plugged NAC’s @ 6m long. But in general I was very happy with the ‘ease of use’ and ‘simple accessibility’ that the app brings. 

 

Next up came the ripping test. I grabbed a few cd’s and bounded up the stairs to the 1st floor and eagerly slid in a cd (can’t remember which cd it was now). I then switched to the Nserve app and found set up and ‘ripping’ section. There was the cd in the process of ripping, connected to AMG to find the cd info and cover art, no errors, this is brilliant, but a little nerve racking. Seven minutes later the UServe ejected the cd and I peered down into the app under Albums and there it sat, cover art in place and as much info as one could wish for….at this point. I ran back down stairs and switched to NStream to play the cd…..it came streaming through my, now rather old looking speakers and filled the small room with sonic loveliness. Still I was not overwhelmed, I was just very, very relieved that everything was working as expected, straight out of the box, clean and simple, no drama and certainly no tears. 

 

After a few more rips, Tina pointed out that I did not need to run up and down the stairs to be near the ND5 to switch cd’s, I could sit on my arse on the couch on the first floor and play away....this is fantastic! I got to about 25 rips and then the UServe started making some unnerving noises, it was on Jef Buckleys’s Grace cd. The noises reminded me of many years ago when on old pc’s cd rom drive would often sound like it was speeding up like a fan noise trying to read the data on the cd but struggled but kept attempting. Speeding up, slowing down, speeding up slowing down, this was very unnerving. I watched intently, the cd was finally ripped but it took longer than other cd’s, approximately about 12 minutes. I checked for errors, none, I played the cd and it worked normally. I put in another cd and the same thing happened, the noise was quite audible as I could hear it from the ground floor through the stair well. Additionally, the chassis undergoes far more vibration during these types of rips but the unit does not seem to get hotter. This happened on three cd’s, the following cd went back to an almost silent rip process. I have no idea why this happened, why it happened on these particular cd’s, or if this is normal, and if normal, why is it normal??? It seems a rather inconsistent normal! In each case, however, the ripping process took longer, for Kruder and Dorfmeister´s KD Sessions, one cd took 22 minutes. This is either related to the UServe or its related to the cd, i.e. could it be that some cd´s are manufactured to a less quality than others and perhaps this is why the ripping software is taking much longer to read and rip the data on the cd? Perhaps the Forum can enlighten me on this matter? 

I continued to rip, listen and drink Chablis all evening until it was time for bed. 

 

So far I have ripped 79 cd´s taken at random. Last night I listened to tracks from various albums just to get a feeling on how the XS series was bedding in. Some comments that I would like to make at this point.

 

I noticed a big improvement in SQ, more on less produced music. For instance, when playing PJ Harvey´s Let England shake the instruments became far more pronounced or detailed in there work, clarity enveloped them and PJ Harvey's voice came out to play. But one major weird affect on the music replay is a kind of surreal ‘slowness’ or concentration of sound that seems to make the music feel deliberate. I first noticed this on The Rolling Stones Sympathy For The Devil, the percussion was more defined and the track actually felt stripped back to a raw sound as though I had been listening to the track in the past with lots of added bells and whistles, very odd. 

 

Then I played Chopin´s Nocturnes by Artur Rubenstien Piano, Op.9, CT. 108-110-No.1 in B flat major....my wife was literally speechless and commented that she had not heard anything quite as remarkable outside of the concert hall. It was a significant breakthrough in sound replay, and this is only after 4 days of warming in, I have much listening pleasure to look forward to.

 

Some notes then. Even though I am streaming over WiFi the SQ is immensely superior to my old system. I have had three drop outs in 4 days, each for about 3 seconds. My old speakers are reborn and are nothing like they used to be. Switching between Nstream and Nserve is a doddle, and so is editing information. No cd cover art is missing, no errors reported during any ripping process. The only downside on the I Phone apps is that there is no volume control???????? Not sure why that is as I swear I saw one on the IPad app????? Also, when I have changed the cover art in Nserve because AMG had retrieved the wrong cover, it does not change the cover art in Nstream but remains with the original cover art, any ideas there?. But of course I would like to get some feed back on the UServe issue mentioned above.

