Impressions of Statement from Hifi Corner Falkirk Event

'Keep the Wolves Away' is an absolute belter and I was reminded of it in this thread when I heard it in a Naim demo. I put it on today (Tidal) and agree that, from memory, it sounded stunning in the Naim demo and pretty damn fine on my own system. So for me it still takes a top notch system to get under the skin of even the more gentler of tracks. It is about achieving an emotional connection, not so much about which system can blast out the more complex tracks. I do agree that keeping control of difficult, complex mixes does test a system but unless it grabs me, all the control in the world isn't worth a candle, certainly not £250k.

By the way I have heard the Statement system a few times now (including at Naim HQ during a factory tour) with different speakers. On occasion it has failed to grab me, other times I have been totally enthralled. So I know Statement is hugely capable, it is just a question of getting the other 'supporting acts' right (i.e. room size, room acoustics, speakers etc).

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

I'm not sure why one of Naim's dealers would have an unfriendly acoustic environment. Everyone knows that hifi shows in hotels often sound distinctly ropey, but a dealer's dem room is a known environment and a very good sound should be almost a given.

The issue seems to be more about trying to squeeze speakers the size of a Volkswagen Up! into a modestly sized room, and from the comments that are consistently made, they are speakers that many Naim owners don't like and/or which don't match Naim amplifiers that well. 

Of course, system optimisation would help, but given that the system was there for some days and that Naim's own experts were on hand, for £250,000 it should sound heavenly. 

A chain is only as good as the weakest link.

Magico S3 / Proac K6 / PMC IB2se / ATC SCM40 / Wilson Sabrina / ART Neo / etc etc.

The demo needs to take into account the space? And 24hours to connect a source to an amp to a pair of speaker? Give me the job. I've fitted more expensive stuff in more challenging spaces (submarines and transport planes for instance).

gary yeowell posted:

I would have liked to have heard my SL2 driven by the full Statement, and not the Focals that were played at the time. At least i heard a Forum members active DBL with S1 pre, so i know what it's actually capable of.

I'd be quite happy for Naim to bring the Statement and an NDS to my house. I'd even  be happy to do demonstrations by appointment to other Forum members, and provide coffee and cake. Then we'd know how it sounds with decent speakers. Can't say fairer than that. 

jon honeyball posted:

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

Naim do far more tweaking to get a product market ready than I'd manage in a lifetime - and then accept that it is going to sound mediocre because of a series of known limitations?...and it costs how much?

I mean...HELLO...WAKE-UP...

Find the best enviroment to demonstrate your product. It cannot be that difficult.

G

It does seem quite odd that Naim didn't use any hi res music.  

But a friend gave me a USB stick of demo music from the Naim label that Naim had been handing out to all comers at a similar event (although just a Statement preamp on that occasion) about a year ago and I was surprised to find they were all MP3s. So Naim have some previous in using less than best quality of their music samples.  As it happened I already had the same demonstration playlist as a 24 bit FLAC download and the difference was dramatic.

best

David

jon honeyball posted:

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

For those of us who are not obsessive about those things, do you think it is reasonable that top of the range Naim products demonstrated in a Naim dealer's premises should apparently not sound very good to a number of people who might be potential purchasers?

<sits back with his own popcorn>

GraemeH posted:

Find the best enviroment to demonstrate your product. It cannot be that difficult.

G

I think, in this instance, it would be better for Naim and the dealer to have demonstrated products to fit the environment, not the other way around.  After all, isn't that what a dealer has to do everyday?

So Statement with Sopra 2 or 3 would probably have given a far better result.  That's not hard, nor is it incessant tweaking mentioned by a contributor above.  Its just the basics.

These sort of demos always seem to go the same way. As with systems at shows, It's often the low budget, low expectation systems which come out best as they tend to perform well beyond their price point. The expectation to be wowed by the mega expensive system just leads to disappointment when it doesn't quite do what it says on the tin.

David Hendon posted:

It does seem quite odd that Naim didn't use any hi res music.  

