My first Naim system

Posted by: Lanesra on 31 January 2016

Just before Christmas I was fortunate enough to receive a sum of money from a legacy, which has finally enabled me to afford my first Naim system. Yesterday, my wife and I visited the Sound Organisation in York to listen to a demo of a pretty high up the food chain Linn/ Naim system: Linn LP12/Ekos, NAC-N272 pre-amp/ XP5 XS power supply, NAP250 power amp, SuperLine phono stage/ HI-CAP power supply and CD5 XS CD player/ HI-CAP power supply driving Spendor A6R's and Neat Motive SX2's.

This not surprisingly sounded fantastic. However, there are a few issues:

I own a heavily upgraded Manticore Mantra/Musician arm/MB6 power supply, which I was unable to bring to the demo as I have to catch a 'plane to visit any hi-fi dealer. So, is it going to do justice to the proposed system?
Even though I can afford the system and am keen to purchase it, my wife doesn't like the idea of me spending so much money on a hi-fi system. Is she right on this, as it's a massive upgrade on my current Cyrus CD6/ Cyrus 6 amp/ Quad 11L system? My logic is to get several upgrades done at once (i.e. top of the range phono pre-amp + buying power supplys straight away), thus saving me money in the long term.
I preferred the Neats for their "fun" sound quality. The Spendors sounded more detailed in the mid-range and with vocals and the bass was deep but slightly soft, but they lacked the drive and tightness of the Neats. My wife, in the demo, said she preferred the Spendors. Subsequently, when we were enjoying a late lunch, I asked my wife whether she really preferred the sound of the Spendors and she admitted that she preferred the sound of the Neats but preferred the appearance of the Spendors. Typical woman! However, I did dismiss a proposed Linn active system of similar price on the basis that I didn't like the look of the speakers/ stands!

Apart from deciding to replace the CD player with a UnitiServe and wishing I had more time in the demo to listen more thoroughly to the speaker options, I have paid a deposit on this system. I'm going to use Hi-fi Racks Limited Podium Reference racks as I can have them made to bespoke widths. So I've gone for one full width rack and one half width rack to fit the hi-fi into a 1m width alcove.

Apparently it's the rack that's going to take the most time to be delivered. So I'll be waiting a while for the Sound Organisation to come to the Isle of Man for the installation.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Adam Zielinski

Lanesra posted:
Adam Zielinski posted:
Robert - it is possible for the NAS playback to reach the same quality level as a CD player.
I used my CDX2.2. as a reference and tweaked my network setup and NDX until they sounded almost the same (CDX2.2. and NDX both feeding the nDAC). Essentially what I was hearing then were differences in the digital transports of CDX2 and NDX. Whether you want to do that tweaking is altogether a different thing
Adam
Adam,
I think I'll leave well alone at least until everything has bedded in fully, as my system is very enjoyable to listen to anyway.

Of course - don't make any changes now. Your new gear needs to settle down - several months I'm afraid angel

250 DR may frustrate you a bit during the burn-in process - one day it will sound like the best amp in the world and the next day you may think what went wrong here
Once you pass the 70-80 hours mark, it starts to be consistent. And then suddenly you will have an epiphany moment

Adam

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Lanesra

Innocent Bystander posted:
The reported worse quality streaming is odd, as if anything streaming should be better, as it doesn't have the challenges of reading the disk. Tomtestbthe theory that it could be bad ripping due to multitasking computer, try picking one that has clear audible differences and re-rip using dB poweramp and allowind its accuracy check with online database, then compare. In fact it would be a useful exercise to do that to both wav and flac, and compare SQ without transcoding, as wav doesn't necessarily sound better and transcoding on the fly could itself cause a deterioration, depending on the processor etc.

Innocent Bystander,

Unfortunately, I only have one PC and my wife won't let me install dBpoweramp on her Macbook. So unless I buy a new laptop I can't really do that.

The rips worked in Ultra Secure mode and were AccurateRip verified in most instances, even if I had to give the CD a good clean after the first attempt. I re-purchased the few "legitimate" CD's that wouldn't rip in Ultra Secure mode after cleaning. Obviously, any CD's that I copied off friends won't rip in Ultra Secure mode.

As I said to Adam, I'll just carry on enjoying my music at least until the amps have been fully broken in.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Mike-B

Adam Zielinski posted:
Robert - it is possible for the NAS playback to reach the same quality level as a CD player

100% +1 & beyond. My CDX2 had a bit more of an impression of up front boogy factor, but the NDX is more refined & very much more accurate. But that is CD vs same CD rip, bring in 24-bit & DSD & it's in another league.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Innocent Bystander

Last item to buy with small change from the inheritance - a computer of your own that you can install anything on! Need not be anything fancy/expensive, just your very own...