 

Anyway, I am a very happy person and am delighted with the initial results on my new audio storage and streaming solution. It is everything I imagined, seamless and simple and I don't even need to turn a pc on to listen to my cherished music, in many ways that is almost as important as the SQ for me.


And jesus, how many radio stations!


Many thanks to all.

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by Bart

Cheers Jason!  I am glad that things are settling in for you.

 

I have to say that the uServe behavior is "normal."  At least mine does that from time to time.  I do think that it has to do with the quality of cd's.  It is interesting that you are keeping your uServe not on the hi fi rack, but elsewhere.  When my NDS arrives, I may do this as well.  It's quite quiet when it's not ripping, but I might still keep it with my NAS, upstairs in the house, rather than on the hi fi rack.  I never see any errors reported and only once could it not find album art (which I easily put in manually).

 

I don't have my NDS yet so have never used nStream.  Isn't the volume control in nStream? It's definitely not in nServe.

 

As to Internet Radio -- I hear a huge difference in sound quality.  I do not expect it to sound nearly as good as a lossless music file, and indeed with lossy transmission bitrates it cannot.  I use it for 'background music' only, or I simply forgive its shortcomings.  Even 320kbps does not sound nearly like lossless.

 

All the best,

 

Bart

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by winkyincanada

(Strange noises emanating from Jeff Buckley's "Grace" isn't abnormal. Sorry that's another post.)

 

I think the CDs that are "difficult" to rip may in some cases have copy protection. Copy protection is actually just deliberate errors to confuse computers that are trying to extract a coherent and error-checked-and-free file. The U-serve (and most computer rippers) will struggle a little with copy-protected CDs.

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by Jasonf
Originally Posted by winkyincanada:

(Strange noises emanating from Jeff Buckley's "Grace" isn't abnormal. Sorry that's another post.)

 

I think the CDs that are "difficult" to rip may in some cases have copy protection. Copy protection is actually just deliberate errors to confuse computers that are trying to extract a coherent and error-checked-and-free file. The U-serve (and most computer rippers) will struggle a little with copy-protected CDs.

Lol, yes I read those comments after I posted this. Frankly I am astounded that you and can't hear anything 'good' let alone beautiful in Mr Buckleys' singing....next you will be telling me his father, Tim escapes you also.....that would be blasphemy

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by pixies

Hi Jason. Regarding the lack of volume control, Have you enabled system automation on the ND5XS setup menu and then connected the RC5 output from the ND5XS to the amp RC5 in ? If not then you won't get the volume option. This is explained in the manual but was an issue I had until advised by the forum. Good luck with the set up.

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by totemphile

Nice write up Jason and congratulations on your new Naim system! I'm sure you'll enjoy it loads for years to come. And the best is yet to come!

 

ATB

tp 

Posted on: 16 October 2012 by Guido Fawkes
Originally Posted by totemphile:

Nice write up Jason and congratulations on your new Naim system! I'm sure you'll enjoy it loads for years to come. And the best is yet to come!

 

ATB

tp 

+1 superb write up and great to read you're happy with your new system. 

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jan-Erik Nordoen
Originally Posted by Jasonf:

 

I arrived home and met my wife in the front garden planting bulbs, she looked at me and smiled knowingly, “Har du lust på te” I asked her, as I excitedly walked into the house.

 

No, no !, if you want to be a proper Norwegian it's "Har du lust på kaffe?"

 

After about  1 and half hours the whole system was set up and I turned on the power to all boxes…wow! The UServe was on the network in a click of a finger, the ND5 found the network no problem. I had already downloaded the Nstream and Nserve apps for the I Phone…..I was ready to rock and roll. 

 

That's the beauty of the UnitiServe ; it just works (and the network players of course).

