NaimUniti on the BBC....

[Anonymous]

Eddie Pound:
Meniscus,

You'll have to elaborate.

Are the CM1s not a terribly insensitive small speaker?

Eddie,

By some standards you could call the B&W CM1 insensitive its rated at 84dbs, there are a lot of speakers rated at less.

The Naim Supernait drives them with ease, don't be fooled by the 80wpc, this amp has power reserves that many an amp of higher rating would envy, I am listening to it at the moment ( Stevie Nicks, Timespace ) the volume control is at 9 o clock " it has never been past 10 o clock " and the bass has never been a problem with this kit, and the speakers can truly astonish at times.

So please consult any Naim amp owner about the power reserves and the huge toroid transformers that they employ.

And by the way I do not consider myself an "audiophile " I just enjoy quality music reproduction from a good system, and this is what I have..........

 

[professorhat]

Great post, Joel (apart from the Chelsea slight, but then I'm pretty used to that

).

 

[Trefor Patten]

Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. Some trying-too-hard-to-be-cool weekend TV presenter does not understand what makes the Naim Uniti a nice bit of kit - so what? ÿI very much doubt that it will put any potential Naim buyers off. Sure a lot of dimwits who think that a Tesco hi-fi is the last word in home entertainment will be astonished that anyone would spend that sort of money on equipment, but why should anyone on these forums care?

ÿ

We all have the right to listen to music on MP3, streamed lossless files, vinyl, wax cylinder.... ÿWhat some meeja type does or does not understand is surely a matter for his employers I would never base my choice of hi-fi on a weekend TV programme or, for that matter, these forums. I would seek it out and listen to it. If I like what I hear and have the money I will buy it. If I haven't got the money I will set about earning it and if I don't like what I hear... ÿWell, end of story. ÿAll of you stop squabbling and wasting your time over the relative intelligence of TV presenters and go listen to some music, then come back and we can discuss Hi-fi.

 

[Andrew Everard]

That's us told, then...

 

[Anonymous]

He's right, and we have lost the thread a small bit here..

Lets get back to talking about scones.

 

[Anonymous]

Taylor74:My wife and I have music on our laptops and want good sound without ruining the living room and spending a fortune. Taylor.

I thought the living room was FOR the hifi...

 

[idc]

MENISCUS:And by the way I do not consider myself an "audiophile " I just enjoy quality music reproduction from a good system, and this is what I have..........

MENISCUS, that is a very good definition of a type 2 audiophile, who is interested in the kit and music reproduction, but is not obsessive, unlike type 1 audiophiles who can become obsessive and go over the top and be a bit snobbish. This forum tends to attract the type 2s and is all the more entertaining for it.

 

[Anonymous]

That's scone pronounced in the same way you would tone, except with an "sk" sound at the start.

 

[Craig M.]

all the talk about getting the masses interested in hifi is missing the real issue, i think. no-one i know listens to music at all unless it's as noise in the background while some housework is being done. they'd rather watch total non talents like that lovejoy idiot on the box, play computer games online or go to the pub. just don't think music is a priority for most people.

 

[Anonymous]

Is that if your a type 1 or 2 scone lover?

 

[Ravey Gravey Davy]

idc:

MENISCUS:And by the way I do not consider myself an "audiophile " I just enjoy quality music reproduction from a good system, and this is what I have..........

MENISCUS, that is a very good definition of a type 2 audiophile, who is interested in the kit and music reproduction, but is not obsessive, unlike type 1 audiophiles who can become obsessive and go over the top and be a bit snobbish. This forum tends to attract the type 2s and is all the more entertaining for it.

IDC

In order to stop it sounding like diabetes, can you give us the full top ten grades of audiophile

 

[manicm]

ChrisMM:Anyway, apart from all that, and I haven't watched the clip... but as a long-time Naim buyer (25 years) I am concerned that Naim are producing more and more complex software-dependant products for instant market penetration, which have great potential to go wrong. Personally I think they should stick to what they know - like getting a state-of-the-art range of speakers out before the next millenium - and leave the fancy stuff to the Japanese.

Well Linn are doing it and are being taken pretty seriously, so why can't Naim?

 

[John Duncan]

JoelSim:I imagine one day I will have streaming device

I have printed this and stuck it to my wall.

 

[John Duncan]

idc:Out of interest, do you know where and when can we find out what the viewing figures were for that show. (I don't even know what it is called; note to self, watch more daytime TV and and try to keep up with stuff)

Well it's less than 1.22 million, as BARB only have the top 30 shows on there (that's if I read correctly and it's BBC2)

 

[JoelSim]

JohnDuncan:JoelSim:I imagine one day I will have streaming device I have printed this and stuck it to my wall.

My nose

 

[Anonymous]

Sconephile.

10. Likes a cake.

09. Its more than like.

08. Has to be a scone.

07. Has to be a certain scone.

06. The plate has to be bone china and on spikes.

05. Not to many mates now, but it does taste better..

04. Buys scones choice every month and other cake mag's, but has little money left now for scones.

03. Spends time on lots of forums talking up scones.

02. Cannot see or belive that anyone else can enjoy cakes, other than the scone.

01. Tells the world that they have it all wrong about life and other people as they understand so much more about scones.

