Frank Harvey
Well-known member
fatboyslimfast:The further up the scale, the bigger the margins (although in real, not necessarily percentage terms). Richer sounds aren't going to making a great deal on the Cambridge A1 amp for instance (retailing at £70), but it does get people onto the "ladder". A Naim Nait XS will be making a lot more. This will depend. You have to take into account that Richer own Cambridge, so with one less 'middle man'. The profit margin on Naim, is actually a lot less then other British manufacturers.
One of the reasons the Naim is a lower profit margin is that they go to many extreme lengths during manufacture that other companies would laugh at if it was suggested in the board room. One thing is that the standard components, and yes, there are some standard components in there just like ANY product at ANY price point, are matched for each channel. So if a resistor/capacitor etc could have a variance of +/-5dB (whatever the measurement is for said component), that could be anything up to a difference of up to 10dB between the two channels at any one time in the signal path. Naim painstakingly match these normally unimportant components by hand, so the difference is within about .5dB if I recall correctly. Naim do lots of little things that takes man hours, but lots of little things add up to a big difference when the product is finished.
Some manufacturers don't bother with this. They'll just buy the resistors/capacitors etc in bulk and just use them, with no regard for the sometimes wildly differing tolerances.
One of the reasons the Naim is a lower profit margin is that they go to many extreme lengths during manufacture that other companies would laugh at if it was suggested in the board room. One thing is that the standard components, and yes, there are some standard components in there just like ANY product at ANY price point, are matched for each channel. So if a resistor/capacitor etc could have a variance of +/-5dB (whatever the measurement is for said component), that could be anything up to a difference of up to 10dB between the two channels at any one time in the signal path. Naim painstakingly match these normally unimportant components by hand, so the difference is within about .5dB if I recall correctly. Naim do lots of little things that takes man hours, but lots of little things add up to a big difference when the product is finished.
Some manufacturers don't bother with this. They'll just buy the resistors/capacitors etc in bulk and just use them, with no regard for the sometimes wildly differing tolerances.