Uniti core

I am sorry for your disappointment and frustration Hélène. But would you tell us how the Core sounded in your 500 series system?  

Chag -

Hi Chag the cds that I have listened through the core and nds sound wonderful no doubt.  I find the dac  in the nds superior to my previous dac. The problem is having to find the cd you want to listen to through the application.  For the clarity of the sound it is beautiful. I went from a preamp 202, then 282-252 and now the 552 and never regretted the investment.

Hélène,

sorry to hear this.  Classical music presents real metadata challenges even at the best of times, regardless of device, platform or brand, and most requires some degree of editing - often quite extensive.  The main thing is to decide who is the Album Artist and then be consistent.  The metadata editing functionality was to have been released around when the Core hit the shops but, as you know from your dealer and from Naim's updates on here, regrettably there have been unforeseen delays.  For most it's an inconvenience, but in your situation where you're mostly ripping classical music it's rather more than that, I can see.  

It may be small comfort, but I know Naim are working hard on it and pulling out all the stops to get it out to Core customers as quickly as they can.

Once you've sent it back, get a good NAS, install a good server such as Asset or Minimserver, and don't look back. 

Richard Dane posted:

Hélène,

sorry to hear this.  Classical music presents real metadata challenges even at the best of times, regardless of device, platform or brand, and most requires some degree of editing - often quite extensive.  The main thing is to decide who is the Album Artist and then be consistent.  The metadata editing functionality was to have been released around when the Core hit the shops but, as you know from your dealer and from Naim's updates on here, regrettably there have been unforeseen delays.  For most it's an inconvenience, but in your situation where you're mostly ripping classical music it's rather more than that, I can see.  

It may be small comfort, but I know Naim are working hard on it and pulling out all the stops to get it out to Core customers as quickly as they can.

Richard

I ripped a 700 CD opera and classical instrumental collection (just about every opera ever released on CD)  I inherited from my late cousin using the Uniti Serve. I had absolutely no problem apart from a few very very obscure ones. When I demoed the Core even some of the popular stuff in a shared library got a bit screwed up. I naturally assumed the same engine would be present in the Core. The Core used the wrong approach for shares. It should have started with the file system directory metadata like J Rivers Media Centre and then tried to link to the music databases as a bonus. 

Filipe posted:

Richard Dane posted:

Hélène,

sorry to hear this.  Classical music presents real metadata challenges even at the best of times, regardless of device, platform or brand, and most requires some degree of editing - often quite extensive.  The main thing is to decide who is the Album Artist and then be consistent.  The full metadata editing functionality was to have been released around when the Core hit the shops but, as you know from your dealer and from Naim's updates on here, regrettably there have been unforeseen delays.  For most it's an inconvenience, but in your situation where you're mostly ripping classical music it's rather more than that, I can see.  

It may be small comfort, but I know Naim are working hard on it and pulling out all the stops to get it out to Core customers as quickly as they can.

Richard

I ripped a 700 CD opera and classical instrumental collection (just about every opera ever released on CD)  I inherited from my late cousin using the Uniti Serve. I had absolutely no problem apart from a few very very obscure ones. When I demoed the Core even some of the popular stuff in a shared library got a bit screwed up. I naturally assumed the same engine would be present in the Core. The Core used the wrong approach for shares. It should have started with the file system directory metadata like J Rivers Media Centre and then tried to link to the music databases as a bonus. 

i borrowed a core from a shop and compared it to my unitserve, with nds in ethernet mode.

I used a lacie ssd external. Half of the downloads i had on it were not recognized. They were in waw format. The core don't accept also waw and flacs: you must choose when you configure the core( the unitserve takes both). Some online sites like tidal and highrez audio propose only flac..

Then i ripped some cds on the lacie ssd using the core. The rips were present but the downloads disappeared. 

I don't understand why naim have launched a product not finished like the core. I think it is the first time in naim history.

For sound quality, i found the core more dynamic and spatial, but thinner than the serve. The serve has more body and is softer. The core a little bright.

finally, the core is no longer bright, a little more crisp and dynamic, but a bit less bass or body...  other day, other impression.