 

Next up came the ripping test. I grabbed a few cd’s and bounded up the stairs to the 1st floor and eagerly slid in a cd (can’t remember which cd it was now). I then switched to the Nserve app and found set up and ‘ripping’ section. There was the cd in the process of ripping, connected to AMG to find the cd info and cover art, no errors, this is brilliant, but a little nerve racking. Seven minutes later the UServe ejected the cd...

 

Sometimes, it's a little enthusiastic ; you may find your disc on the floor. 

 

After a few more rips, Tina pointed out that I did not need to run up and down the stairs to be near the ND5 to switch cd’s, I could sit on my arse on the couch on the first floor and play away....this is fantastic! I got to about 25 rips and then the UServe started making some unnerving noises, it was on Jef Buckleys’s Grace cd. The noises reminded me of many years ago when on old pc’s cd rom drive would often sound like it was speeding up like a fan noise trying to read the data on the cd but struggled but kept attempting. Speeding up, slowing down, speeding up slowing down, this was very unnerving. I watched intently, the cd was finally ripped but it took longer than other cd’s, approximately about 12 minutes. I checked for errors, none, I played the cd and it worked normally. I put in another cd and the same thing happened, the noise was quite audible as I could hear it from the ground floor through the stair well. Additionally, the chassis undergoes far more vibration during these types of rips but the unit does not seem to get hotter. This happened on three cd’s, the following cd went back to an almost silent rip process. I have no idea why this happened, why it happened on these particular cd’s, or if this is normal, and if normal, why is it normal???

 

https://forums.naimaudio.com/di...ly=15504822859951583

 

It seems a rather inconsistent normal! In each case, however, the ripping process took longer, for Kruder and Dorfmeister´s KD Sessions, one cd took 22 minutes. This is either related to the UServe or its related to the cd, i.e. could it be that some cd´s are manufactured to a less quality than others and perhaps this is why the ripping software is taking much longer to read and rip the data on the cd? Perhaps the Forum can enlighten me on this matter? 

 

As others have mentioned, was the disc copy-controlled ? or damaged ?

 

I continued to rip, listen and drink Chablis all evening until it was time for bed. 

 

No, no !, if you want to be a proper Norwegian it's aquavit, preferably this one (track your own bottle !)

 

http://www.linie.com/

 

  

I noticed a big improvement in SQ, more on less produced music. For instance, when playing PJ Harvey´s Let England shake the instruments became far more pronounced or detailed in there work, clarity enveloped them and PJ Harvey's voice came out to play. But one major weird affect on the music replay is a kind of surreal ‘slowness’ or concentration of sound that seems to make the music feel deliberate. 

 

I've also found this effect, it's a sign of a very high level of audio reproduction. I get it during live concerts too. It's as though time is stretched somehow (and no it wasn't the aquavit). 

 

Anyway, I am a very happy person and am delighted with the initial results on my new audio storage and streaming solution. It is everything I imagined, seamless and simple and I don't even need to turn a pc on to listen to my cherished music, in many ways that is almost as important as the SQ for me.


And jesus, how many radio stations!


Many thanks to all.

Thanks for writing ; always fun to read your thoughts,

 

Jan

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by maze
What a lovely descriptive prose Jason, beautifully written, reads like a novel.I have read many of your posts re what you may or may not purchase so good to read what you eventually bought. My userve makes much the same kind of noise, as I think they all do. When I moved from my nait 5i to the Nait xs I was not impressed with the sound at first, to be honest it sounded horrid compared to the 5i it replaced, however after a month or so it really came together and now sounds great. I leave it powered all the time but a couple of weeks back switched off the system as a experiment to see how it affected the sound quality, only powering the system up each evening. The system sounded just like when I first got the xs, horrid so have gone back to always powering the system. Strangely it took a few days of powering down for the sound to change to worse. I am assuming you got the 2tb userve? I think the volume control is only available on the nstream app not the nserve app. Happy listening.
Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jasonf
Originally Posted by pixies:

Hi Jason. Regarding the lack of volume control, Have you enabled system automation on the ND5XS setup menu and then connected the RC5 output from the ND5XS to the amp RC5 in ? If not then you won't get the volume option. This is explained in the manual but was an issue I had until advised by the forum. Good luck with the set up.

