philiphifi
pfm Member
Hi - is it foolhardy buying a old streamer like a Naim NDX? The technology is old. Is it better to buy a cheaper but newer machine?
Biggest consideration for me would be the lack of native Roon support. The new Naim streamers support Roon, the original NDX doesn't. Lots of people love Roon (myself included), others are meh, but if you don't need/want Roon and the price for the NDX is ok, why not?
thanks guys. I wish the NDX was £100 then it would be a no-brainer. Unfortunately, they are still priced at £1k which i think is very steep unless it is an exceptional sounding machine which no new kit would match at that price point presently (which I hope is not the case?)
I am sorry but the difference between the streaming part is marginal. For your money I would be concentrating on the dac. Furthermore I wouldn't be putting money into hifi manufacturer's for the streaming element. Things are coming on line all the time, and these companies are just too slow, or have BOM'ed the hell out of the device so that it is absolute the minute its released.
I appreciate the ndx has a dac, but along with it a very outdated streamer. And probably dead screen.
thanks guys. I wish the NDX was £100 then it would be a no-brainer. Unfortunately, they are still priced at £1k which i think is very steep unless it is an exceptional sounding machine which no new kit would match at that price point presently (which I hope is not the case?)
If I were starting from scratch today, the DAC all the way for me.
And at this moment...the DAC has to be a chord...of some type, dependent on budget
(A happy NDS owner)
I don't agree with your hyperbole, there is marginal differences at best with just the streaming element. God only knows I have paid out. I have dedicated USB cards with linier power supplies and all sorts, the differences are very small and I am not confident I could tell you in a blind test.
Dacs yes, night and day on the fair number I have knocking around here. Streamers, well I have Pis in various configurations, PCs in various configurations playing roon, UPNP, various incarnations of LMS, etc. All within a margin of error imo. I have had dedicated streamers through here small differences for sure but not justifying the eye watering price, which becomes even more unbearable when the hifi company drops it like its hot.
If I were starting from scratch today, the DAC all the way for me.
You're still using a Pi's and PC's, that says enough to be honest.
Huge difference in streamers, but once a bias has set in, it's hard to shift it. I had the similar, till I moved from a Node to a ND5XS2, and then moving to a G2.
The Pi wasn't fit for a streamer whatsoever, I wasted far too much good listening time with that thing. Junk.
Just to let you know, in case you are unaware, that 99.99% of music you are listening to has been produced and mastered on a DAC connected to a PC. Noone in the pro audio world thinks this is a problem. Why do you think that streaming is different to running a DAW? You are very much an outlier if you think this, so you have to justify it rather than just assert it as a statement (streamers make a difference).