But a friend gave me a USB stick of demo music from the Naim label that Naim had been handing out to all comers at a similar event (although just a Statement preamp on that occasion) about a year ago and I was surprised to find they were all MP3s. So Naim have some previous in using less than best quality of their music samples.  As it happened I already had the same demonstration playlist as a 24 bit FLAC download and the difference was dramatic.

best

David

My impression is that Naim puposely choose ripped CDs (and even MP3s) over hi res (24 bit) files to carry out there demos to show you don't 'need' hi res files for a Naim system to sound great. I also believe that they want to prove that our CD collections (ripped for demos with steamer sources) have the potential to sound great assuming the original recording/production/mastering is up to the job. This was certainly a priority when we were all finding our feet with hi res downloads, but is probably less of an issue these days.

Hi from the bits I have gleaned from this thread....the amps had around 24 hours warming up.....if it is anything like Naims other equipment this setup would have benefitted with more time, certainly my humble set up does. As for volume I am often shocked at the sheer loudness...people listen at...generally as distortion is so low it is possible to crank it up. Also maybe Naim are politically forced to go down the focal route.... was the Statement tested when developed with focal....

Penarth Blues posted:

jon honeyball posted:

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

For those of us who are not obsessive about those things, do you think it is reasonable that top of the range Naim products demonstrated in a Naim dealer's premises should apparently not sound very good to a number of people who might be potential purchasers?

<sits back with his own popcorn>

I would think that someone in the market for a quarter million dollars worth of electronics, might have already experienced an broken in Statement, in The Dealers best showroom, or perhaps in his own Sound Room. 

These shows are for individuals like myself, so when we leave, we can justify our 282, 252, and 552 Systems. 

The Big Boys are deciding, between David Wilsons Alex $109 Speakers and  other Speakers that our complete Systems can match, dollar wise! 

But it's fun, I enjoy the spread, and the drinks! 

And the Sound Ain't Bad! 

Allante93! 

Penarth Blues posted:

jon honeyball posted:

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

For those of us who are not obsessive about those things, do you think it is reasonable that top of the range Naim products demonstrated in a Naim dealer's premises should apparently not sound very good to a number of people who might be potential purchasers?

<sits back with his own popcorn>

I have never visited this dealer, so am not in a position to know. But some dealers listening rooms are utterly atrocious. 

How many of them meet BS 6840-13: 1998/IEC 60268-13: 1998? How many of them even know what that is, let alone have the equipment to measure it?

<dives into a fully loaded hotdog>

jon honeyball posted:

Penarth Blues posted:

jon honeyball posted:

In defence of naim.... (not that they need defending....)

This is a community where people obsess over the placement of a power cable, will run an amplifier for months accepting lower quality in the knowledge that it will come "on song". Which will cheerfully decide which bit of obscure tech wizardry is better than another.

Naim turns up at what is going to be, almost by definition, a fairly unfriendly acoustic environment. And tries to set up a dem which has to work in under 24 hours. For a room full of people, and not just the hot seat/hot sofa which the Naim afficionado enjoys at home, whilst sipping a glass of favourite wine. 

And we wonder why the system can not give of its best?

I mean.... HELLO..... WAKE UP....

Now either all the obsessive tweaking is valid and worthwhile, and you are being unreasonably unfair on Naim. Or all the obsessive tweaking is just self delusion, and actually you cant hear particularly well, and dont have a common vocabulary or even taxonomy to start to describe what you are listening too. 

You choose...

<retires to the forum sofa, and makes a bowl of popcorn...>

For those of us who are not obsessive about those things, do you think it is reasonable that top of the range Naim products demonstrated in a Naim dealer's premises should apparently not sound very good to a number of people who might be potential purchasers?

<sits back with his own popcorn>

I have never visited this dealer, so am not in a position to know. But some dealers listening rooms are utterly atrocious. 

How many of them meet BS 6840-13: 1998/IEC 60268-13: 1998? How many of them even know what that is, let alone have the equipment to measure it?

<dives into a fully loaded hotdog>

I couldn't agree more on the crap nature of many listening rooms, just wanted to know what your thoughts were on demo's that might actually put people off an expensive system - and whether, in your long years of evaluating systems, you felt there was a better way of doing it?

The way you describe the audience means they either understand that they need to wait for 3 generations of their family to pass away for the system to sound 'right' while they tweak away until the Naim fairy dust is aligned correctly, or they will just expect it to sound right when they go in (a reasonable assumption for the average man in the street given the price) and will therefore inevitably end up being underwhelmed.