 

Originally Posted by AllenB:

Congratulations Jason on your new system, you are in for some good times 

 

The swings in sounds are the normal burning in process, things should settle after a week, but there may be a few more swings when the PSu's fully bed in.

 

Look into system automation to 'activate' volume control via the app. You'll need a cable as mentioned above by pixies.

 

Whenever you change anything in the UServe, even just album art, you need to 'Refresh' the share (where the music is stored) and possibly also refresh the cover art cache on nStream in the case of latest album art not showing.

 

Enjoy!

 

Allen

Hi Pixie/Allen, yes you are right...I really should read the manuals in full and get that volume control sorted out.

 

Bart/Winky, thanks for putting my mind at rest on the cd ripping nervousness. It makes sense that there would be a certain amount of copy security measures. I will go with the flow on this and ignore any indecent whirring sounds...until that little bit of plastic falls off from the TEAC cd mechanism.

 

Jan, it would usually be Kaffe, except my wife is now very partial to tea with milk and it would normally be aquavit, however I am now slowly converting the entire nation to Port, particularly Taylors 20 Year Tawny and Fonseca 20 Year Tawny and you may have read on a previous post where I am also converting the entire nation to embrace the sauna with more vigour and enthusiasm. Thats not going so well as I think there may be some pride involved as regard to a Swedish inferiority complex going down in some quarters. Also, what isn't going down very well is converting them to Marmite, that is a tough nut to crack. Talking of nuts, I have managed to introduce conkers to some close friends, they were slightly perturbed in the beginning when they realised that there were some hitting and bashing involved. I have some beauties sitting here in my hallway ready to be put in vinegar for next season. I think every young lad should engage in a bit of conker bashing

 

Now I am sitting here listening to Nick Cave's Red Right Hand on the Let Love In cd, with a glass of Regale....I think Debs should know this one.......

 

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jasonf

Oh, I forgot to say to Bart that I was recommended by my dealer and some forum members, TP et al. to place the UServe away from the hifi boxes to prevent any interference........erm, just have to say, Neil Young's Down By The River is.......coming across all sonic loveliness.

 

I have also noticed that the streamer is picking up IRadio, not from the UServe or the router but from the modern, or to be more precise my provider before it reaches the router as I switched off the UServe and router to do some experiments and discovered this. Now that may seem bloody obvious to most here but yet another thing that did not occur to me.

 

I guess the next question in terms of router is that I should purchase a switch as when I was downloading a heavy file there was some drop out on the stream from the UServe, although I am still using the WiFi. But I think I read somewhere that Naim recommend a switch even on a hardwired connection, would the Forum concur?

 

Cheers.

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jan-Erik Nordoen

You think it's good now, wait 'til you get the hardwired connection in. Yes a switch is optimal, because it isolates your audio system from other traffic on the network.

 

... Swedish inferiority complex ? as in Norwegians making jokes about the Swedish ? (and the Swedish making jokes about the Danes... I wonder who the Danes joke about. Canadians ?)

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jasonf

Yeah, its been a bit of a scandinavian few days what with Elsa blowing her top.

 

I have met a few Swedes and have some Swedish friends are they tend to be a little more chilled out and relaxed than the Norwegians, the Danes are still a mystery to me, can't stand that very guttural accent, the Norwegian accent is nicer to my ears than either the Swedes or the Danes, its a little more singing.

 

I think the Danes joke about the Norwegians and the Swedes...and then knuckle down to some furniture making or speaker cabinet making because they certainly can't talk to each other as they can't understand each other.

 

Cheers.

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Bart
Originally Posted by AllenB:

 

Whenever you change anything in the UServe, even just album art, you need to 'Refresh' the share (where the music is stored) and possibly also refresh the cover art cache on nStream in the case of latest album art not showing.

 

Enjoy!

 

Allen

+100

Sometimes I actually have to do this several times.  It's my ONE complaint about the uServe.  But to be fair mine has been the 1TB model, and it is about to be shipped back to me as the current 2TB model, including several hardware and firmware updates.  So I will report back if this behaviour has improved.

