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Naim Audio - Threat or menace?

I spent an hour or so this past weekend at Promusica in Chicago. I had a great time listening to some entry level Naim gear on some Sonus Fabor Cremona's. It was great to listen to some of Ken Christiansen's recordings and talk to him about Naim gear. For those of you who don't know, Ken records for the Naim audio label in addition to selling Naim gear out of Promusica. Ken's recordings are fantastic, using two microphone direct to two track Nagra tape. They really seem to capture the dynamics of the live performance. They sounded fantastic on the Naim gear as well.

I am a newbie to Naim audio but not to hi-fi. I have recently sold off my electronics (BAT, Theta) for financial/logistical resasons and am looking to start a new. I have been reading too much about BAT, Rowland, Musical Fidelity, VAC, Unison and Ayre gear. My preliminary scanning of the online reviews suggests that Naim gear is polarizing (people either love or hate). I haven't however found a good discussion of why.

So anyone out there who has an opinion on Naim gear...house sound, relative value or anything else is welcome to pipe in. If you have had a negative experience with Naim and have an alternative suggestion, feel free to emote.

Statements like component X "blows away" Naim X are generally not useful to me. I know I have to listen to the gear in my house, on my speakers...

The new gear will be powering North Creek Rhythm Revelator Signature speakers. I listen mainly to CD, rock and jazz. My room is acoustically treated but my electricity is not.

Thanks in advance.

-Karl
128x128karl_desch
jond's avatar
jond
3,400 posts
 
Naim gear beat me up and stole my lunch money, so I would say menace.
parkcaka's avatar
parkcaka
15 posts
 
There is "Naim"....

and "others" in hifi.
jaybo
4,478 posts
 
all brands have (to a degree)have a house sound. its best to listen to gear with a wide variety of music with varied production quality to 'really' hear a brand's sound character. exposure, sontateer, cyrus, roksan, revox and (the late)audiolab all have(had) the rhythm thing(which is really a 'midrange thing' down to a science. ss components that are not shy about being 'just that'
superhonestben
171 posts
 
a follow up, if your considering diving into naim, I would suggest the following, either the 5i or go right to a 202/150.....to get the most out of the series 5 gear, you would get all the boxes, 112/150 and a flatcap, nice, but going to the 202 is a bigger improvment and 1 less box, you can get a naim cd player but dont have too, ihave found very good results with non naim cd players, which is good, because I would hate to feel that their gear can only sound good on their cd player. Anyway, the 202 is very nice and later you can get a hicap and then the 200, which I feel is the best overall value in the line. From there it doubles up in price mighty fast....yikes
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muzikat
887 posts
 
I have bought and sold much gaear here on Audiogon in the last 5+ years. The only one I keep coming back to is Naim. There is something about the presentation of music with Naim that just grabs you and keeps you involved. As it has been said, keeps your toes tapping, you cannot help it.

I think the philosophy of the gear serving the music rather than the music serving the gear about sums it up.

As a side note, Naim holds value and is easier to resell than just about any other out there.
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