The Core does recognise and can play a mix of WAV and FlAC. The choice of WAV or FLAC you make in setting it up is just the choice for new rips. I don't know why your's wouldn't work that way.

But certainly metadata on classical music rips is hopeless and also especially annoying is the way the Core totally ignores user edits on imports from Unitiserve. 

Best

David

David Hendon posted:

The Core does recognise and can play a mix of WAV and FlAC. The choice of WAV or FLAC you make in setting it up is just the choice for new rips. I don't know why your's wouldn't work that way.

But certainly metadata on classical music rips is hopeless and also especially annoying is the way the Core totally ignores user edits on imports from Unitiserve. 

Best

David

you may be right, i am on this unit since 2 days and perhaps have not understood all . In the app, when you choose the core, the question appears: waw or flacs to configure the external drive. I didn't know that is only for rips.  I put this morning some waw tracks on this external drive: the core didn't recognized some tracks , they didn't appeared on the app.  After i tried to rip some cds, it did not work.  Yesterday i ripped some cds, it worked, but the downloads disappeared.  If it is not bugs, maybe there is still things that i don't understand.

Chag... posted:

I am sorry for your disappointment and frustration Hélène. But would you tell us how the Core sounded in your 500 series system?  

Chag -

The cd's that she could not find after ripping them had a wonderful "inky blackness" to their sound quality.  

Bart posted:

 

The cd's that she could not find after ripping them had a wonderful "inky blackness" to their sound quality.  

Having the same problem as Hélène, I can confirm that the inky blackness also extends to one's mood when the desired album turns out to be another one that is impossible to find.

best

David

I love inky blackness, can't get too much of it. It's funny, if Naim introduced something identical to my Qnap nas but with a Naim badge, people would be falling over themselves to buy it. 'Rip with your computer', store it out the way in a cupboard', choose the upnp server you want', edit your metadata with easy to use software', only £500 including drives', 'backup to USB at the touch of a button'. 

The Android App is now available. The FB post has details including this link to Tips https://www.naimaudio.com/conn...20Hints%20and%20Tips

David Hendon posted:

Bart posted:

 

The cd's that she could not find after ripping them had a wonderful "inky blackness" to their sound quality.  

Having the same problem as Hélène, I can confirm that the inky blackness also extends to one's mood when the desired album turns out to be another one that is impossible to find.

best

David

In all seriousness, my mood often was darkened when I'd go to play music, not be able to, only to be berated by my wife in the form of, "How much did you pay for this stuff?"  Not only do I never hear that any more, but she plays music when I'm not around and actually gets it to work.

Hi guys,

If any of you who are finding that lookups aren't working correctly for you know how to manually set DNS server addresses on your router then could you try setting your router to use Google's DNS servers (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) as a test and see if your lookup then works ... it's a really odd issue that you have there - without exception we are getting much better lookups on Core than on the 'old' servers and there has to be a logical reason.

Cheers

Phil

Phil,

i , like many am having a lot of issues with the core, and the metadata is brutal compared to the same rips on the HDX.

i have emailed you a number of times last week on a few issues with core and waiting for some support.

one thing I have noticed is that if an external usb drive is plugged in rear port, then this appears to be the priority drive and downloads are sent here rather than the internal hdd, and the system does not then read the internal drive

Keler Pierre posted:

finally, the core is no longer bright, a little more crisp and dynamic, but a bit less bass or body...  other day, other impression.

Sounds like burn-in.

Phil Harris posted:

Hi guys,

If any of you who are finding that lookups aren't working correctly for you know how to manually set DNS server addresses on your router then could you try setting your router to use Google's DNS servers (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) as a test and see if your lookup then works ... it's a really odd issue that you have there - without exception we are getting much better lookups on Core than on the 'old' servers and there has to be a logical reason.

Cheers

Phil

Phil

This isn't a DNS problem. The issue is with imports from the Unitiserve. The Core looks the ripped CD up again on the different sites and makes all manner of big errors and erroneous assumptions.  If you take the original CD and rip it to the Core, it is much better able to cope than when it works with what is saved in the rip folder from the Unitiserve.  I know because for the really impossibly stupid Core results on imports from my Unitiserve, I do re-rip the relevant CDs. It's a big pain, but it is the only thing to do as we can't edit Core metadata yet.

