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[IC] Naim Unitiserve 2TB - Spares or Repair (or upgrade...)?

A

AnthonyP

pfm Member
My 2TB Unitiserve has developed a fault - logo continues flashing and it can't be found on the network. I've already got a UnitiStar (and a backup of my library) so don't really need the US anyway.

Would anyone be interested in buying this for repair, spares, or use as a stylish door-stop? Cosmetically it's in fine condition. Complete with original box and power supply.

Or, is anyone looking to buy a UnitiCore and wants to get £400 off (terms & conditions apply - but as I understand it the "trade-in" doesn't have to work).

Get in touch if interested. Also if you just want the box or PS.

Cheers.
 
Have you tried resetting to factory defaults? Here are a couple of examples to try.

""When turning on the power t hold down the Standby button (for about 20 seconds) until the Naim logo and Front USB LED flashes multiple times. Then release the Standby button.

"Press & hold “stop” on the front panel while switching the power on, you need to hold it long enough for the unit to boot past the splash screen, so give it 5 to 10 seconds before releasing.
The reset takes a minute or two & should reboot to a connectable state "

Good luck.

DV
 
With a very small mod on the back this will accept a standard mico ATX motherboard.

Just sayin'
 
Darth Vader said:
Have you tried resetting to factory defaults? Here are a couple of examples to try.

""When turning on the power t hold down the Standby button (for about 20 seconds) until the Naim logo and Front USB LED flashes multiple times. Then release the Standby button.

"Press & hold “stop” on the front panel while switching the power on, you need to hold it long enough for the unit to boot past the splash screen, so give it 5 to 10 seconds before releasing.
The reset takes a minute or two & should reboot to a connectable state "

Good luck.

DV
Click to expand...

Thanks DV, although I’m not sure how those resets work on the US as it doesn’t have a standby button or “stop” button? I have tried keeping the logo pressed/touched to force a reset but that didn’t help.
 
garyi said:
With a very small mod on the back this will accept a standard mico ATX motherboard.

Just sayin'
Click to expand...
I’m intrigued, even though I have no idea what an ATX motherboard is. How can I find out more? If I did this would it then work as a normal US including understanding metadata etc?
 
At the heart of a unitiserve/HDX is an micro ATX motherboard. ATX is a universal mounting standard for motherboards to ensure they fit in in any ATX case. The untiserve is just an ATX case, although the back panel hole needs to be widened slightly to allow for the I/O plate.

I know all this because if have done it. I put a standard PC into a unitiserve case and indeed in an HDX. From there you can put any software that runs on any other PC. In my case I just put Roon Rock into it, but reasonably LMS, NAS software, windows, what ever its all good, its just a PC.

What it wont do is resurrect the uniti software. That is proprietary that naim purchased from some other company and ran on top of embedded windows XP, (to give you some idea of its age)

If you want a ripper server then something like vortexbox in it would be ideal. Although if you run roon it will I believe rip now as well.
 
Thanks Gary, that’s helpful. It may be a bit beyond what I have the appetite for but if I keep the US and can’t revive it I’ll bear it in mind as a possible project.

presumably you just scrap all the existing innards including the cd drive and HDD?
 
As a bit of extra background, the US dates from 2012 but had the HDD replaced by Naim in 2018 and upgraded to 2Tb (before I bought it) so is fresher than its original s/n might suggest.

I’ve been asked how much I’d want in pms. £200 plus any postage would do it (presuming I don’t revive it first…)

cheers
 
AnthonyP said:
Thanks Gary, that’s helpful. It may be a bit beyond what I have the appetite for but if I keep the US and can’t revive it I’ll bear it in mind as a possible project.

presumably you just scrap all the existing innards including the cd drive and HDD?
Click to expand...

Well technically the CD and harddrive can remain, the motherboard in there right now is a micro ATX, you would just replace that bit.
 
Hi Everyone, and thanks for the comments so far.

A new development - I pulled it out of storage this evening just to take photos before selling for parts, and plugged it in just to see what happened. For the first time in ages it flashed for a while but has now settled down to a steady green log. Feels like this is positive, BUT I still cant see it on the network or via the UnitiStar. Any thoughts on what to try next? (I don't have screen or keyboard to plug in)

Cheers
 
No one seems to have suggested replacing the bios battery yet so that might be worthwhile . Unfortunately you then need a keyboard and screen ( VGA at its simplest or with a vga to hdmi converter ) in order to reset the bios to naim defaults .
In practice it is likely to be a corrupted or failing harddrive and if you want to resurrect it you will have to shell out the £400 to naim - in practice better spent on a uniti core .
I managed to trick one in a similar state into running an old 32bit version of ubuntu but you are then limited to what software you can use . - most modern software expects 64bit .
In practice it is better to install a secondhand low power mini atx board . You can then install ubuntu plus logitech media server or you can just install volumio - which is what I did .
Having installed volumio it provides a NAS storage area to which you can upload music files for playing locally or via ssh you can login and install minidlna which will act as a server for the same NAS area .
Note that with some boards the spdif output is muted at install so again via ssh you can login and using alsmixer unmute that output .
I should add that if you want volumio to do cd ripping you have to pay for a separate plugin - the public domain ripping plugin didn't work for me and made the system unstable .
 
Further update to above . Although you have to pay for the cd ripper plugin for volumio it seems abcde command line cd ripper software is already built in so if you log in via a ssh client and learn a few ubuntu file commands you can use this to rip cds using the unitiserve cdrom alone .
 
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