Anyhow - it was just curiosity and a long day beckons tomorrow <retires to bed with ear trumpet and hot water bottle>

PB, its a really tough question! 

I have come to the conclusion that any sort of dem like this (whether at a dealer, or a hifi show or (even worse) CES in las vegas)) is only going to manage to be a taster. Something to whet the appetite.

From a sales point of view, a customer already knows whether they are in the game for a Statement system, simply on the basis of cost. They might not have decided, but they have an inkling. And that applied to good friends on here who have gone down the S1Pre route.

Do I think any of them made *decisions* based on such a dem? I'd hope not! Home dems over time are the only way, as we would all agree

For the rest of us mere mortals, its a possibility to get some of the flavour of what Naim is trying to do. To really understand, you need to visit someone who has the components in play and to spend time, Which was why I had so many friends visit when I was fortunate enough to have S1 Pre in my 6pack dibble system. And why I spent a lot of time listening to S1Pre/Power in the Magico system at Martin's when he had it there. 

So no, there is no solution. The dealers and manufacturers do their best within the constraints of what is possible. And thats fine, as far as I'm concerned.

jon honeyball posted:

PB, its a really tough question! 

I have come to the conclusion that any sort of dem like this (whether at a dealer, or a hifi show or (even worse) CES in las vegas)) is only going to manage to be a taster. Something to whet the appetite.

From a sales point of view, a customer already knows whether they are in the game for a Statement system, simply on the basis of cost. They might not have decided, but they have an inkling. And that applied to good friends on here who have gone down the S1Pre route.

Do I think any of them made *decisions* based on such a dem? I'd hope not! Home dems over time are the only way, as we would all agree

For the rest of us mere mortals, its a possibility to get some of the flavour of what Naim is trying to do. To really understand, you need to visit someone who has the components in play and to spend time, Which was why I had so many friends visit when I was fortunate enough to have S1 Pre in my 6pack dibble system. And why I spent a lot of time listening to S1Pre/Power in the Magico system at Martin's when he had it there. 

So no, there is no solution. The dealers and manufacturers do their best within the constraints of what is possible. And thats fine, as far as I'm concerned.

Back from the really long day and a bit...

Thanks for taking the effort to write a nicely considered response. I'd guess anyone who's spent any time at all on this forum would realise that the only way to really know if it sounds right enough to buy is to take it home to your environment and listen to it there.

So basically this invited event, for people who already know all this, was to essentially see what one looks like in the flesh and hopefully find one or two tracks that contain enough magic in that environment to trigger a home demo or the purchase of a lesser bit of kit on the 'halo' effect.

I guess I'm just a bit disappointed as I'd always wanted to hear what Statement could do in the hope of hearing what was possible from such a system, and was wondering whether to make the effort to listen to one. Nothing more than curiosity as I'm more likely to get into space than to own kit at this level of cost. It seems from comments over time that even the setup in the Naim factory has some serious flaws - possibly from the voicing of the big Focals it is paired with, so even that does not appear to be the ultimate place to go.

In fact I've just figured out the only reason I'm interested in Statement at all now is the experience of a few people on this forum, including yourself, who seem to have made it work at home. They should pay you all in free upgrades :-)

Ah well - back to 'just' listening to my Uniti2, which still sounds amazing to my ears in relation to anything I've owned before, wondering how HH's ear is recovering, and when I'm next going to be told that my Uniti2 is basically not worth listening to :-)

Even shop demos of lower level kit fail to show what they are capable of.  I've been to lots of demos in a number of dealers and I've yet to be stunned by a system.  What I have been able to do is compare amps in the same system and environment, or speakers in the same environment which gave me a steer for a home demo but I find you need your own room and a chance to tune things to your own ears for it to be woorth while.  Now if I could just persuade someone to let me have a home demo of the Statement.....

Penarth Blues posted:

jon honeyball posted:

PB, its a really tough question! 

I have come to the conclusion that any sort of dem like this (whether at a dealer, or a hifi show or (even worse) CES in las vegas)) is only going to manage to be a taster. Something to whet the appetite.

From a sales point of view, a customer already knows whether they are in the game for a Statement system, simply on the basis of cost. They might not have decided, but they have an inkling. And that applied to good friends on here who have gone down the S1Pre route.