You still end up with problem that the metadata says whatever the CD producer or publisher decided and/or the editors at the lookup sites preferred.  Classical music is the really big problem area.  So for example whether a CD metadata has the music of Schubert, Franz Schubert or Schubert Franz means that searches and album views give indifferent results.  And whether the album is called Beethoven Symphony No 1 or Symphony No 1. And whether the artist is Beethoven or Daniel Barenboim for example or indeed Ludwig van Beethoven. The biggest issue is where a bunch of CDs are released as a set.  What the set is depends on marketing decisions.  It could be a birthday anniversary release, or an all the works of this composer box or all the works of this conductor or that soloist box.  It's often exactly the same CDs, but having a description in the Core which tells you that this is disc 27 of the great classic series, for example, isn't at all helpful! Especially if you bought it as a single CD and recognise the art work. Another irritation is the Core unhelpfully finding the German language version of the titles of the album tracks on DG CDs, when the Unitiserve had actually correctly found the English version on a different lookup site.

Of course the sensible thing for Naim to do would have been to keep and respect the Unitiserve user edits. But for whatever reason, that isn't how the Core was released. But everyone knows I think this because I've said it here many times in the last two months.

best

David

This is an example of a recent cd purchase and how the HDX has ripped and its metadata, and then same cd ripped on the core and the result of its metadata. And Brian Eno is not the typical classical issue!

This is the HDX version

And this is the same cd as read by the core

Hélène posted:

I bought a uniti core a couple of weeks ago with an nds, I am returning the core as it is one of the worst product launches I have never witnessed. In the magazines and on their site they claim it can be use as a CD player but it can't at this time, they claim we can edit but we can't, it is not compatible with a Samsung tablet and we can't do the back up at specific time. Unfortunately the worst is that after ripping 280 cd, mainly classical I can't find a very high proportion of them, either they are under a different name, or without metadata or under different labels that are totally irrelevant. Extremely disappointing.  I do own the 500 amp and pre-amp with a 500 power supply and it is outstanding, so do not understand why launching a product that is not complete. I wrote to naim but never received a response. I am now looking at other companies

---

 

It is indeed difficult to understand how it came to happen but, with the Core, Naim have done more or less all mistakes that were conceivably doable.

Apart from shipping an immature product with much fanfares but very preliminary software and incomplete technical specifications, they have failed to communicate, at the time the Core became available, which features were actually supported and which would become available via future software upgrades.

Uncritical early reviews have done the rest. In the meanwhile, Naim has recognised their mistakes and there is a sort of roadmap, at least for correcting the most obvious software deficiencies.

What I find most disappointing, however, is that the most annoying limitations of the Core are not a consequence of implementational errors but of conscious design choices. Thus, even if metadata editing functionalities will soon be made available via firmware upgrades, the Core will not be a first-class choice for users who want to rip and manage classical music collections: as in the case of the US, the Core's UPnP server and SPDIF player will not support customizable browsing and searching indexes and, possibly, not even the most basic indexing schemes needed for managing classical music and opera. From this point of view the Core does not seem to be better than the UnitiServe. Considering that the US has been designed 8-9 years ago, this is very disappointing and hardly understandable.

If you are interested in classical music, you are probably better off installing MinimServer on a Raspberry Pi, a NAS or a small server than trying to use the Core. Perhaps surprisingly, a Raspberry Pi running MinimServer will also make editing metadata, managing backups and transferring data to and from other devices much easier and more reliable.

Supposed to be plug and play easier than nas right?  Hımmmmmm

David Hendon posted:

Phil Harris posted:

Hi guys,

If any of you who are finding that lookups aren't working correctly for you know how to manually set DNS server addresses on your router then could you try setting your router to use Google's DNS servers (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4) as a test and see if your lookup then works ... it's a really odd issue that you have there - without exception we are getting much better lookups on Core than on the 'old' servers and there has to be a logical reason.