 

iRadio -- both the streamer and the uServe can play iRadio.  But with your setup, yes I'd think you'd use the streamer to do it.

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Iver van de Zand

Super writing Jason .... I enjoy your posts !

Posted on: 17 October 2012 by Jan-Erik Nordoen

One other thing about the UnitiServe. After shutting down from the front logo, make sure that you also turn the unit off with the switch on the back. If not - and there's a power outage - the boot sector can become corrupted from the power surge and the unit will not start up. Happened to mine.

Posted on: 20 October 2012 by Jasonf
Just a quick comment on cover art retrieval. I have noticed that 99% of the time a better quality cover art could be used instead of the one that is downloaded by AMG or freedb. It seems that as there are at least 5 versions of the same image, it almost always picks one of the lesser quality ones.

This is not a big problem as its just a variation on the hue and contrast, but so far with 150 downloads, I have manually downloaded better quality cover art on 99% of them. So I am now checking each download for a better cover art as I go.

Cheers.
Posted on: 20 October 2012 by totemphile

Are you using one of those evil PCs or Macs to do that Jason, you know that horrible computer stuff 

Posted on: 20 October 2012 by Russ

Jason: I join those who very much enjoyed your long, excellent post sharing your experience with all of us.  I envy you and Bart and anyone else who ones one, your Unitiserve!

 

Russ

Posted on: 22 October 2012 by Jasonf
Hey Daniel, I am using the nStream Iphone app to edit the cover art...its not as fiddly as one would expect. The only slight problem is scale...focusing on a 7mm square image its not ideal for someone with eyesight issues so an Ipad or macbook would be better.

Since I bought the Iphone my surfing habits have changed, I rarely turn on the Macbook these days to surf the web and instead just use the Iphone as its always on and at hand. When I need to write a long post for the Forum then I will turn on the Mac, but otherwise its left off. But I have often felt that a 'computer' is a massive overkill for the majority of home users as most people only use it to surf the web. I guess as Ipads get more advanced (storage capacity and speed) along with the phone and people start to store their stuff in clouds then the laptop will also become redundant in the home. While I am in a prediction mode, I also predict that the tv will take over many of the roles of the pc for entertainment...as it already has, such as full web surfing, apps downloading films etc.....so the pc in the home is soon to be extinct in its present form.

And, I also predict Daniel, that you will come and visit me in Oslo soon.........perhaps to pontificate on my new Naim set-up, you could also give me some tweaking tips while we knock back some ales and then indulge in some 20 year old Tawny.
Posted on: 22 October 2012 by Jasonf
Originally Posted by Russ:

       

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Jason: I join those who very much enjoyed your long, excellent post sharing your experience with all of us.  I envy you and Bart and anyone else who ones one, your Unitiserve!

 

Russ




Hi Russ, likewise with your posts, very entertaining.

I am interested in your experience in planning and executing your electrical wiring audio Utopia. I noticed that you have discussed it occasionally here on the Forum, but it would be great to get some insites into any special approaches you took with your electrical engineer/electrician, if any. I know from experience that one could spend an inordinate amount of money if one wished. For example have you considered the issue of  EMF (power frequency electrical fields) in the home???

By the way I got your long and rather macabre story. As I was reading it it reminded me of a scene from the excellent film Deliverance with Burt Reynolds, and I could hear that very skillful banjo duel as that crazed dog chased its tale into oblivion.
Posted on: 29 October 2012 by totemphile
Originally Posted by Jasonf:
Hey Daniel, I am using the nStream Iphone app to edit the cover art...its not as fiddly as one would expect. The only slight problem is scale...focusing on a 7mm square image its not ideal for someone with eyesight issues so an Ipad or macbook would be better.

