250 vs 300

No i’m saying I prefer my new set up to my old set up. I basically had a pile of boxes that were starting to annoy and look untidy so my criteria were to reduce that pile, add a turntable, retire CD, and add streaming for about the same price (i.e. sold = bought). Within that context the Nova/250DR is a match for my old 252/300 (CDS3 based) although different presentation. On a straight 1:1 comparison obviously the higher priced boxes will win out every time. However, I am happier with my new holistic set up both cosmetically & musically…

5 Likes

…plus the floor has stopped sinking with the weight :wink:

3 Likes

Question about the fan on 300DR. Is it possible to hear it at any time even if you are only 1-2m away or dead silent?

I’ve never heard it - not even heard anyone mention this as a “thing”. Have heard people talk about hearing fan on a 250 but they was years ago

I never heard it. It probably never was in function. I suppose you really need to push the power amp for it to need that extra cooling.

250 doesn’t have a fan, 135 does.

Ok - dodgy memory then. Sorry :neutral_face:

What I find fascinating is … the 250 and 300 are very closely related…the relocating of the psu and the retweaking of the earth … makes such a massive difference. You would think the addition of the burndies would limit performance…but it does not appear to. I think it goes to show how the critical spacing and siting of a dirty great transformers is to … the music. With a 250 you are sitting the circuits in a huge magnetic field…

Not exactly the same design and circuitry:

1 Like

Things are rather better spaced out on the NAP300, and of course, you have the big central fan-cooled heat sink on the 300, but otherwise, componentry and circuit are very similar. With the NAP250 you’re having to squeeze all of that into one case. No room for the fan-cooled heatsink, so the case and cover will have to do…

1 Like

Hi @Richard.Dane

The NAP 250 DR seems to have been deleted from Naim’s website.

An unwanted deletion or is the product going EOL?

–> https://www.naimaudio.com/range/marque-separates#classic-series

Point taken…I understand the circuits are virtually I dentical. But critically they have been carefully spaced out and the earthing changed and optimised… and cooling improved … its kinda like a super optimised 250… it is still fascinating…

Similar, not identical. This makes a slight, but significative, difference :wink:

Still there Thomas from what I can see…

Sorry, I meant from the Classic Series start page :
–> https://www.naimaudio.com/range/marque-separates#classic-series

It’s there, fourth tier down, next to the NAC252.

Oops, sorry, again. Found it.
It required another click…

Having the power supply capacitors away from the heat generating transistors will help their life too.

It goes to show how careful optimisation of layout is to sound quality. It makes you wonder how good it would be with 2 separate power supplies … totally separating amplifier boards…almost like monoblocks…

IIRC, Naim tried two transformers but found one appropriately larger one wound for each channel to sound better.

1 Like