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Quad 66 FM vs Naim NAT03

D

DNZ

Member
My ongoing search for a tuner…

I have two tuners at home to demo now - and a splitter on the (omnidirectional with line of sight to the transmitter tower) FM antenna on the roof so I can have the tuners into the amp on adjacent line level inputs and switch between them.

I have a NAT03 on loan and a Quad 66 FM tuner on loan (with remote of course).

I gotta say, I expected the NAT03 to be better than the Quad 66 but there is almost nothing in it - the Quad is slightly better in terms of definition and tone - more space in the music. Piano notes are slightly rounder and strings are slightly more textured - the difference is small but noticeable.

The Quad has a Nordost Blue Heaven RCA interconnect and the NAT03 has a Chord Co Chrysalis DIN-RCA - going into an Accuphase E-280.

I also have the loan of a TAG McLaren T20 tuner (which is not for sale) and it absolutely beats the pants off both the Naim and the Quad. There’s no comparison - the TAG is very very good.

The NAT03 is going for a very reasonable price - so, would an olive FlatCap, if one came up for sale, make a huge difference to the NAT03 and therefore worth getting the NAT03 in the hopes of improving it with an eventual power supply?
 
DNZ said:
Ah right - my knowledge of Naim is fairly limited. Can any other Naim power supplies work with it?
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The ONLY tuner that allows an optional add-on PS is the NAT-05.
A friend of mine had this tuner and tried it with and without a Hicap, and found that in this application, the Hicap really wasn't that much of an improvement. Besides you can buy a complete NAT01 for less than the price of a Hicap.
I had the 01 and 03 side by side one afternoon, both hooked up to a roof mounted G17 antenna, and the 01 was leagues ahead of the 03.

I'm pretty sure that a it is a fairly simply job to add a 24V external supply, if you could find somebody to do it for you.
 
Pezo 62. said:
Here’s the curve ball!

Go listen to a Magnum Dynalab tuner.

Seriously good tuners!
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Actually, when I had the NAT03 and the NAT01 side by side, it was actually a 3 way tuner shootout. The third tuner was the entry level Magnum FT101 (I think).
Sonically it was about on par with the NAT03, but could pull in way more stations, even when both were fitted with the G17 antenna.
But it wasn't close to the NAT01.
Magnum of course make much higher spec tuners than the 101, including one with triode output stages.
 
I’d stick on the 66. Quad had been knocking it out of the park for decades with FM tuners by the time the 66 came along. Interesting that the T20 is so good.
 
The predecessor to the T20 was the Audiolab 8000T and it did sound excellent. I think the TAG was basically the same.
But I agree, stick to the Quad. (even if I prefer the FM4!)
 
Pezo 62. said:
Here’s the curve ball!

Go listen to a Magnum Dynalab tuner.

Seriously good tuners!
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Down here in NZ there are no Magnum Dynalab dealers but there is one model available in Australia from, it looks like, the distributor/dealer - the MD90T with the triode stage as referred to by rontoolsie. It's expensive at $2995 AUS and I couldn't audition it - but the only modern alternative (but which I could audition) is the Accuphase T1200 which is $10,000.
 
Mike1965 said:
The predecessor to the T20 was the Audiolab 8000T and it did sound excellent. I think the TAG was basically the same.
But I agree, stick to the Quad. (even if I prefer the FM4!)
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the 8000T is a superb tuner. I'd like one.

I've a few - Onix BWD1 with homebrew offboard supply probaby teh best - but a home-serviced FM4 with couple of added 10uF caps decoupling on the principal ICs its not worth worring about. And the FM4 has a well-judged automated 'blend' such that signal weakness keeps stereo noise well-under control.

Frankly - the thing that limits 'FM' these days , sadly, is just how piss-poor FM 'production' has become. Even on BBC R3.
So - just use the tuner, you like using.
 
I'd be wanting to compare the two tuners using the same interconnect to eliminate that variable.
 
Hadn’t realised you were down in NZ.

So, it sounds like a Magnum Dynalab is difficult to demo!

Mind it is great you can get Accuphase. I’m tempted by an E-280 myself.

I love looking on Trade Me for hifi when visiting family in NZ. Fascinating what appears and I gather there is quite a good hifi scene down there.

Some good radio stations down there also!

Sounds like the Quad 66 will do the trick. If you can find a serviced Quad FM3, they sound lovely, or even a Quad FM2, the valve tuner is very nice.

The Quad FM4 is another good offering, but just check that the internal battery hasn’t leaked on to the circuit board!
 
There is an FM4 that I can demo - I had the 66 and the FM4 but didn't have a splitter for the antenna cable and because it's radio you can't just play the same track again when you swap sources.

But now I have a splitter I might go and get the FM4 again and compare it to the 66 - when I was comparing them by memory I thought the 66 was better.

I opened up the FM4 when I last had it, after hearing about the battery issue on here, and the battery has a little plastic fence around it so it must be a later version as I understand Quad made this mod later on. Very tidy looking internals too. Here's a pic - hopefully this works...

https://flic.kr/p/2pNU7FE
 
Photos of the inside of a FM66 would be nice. No service manual has ever been circulated. I can tell a lot about a tuner if I see the PCB
 
Now I have the FM4 in the system with a couple of hours to warm up I think it's a very slightly thinner sounding than the NAT03 - not quite as much bass and a little sibilant, perhaps. I will give it a couple of days in the system and then compare the FM4 with the 66.
 
DNZ said:
Here it is - a bit sparser than the FM4 perhaps?

https://flic.kr/p/2pNWFum
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I cannot read the tuner IC top right. This looks more of a Nat Semi design, the FM4 more Hitachi.
What is very interesting is the unscreened front end tuner and the lack of ceramic filters. In my opinion the better ceramic filters used in my Sony have much better IF filtering group delay vs shape than you are likely to get with a few Toko coils.
Don't touch any of those coils, realigning this would be challenging.
 
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