Since I bought the Iphone my surfing habits have changed, I rarely turn on the Macbook these days to surf the web and instead just use the Iphone as its always on and at hand. When I need to write a long post for the Forum then I will turn on the Mac, but otherwise its left off. But I have often felt that a 'computer' is a massive overkill for the majority of home users as most people only use it to surf the web. I guess as Ipads get more advanced (storage capacity and speed) along with the phone and people start to store their stuff in clouds then the laptop will also become redundant in the home. While I am in a prediction mode, I also predict that the tv will take over many of the roles of the pc for entertainment...as it already has, such as full web surfing, apps downloading films etc.....so the pc in the home is soon to be extinct in its present form.

And, I also predict Daniel, that you will come and visit me in Oslo soon.........perhaps to pontificate on my new Naim set-up, you could also give me some tweaking tips while we knock back some ales and then indulge in some 20 year old Tawny.

You never know Jason, it could indeed happen soonish, 2013 sounds like an option

Btw. you may want to consider an iPad as your control unit at some point in the future, the user experience is so much nicer and with the system you now have, well, it deserves one.....

 

Enjoy!

Posted on: 29 October 2012 by Russ

Jasonf:  For some reason I failed to notice your answer to my previous post, until just now.  I am unsure whether by the effects of EMF you mean health issues or effect on SQ--I am assuming from the context that you mean the latter.  And of course the answer is that I have thought about it in the simplest terms (for that matter, the only terms in which I am competent to think about it ) but have decided for my aging ears, it would constitute overkill of the worst sort. 

 

I was very fortunate that the idea of acquiring a classic two-channel rig (I have never cared for surround sound, personally), while the house was still in the planning stage.  I did, as you may have seen, ascertain that local codes would make it difficult, if not impossible, to come out of my meter (or in the UK, consumer unit) with a separate set of service entrance wires to a separate main breaker.  But I am having a separate 20 amp 115 volt circuit installed to (as previously suggested on this forum) four c(ommercial quality outlets.  Also, the electrician approached me yesterday with the news that we have so many lights and outlets in the house, that he ran out of space in the huge (200 amp) breaker box--and would have to install a second, sub-panel for the remaining outlets.  So I took the opportunity to:

 

1.  put my dedicated Hi Fi circuit on that box--feeling that the further isolation of another sub "main" breaker might be of help.

 

2.  limit the additional outlets and lighting circuits on the new sub-panel to those in the attic--for the simple reason that, incredible super human that I admittedly am, I will not be able to be in the living room listening to music and up in the attic, doing God-only-know what!  So whatever lights or devices I may have up there will always be off when the Superuniti is on.

 

As you probably also saw elsewhere, I have taken the advice of not having mains lines running parallel to the NAC-A5 anywhere (well, almost anywhere--there is one area in the wall where I could not avoid it for a couple of feet--but hopefully that will not matter.  I seriously doubt if I would notice it if it did.  (Did I mention that as a teenager, I dug swimming pools out of solid rock with a jackhammer and fired hundreds of rounds with high-powered rifles?Not exactly conducive to becoming a discriminating audiophile later in life--kind of like taking up wine tasting as a hobby after having your tongue amputated!   

 

While on the subject of "local codes", you might consider forgiving me one small step up onto my soap box: The house we are building is about 3/4 mile from a bay which separates us from the Gulf of Mexico by some four miles total.  The building site is 18 feet above sea level--so a Katrina-class storm would be problematical, though unlikely in this area.  Anything else would be survivable--the house is so solidly built (with 2x6 studs, 140 mile per hour rated roof, and impact-resistant windows that will withstand repeated blows from a sledge hammer without compromising the envelope of the house.  In short, the structure will float or fly as a unit.    I am having it built to what is known as "Miami-Dade County" standards, whereever possible--even though our area is less susceptible to the super hurricane winds that haunt that area.  But when it came time to buy doors--the local bureaucrats would not accept the same units that had passed he higher Miami-Dade standards--unless of course, the company had spent an additional hundred-thousand dollars or so, testing them in Texas.  Have I mentioned that government--not money--is the root of all evil?