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by hungryhalibut

Lanesra posted:
Innocent Bystander posted:
The reported worse quality streaming is odd, as if anything streaming should be better, as it doesn't have the challenges of reading the disk. Tomtestbthe theory that it could be bad ripping due to multitasking computer, try picking one that has clear audible differences and re-rip using dB poweramp and allowind its accuracy check with online database, then compare. In fact it would be a useful exercise to do that to both wav and flac, and compare SQ without transcoding, as wav doesn't necessarily sound better and transcoding on the fly could itself cause a deterioration, depending on the processor etc.
Innocent Bystander,
Unfortunately, I only have one PC and my wife won't let me install dBpoweramp on her Macbook. So unless I buy a new laptop I can't really do that.
The rips worked in Ultra Secure mode and were AccurateRip verified in most instances, even if I had to give the CD a good clean after the first attempt. I re-purchased the few "legitimate" CD's that wouldn't rip in Ultra Secure mode after cleaning. Obviously, any CD's that I copied off friends won't rip in Ultra Secure mode.
As I said to Adam, I'll just carry on enjoying my music at least until the amps have been fully broken in.

What do you mean 'she won't let me'? The program sits in the background and is only used when ripping or editing the metadata. When you right click on a music file the DB options appear, but in general use are invisible. If you are to use a streaming system effectively, some sort of tag editor is essential.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Lanesra

Hungryhalibut posted:
Lanesra posted:
Innocent Bystander posted:
The reported worse quality streaming is odd, as if anything streaming should be better, as it doesn't have the challenges of reading the disk. Tomtestbthe theory that it could be bad ripping due to multitasking computer, try picking one that has clear audible differences and re-rip using dB poweramp and allowind its accuracy check with online database, then compare. In fact it would be a useful exercise to do that to both wav and flac, and compare SQ without transcoding, as wav doesn't necessarily sound better and transcoding on the fly could itself cause a deterioration, depending on the processor etc.
Innocent Bystander,
Unfortunately, I only have one PC and my wife won't let me install dBpoweramp on her Macbook. So unless I buy a new laptop I can't really do that.
The rips worked in Ultra Secure mode and were AccurateRip verified in most instances, even if I had to give the CD a good clean after the first attempt. I re-purchased the few "legitimate" CD's that wouldn't rip in Ultra Secure mode after cleaning. Obviously, any CD's that I copied off friends won't rip in Ultra Secure mode.
As I said to Adam, I'll just carry on enjoying my music at least until the amps have been fully broken in.
What do you mean 'she won't let me'? The program sits in the background and is only used when ripping or editing the metadata. When you right click on a music file the DB options appear, but in general use are invisible. If you are to use a streaming system effectively, some sort of tag editor is essential.

Hungryhalibut,

My wife thinks I fill up her laptops with junk! Which is interesting as I prefer to use my own desktop PC. So she won't let me install any software on the MacBook I got her for last Xmas. Anyway, it seems that my wife is going away for 6 weeks soon. So if she lets me use her MacBook. I'll install dBpoweramp on it, try ripping a few CD's without multi-tasking, check to see if there is an improvement in sound quality. If there is an improvement, I'll just re-rip all of them and remove dBpoweramp before she gets back!

I have another query: I'm going away for 3 nights from tomorrow. Would it be safe to leave my Naim amps powered up while I'm away? My dealer thinks it would be a good idea to play music through the system at a low level whilst I'm gone and the amps will be pretty well broken in when I return home.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Tallan

My dealer thinks it would be a good idea to play music through the system at a low level whilst I'm gone and the amps will be pretty well broken in when I return home.

Me too.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Tallan

To elaborate a bit: I have the 272/250DR playing into 4 ohm Dynaudio Confidence C1 speakers and neither gets more than barely warm to the the touch at any volume level I enjoy. If nothing has gone snap, crackle, or pop within about 24 hours it's very unlikely to in future months or even years (barring abuse, of course).

On the other hand if the weather report calls for thunderstorms & possible lightning while you're gone you might want to be safe rather than sorry and unplug your new gear before leaving.

Posted on: 06 April 2016 by Lanesra

Tallan posted:
Me too.

Tallan posted:
On the other hand if the weather report calls for thunderstorms & possible lightning while you're gone you might want to be safe rather than sorry and unplug your new gear before leaving.

I think I'll risk it. There are no thunderstorms currently forecast.

Posted on: 07 April 2016 by Tallan

There's "just one more thing," as Steve Jobs used to say: when I first got my gear I used my CD5xs as the source probably 90% of the time. Over recent months, however, I've been streaming more & more and to my ears the NAC 272 DAC/streamer didn't really break in until recently. In other words just having current going to the whole unit did not seem to make the DAC come on song: an actual signal had to go through it for quite some hours. As ever YMMV; have a great trip!