 

[manicm]

momo72:chebby:So what is the answer?

How do you in the industry (and media) get the public excited again about high quality replay of everything from their CDs to radio (internet or otherwise) and get them engaged with extracting the best from their downloads?

How are you going to get them to understand about spending enough? People who can still afford holidays and cars and vast flat screen TVs can presumably afford enough (relative to those other often more expensive items) to invest in good sound.

So how can the industry make that important to people again?

How many people say "let's sit down and put a CD on"? How many people care about how their music sound?

Apple's iPods (as a generalisation) brought convenience to the mass market and once people have bought into that I think it is going to be very hard to get them to spend £££s on some more serious kit that will give them higher fidelity sound reproduction.

With the decline of recorded music (vinyl and CDs), it is inevitable that as more people turn to downloads-only purchases (just as Tim Lovejoy said in his show), the sales of hi-fi hardware will decline. Unless they address this new phenomenom. I'd say "Well done" to Naim for at least to bring to market the HDX and the Uniti, but they should be targeting those "downloads-only" people not the hi-fi enthusiasts.

Edit:

Taking the Uniti to the BBC on a primetime mainstream entertainment show I think takes some courage, but I am not sure it served the product well. Not when the presenter throws back the product because of the iRadio function name on the display. At least more watchers got to hear the name of Naim, which in itself is "priceless" (in terms of free advertising).

His comment about iEverything was quite valid though IMO.

Just my 2p's worth.

You're way, way off the mark here. Linn have got their very serious digital players targeted toward uncompressed/lossless music software - does this make for less serious hifi? Please!

And about the iPod - well Apple never put out the banner 'Binn Your Linn' now, or claiming to be high-fidelity, it's us audiophiles and mags who chose to feel threatened.

All Naim is doing is catering to this market, in an open way by supporting most music software formats and coupling it with decent amplification and CDP. And they have a very flexible product.

And this is no different to the success of Arcam's Solo Mini which has done very well. I have one and will never claim it to be true high-fi but they've combined that convenience with very, very decent sound. In fact MP3s WMAs through its USB sound very, very good with better image depth than the CDP itself - in fact if it supported WMA Lossless (with all bass intact) its USB playback would beat its CDP hands down.

 

[manicm]

MENISCUS:

I think that you're flogging a dead horse here, Hi Fi will never become mass market.

Only enthusiasts like ourselves will require the best that we can afford in musical reproduction, most will be happy to be satisfied with the mediocre just as in photography everyone uses a camera but very few have Canon or Nikon SLRs...........

This would only be for cost reasons. Take the A400 - it cost considerably less than a new Pioneer would now isn't it? I believe the true cost of hifi has gone up considerably, unlike other electronics.

 

[manicm]

Catcher:

Its beyond me why anyone with a computer would buy a cd player. I have seen some people on here and other forums get all nostalgic for cd players and claim things about sound quality inherent in the format as if where the zeros and ones are stored makes any difference (except for transports being able to degrade it).

I expect the market in DACs and amplifiers with DACs fitted will get bigger.

I'm not sure its the job of Hifi enthusiasts to market the products they're buying but sometimes the snobishness is a little tiring. I joined the Linn forum to get advise for setting up an arm on my Basik and while a few people were helpful most of what I got was a long stream of orders that anything less than an LP12 was unlistenable to.

A lot of people dont even know about the existence of seperates systems and a lot of people wouldn't get them past er'indoors they're so ugly and space consuming.

If there's one thing I detest about some Hifi enthusiasts its the assumption by some that they are enjoying their music more than other people. I enjoyed music just as much listening to it on a tape walkman as I do now.

Why anyone who has a PC may not go the soft route is ironically, because of convenience, well in my case anyway, esp. if you have a music loving family. Let's face some things - you'd want a dedicated laptop/netbook and then a decent DAC, and some storage.

Eventually I'd go this route but it's not necessarily cheaper than the 'hard' route.

 

[Anonymous]

This forum is like zoo!

I feel I made some good points, but no one responded

I suppose because there wasn't enough to argue about!

 

[Anonymous]

Of course anyone who thinks anything at all has been decided RE the scone/skon debate is deluding themselves. We haven't even touched on the jam on cream on first debate yet. I believe this resolves itself into a north/south divide more conveniently than the scone/skon issue. I'm a cream first man myself. Then there's the whole issue of do you butter first?

 

[John Duncan]

Catcher:Then there's the whole issue of do you butter first?

Are we still talking about skons?

 

[Ravey Gravey Davy]

JohnDuncan:Catcher:Then there's the whole issue of do you butter first? Are we still talking about skons?

Nope- Tangos.

(not the fizzy type)

 

[mikeinbrum]

in Paris?

 

[Anonymous]

Clockwise from bottom:

Hot buttered tattie scones next to a cheese scone, shiny and flat treacle scones, and a milk scone above a fruit scone.

Bit like WAV, FLAC, mp3 and good old mp4.