Cheers

Phil

Phil

This isn't a DNS problem. The issue is with imports from the Unitiserve. The Core looks the ripped CD up again on the different sites and makes all manner of big errors and erroneous assumptions.  If you take the original CD and rip it to the Core, it is much better able to cope than when it works with what is saved in the rip folder from the Unitiserve.  I know because for the really impossibly stupid Core results on imports from my Unitiserve, I do re-rip the relevant CDs. It's a big pain, but it is the only thing to do as we can't edit Core metadata yet.

You still end up with problem that the metadata says whatever the CD producer or publisher decided and/or the editors at the lookup sites preferred.  Classical music is the really big problem area.  So for example whether a CD metadata has the music of Schubert, Franz Schubert or Schubert Franz means that searches and album views give indifferent results.  And whether the album is called Beethoven Symphony No 1 or Symphony No 1. And whether the artist is Beethoven or Daniel Barenboim for example or indeed Ludwig van Beethoven. The biggest issue is where a bunch of CDs are released as a set.  What the set is depends on marketing decisions.  It could be a birthday anniversary release, or an all the works of this composer box or all the works of this conductor or that soloist box.  It's often exactly the same CDs, but having a description in the Core which tells you that this is disc 27 of the great classic series, for example, isn't at all helpful! Especially if you bought it as a single CD and recognise the art work. Another irritation is the Core unhelpfully finding the German language version of the titles of the album tracks on DG CDs, when the Unitiserve had actually correctly found the English version on a different lookup site.

Of course the sensible thing for Naim to do would have been to keep and respect the Unitiserve user edits. But for whatever reason, that isn't how the Core was released. But everyone knows I think this because I've said it here many times in the last two months.

best

David

Hi David,

From Helene's original post...

"Unfortunately the worst is that after ripping 280 cd, mainly classical I can't find a very high proportion of them, either they are under a different name, or without metadata or under different labels that are totally irrelevant. "

...so it sounds like her issue is with lookups and so I would like to try to work that problem through.

We are aware of the issue that you are referring to and the guys expect that the fix for that will be out with the metadata editing update.

Best

Phil

OK sorry to add to the confusion. I will leave it with you.......

best

David

Cbr600 posted:

Phil,

i , like many am having a lot of issues with the core, and the metadata is brutal compared to the same rips on the HDX.

i have emailed you a number of times last week on a few issues with core and waiting for some support.

one thing I have noticed is that if an external usb drive is plugged in rear port, then this appears to be the priority drive and downloads are sent here rather than the internal hdd, and the system does not then read the internal drive

Hi Paul,

I believe that you were emailling my old "naimnet" address that has been out of use for a couple of years now - not the "naimaudio" address listed in the sticky at the top of the forums or in the right hand sidebar ... I do have an email from you in my inbox from towards the end of last week whilst I was away from the office getting sorted for the Acoustica event and you should have had an autoresponder saying that I would reply as soon as possible on my return to the office this week - did you not?

Did you have a Core music store set up on the USB external drive at any point because that should be the only way that imported data can be written to the USB drive?

Best

Phil

Richard Dane posted:

...

The main thing is to decide who is the Album Artist and then be consistent.  

...

Richard, why is it important to set the Album Artist? I never really cared about this index and I do not use it to search or browse my music collection.  Here's an example of the tags I use for opera:

01 - Wagner - Lohengrin - Act I - Prelude.flac:
albumartist=Gunther Groissbock, Klaus Florian Vogt, Annette Dasch, Gerd Grochowski, Susanne Resmark, Markus Bruck, Berlin Radio Choir, Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Marek Janowski
ensemble=Rundfunkchor Berlin
ensemble=Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin
conductor=Marek Janowski
artist=Gunther Groissbock
artist=Klaus Florian Vogt
artist=Annette Dasch
artist=Gerd Grochowski
artist=Susanne Resmark
artist=Markus Bruck
composer=Wagner, Richard (1813-1883)
label=Pentatone
tracknumber=01
copyright=2012 PentaTone
period=romantic
genre=Klassische Musik
genre=Vokalmusik
work=Lohengrin (1845-1848)
album=Wagner | Lohengrin
title=Lohengrin: Act I: Prelude
form=Oper
isrc=NLE421101001

Best, nbpf