 

As to a controller, I currently use my iphone, and have considered buying an ipad, but am thinking that perhaps the new mini ipad might be the ideal dedicated controller for nstream and perhaps one day, nserve.  It would, by way of just one example, be large enough to avoid mistakenly hitting the list of iradio presets when trying to increase the volume--but not so large as to feel like a small dog sitting in your lap. 

 

 

Best regards,

 

Russ

Posted on: 30 October 2012 by Disposable hero

Your success with your new ND5 XS has encouraged me more now towards this option

 

When you say three drop outs in 4 days, is that just as short blips in wi-fi connection, or complete drop out needing power on/off to reset or some similar action?

Posted on: 31 October 2012 by Jasonf
Originally Posted by Disposable hero:

       

         class="quotedText">
       

Your success with your new ND5 XS has encouraged me more now towards this option

 

When you say three drop outs in 4 days, is that just as short blips in wi-fi connection, or complete drop out needing power on/off to reset or some similar action?




Hi Dis -

It has now been nearly 3 weeks since I first turned on the system and it is now singing very nicely...a big improvement over the first few days....although my wife is pretending otherwise

I think I need to clarify the signal drop outs.

I am still using WiFi. The ND5 is one floor down from the Time Capsule and also not directly underneath, I would say about 5-6metres as the crow flies, through a 275mm thick rafted timber floor which has Rockwool insulation stuffed between the rafters.

Yes, short signal blips in WIFi not power related. When I first mentioned them in a previous post they were related to the IRadio signal, which was streaming directly from my provider and not from the UServe, so that was a service provider issue and not Naim.

However, I have also had similar drop outs when streaming ripped music from the UServe during the ripping process and these were also short, lasting about three seconds. Also the drops out only happened on very few ripping occasions, I think when the ripping is taking longer on difficult cd's. I have not had signal drop outs when only streaming ripped music from the UServe. I notice that Bart, for instance, does not stream whilst ripping.

I don't know if using a Cat 6 cable will cure the drop outs whilst streaming and ripping. But I am amazed that the UServe is able to do both at the same time with out other issues.

So far Disp, I can safely say that streaming to the ND5 from the UServe via WiFi is producing excellent SQ in my setup, to an extent that I often forget about the problem of deciding how I am going to feed the Cat 6 from the ND5 to the UServe. I will probably wait until the new year as the SQ is so good, and to my inexperienced ears I may not even notice a difference.

That question is probably worth a new thread

Cheers.
Posted on: 31 October 2012 by Jasonf
Originally Posted by totemphile:

       

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Originally Posted by Jasonf:
Hey Daniel, I am using the nStream Iphone app to edit the cover art...its not as fiddly as one would expect. The only slight problem is scale...focusing on a 7mm square image its not ideal for someone with eyesight issues so an Ipad or macbook would be better.

Since I bought the Iphone my surfing habits have changed, I rarely turn on the Macbook these days to surf the web and instead just use the Iphone as its always on and at hand. When I need to write a long post for the Forum then I will turn on the Mac, but otherwise its left off. But I have often felt that a 'computer' is a massive overkill for the majority of home users as most people only use it to surf the web. I guess as Ipads get more advanced (storage capacity and speed) along with the phone and people start to store their stuff in clouds then the laptop will also become redundant in the home. While I am in a prediction mode, I also predict that the tv will take over many of the roles of the pc for entertainment...as it already has, such as full web surfing, apps downloading films etc.....so the pc in the home is soon to be extinct in its present form.

And, I also predict Daniel, that you will come and visit me in Oslo soon.........perhaps to pontificate on my new Naim set-up, you could also give me some tweaking tips while we knock back some ales and then indulge in some 20 year old Tawny.

You never know Jason, it could indeed happen soonish, 2013 sounds like an option

Btw. you may want to consider an iPad as your control unit at some point in the future, the user experience is so much nicer and with the system you now have, well, it deserves one.....

 

Enjoy!




Anytime Daniel, we have space.

I think, as Russ mentioned below, I will get the IPad mini as a dedicated Naim 'roots' controller as the IPhone app has its shortcomings, very timely that.

Cheers.