Do I think any of them made *decisions* based on such a dem? I'd hope not! Home dems over time are the only way, as we would all agree

For the rest of us mere mortals, its a possibility to get some of the flavour of what Naim is trying to do. To really understand, you need to visit someone who has the components in play and to spend time, Which was why I had so many friends visit when I was fortunate enough to have S1 Pre in my 6pack dibble system. And why I spent a lot of time listening to S1Pre/Power in the Magico system at Martin's when he had it there. 

So no, there is no solution. The dealers and manufacturers do their best within the constraints of what is possible. And thats fine, as far as I'm concerned.

Back from the really long day and a bit...

Thanks for taking the effort to write a nicely considered response. I'd guess anyone who's spent any time at all on this forum would realise that the only way to really know if it sounds right enough to buy is to take it home to your environment and listen to it there.

So basically this invited event, for people who already know all this, was to essentially see what one looks like in the flesh and hopefully find one or two tracks that contain enough magic in that environment to trigger a home demo or the purchase of a lesser bit of kit on the 'halo' effect.

I guess I'm just a bit disappointed as I'd always wanted to hear what Statement could do in the hope of hearing what was possible from such a system, and was wondering whether to make the effort to listen to one. Nothing more than curiosity as I'm more likely to get into space than to own kit at this level of cost. It seems from comments over time that even the setup in the Naim factory has some serious flaws - possibly from the voicing of the big Focals it is paired with, so even that does not appear to be the ultimate place to go.

In fact I've just figured out the only reason I'm interested in Statement at all now is the experience of a few people on this forum, including yourself, who seem to have made it work at home. They should pay you all in free upgrades :-)

Ah well - back to 'just' listening to my Uniti2, which still sounds amazing to my ears in relation to anything I've owned before, wondering how HH's ear is recovering, and when I'm next going to be told that my Uniti2 is basically not worth listening to :-)

After several 'disappointing' public demos (a few with Statement) I have learned to lower my expectations at such events but also to not blame the kit for the mixed results. Home demos are the only way to truly explore what kit is capable of with material you are both familiar with and appreciative of. I have to admit to being rather disappointed with a Statement demo at Naim HQ as part of a factory tour. I later realised that much of my disappointment was with the material being played and the volume it was played at. There were about 20 of us and we were given the freedom of the iPad to play what we fancied from the music stored on their server. Much of this was unrecognisable or unfamiliar and we all struggled find something we knew and liked. This put me (and the others I suspect) in a poor frame of mind to enjoy anything.

Your own listening room with music you love is the only way to test a system's (or component's) capability. I am often amazed at how my system sounds and occasionally try to compare it in my mind to what I heard from the Statement at Naim HQ, even though my memory of that experience is fading. There is of course no comparison in the absolute capability of each system but because I am listening to what I like in my own home, my humble Classic system sounds pretty damn fine. Indeed much (most?) of the enjoyment we get from our system derives from the enjoyment we get from listening to music we love IMHO. The ability of a system to reproduce music and the enjoyment from listening to that music are difficult to separate if that makes any sense whatsoever. Does it then follow that a great system playing music we don't appreciate can often sound…well…disappointing?

I would of course be happy to do a straight swap with a Statement, were that on offer!

Maybe it's just luck? I heard the Statement at Brighton last year and thought it was a pretty devastating demonstration. It clealy showed me that each change brought about an improvement. When the Statement finally went into system the music, to my ears, jumped into an entirely different league and was pretty conclusive.

it was at a demo of active 135's that convinced me to embark on the Naim trail. It was also a demo of Isobariks at a hifi show that prompted me to buy them.

Without these demos I'm not sure I would own Linn or Naim equipment?

Geko posted:

Maybe it's just luck? I heard the Statement at Brighton last year and thought it was a pretty devastating demonstration. It clealy showed me that each change brought about an improvement. When the Statement finally went into system the music, to my ears, jumped into an entirely different league and was pretty conclusive.

it was at a demo of active 135's that convinced me to embark on the Naim trail. It was also a demo of Isobariks at a hifi show that prompted me to buy them.

Without these demos I'm not sure I would own Linn or Naim equipment?

 

Some vital info missing here - what were the speakers and were they a sensible size for the room?