I don’t agree the 300 provide fuller bass than 250. It provides deeper and more controlled bass. Same with XPSDR vs 555. 555 provide less full bass but deeper and more controlled. It’s like putting on glasses for your ears. So I believe it’s either room nodes issues or not being used to the slightly different character. Stepping up in naim range has never given me more and more full bass. That would mean a top system would sound awefully bloated.
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Maybe it depends of the kind of speakers, room…?
But for me and at dealer place, the 300 dr gave a fuller sound, more body, fuller bass, more bass too.
As for the 555dr vs XPS dr, the former should not give a general thinner sound, what observed the OP.
I see you received your 250 dr. Congrats ! How all is sounding now? Which of the Totems work best in your office / room?
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Quite delightful, I must say. It’s really quite a bit better than anything I thought I would ever have, so quite delighted.
The Forest Signatures. The balance is really nice. The Hawks are with the Nova in the lounge, but I’ll try them on the 252/250 one day for interest.
Sorry for the thread diversion.
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That 555ps dr will rapidly improve in 1st 2 weeks and take around 6 weeks to really start showing its true worth…and around 3 months for full performance. Enjoy…by the way leave it permanently powered…
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Thank you all for your recommendations, here is a follow up a few days later. The detail I am hearing is indeed superior to the one coming from XPS DR, the image is more focused, the voices are even more separated from the mix, popping in front of the rest.
The bass does seem a bit lower, it took 1 notch on the volume and 2 notches on the crossover buttons from the Rel to bring it almost to the same impact as before.
Which more and more leads me to the conclusion that the 1028 may not be the best option for the kind of sound I’d like. They are indeed very sharp, tight and layered bass, but warm sounding they are not.
I’d like more scale and dynamics, more impact, something I think I can only get from bigger drivers. And one model that comes again and again in my search is Tannoy Cheviot. Though not extremely popular here, I think there are only a handful of posts on the Legacy line. Any of the Cheviot (or Eaton) owners care to share some experiences, if/how they are matching with the 250DR and rather smallish rooms?
I use Legacy Eatons and use them in my rather small room having used them with both 250DR and 300DR and XPSDR and now 555PSDR on my 272. It to me sounds like you would love the Cheviots if you have room for them. A friend of mine have those with a Mcintosh and they might become too much for a small room so don’t exclude Eaton from your list. They sound huge with great lower mid warmth adding size to voices and never any fatigue listening to high volumes or for long periods. Imaging is awesome due to the coax driver getting all sound from one point. In short, they are speakers positioned to play music creating emotions and not focused on the best measures in the industry. I’ve been down that path in finding speakers that measure correct but I always ended up fighting them and got tired. With the Legacys I always get a smile on my face, no matter genre or listening levels. I’m surprised not more use them really but at least where I live it’s challenging getting your hands on them.
I got to the root of the bass problem. I assumed that due to the different regime of bass, I needed to move the Rel to a different position. So I turned it off first. And instantly the bass was back! And the immediate conclusion was - out of phase. So I switched the phase from 0 (as it was with/without the XPS) to 180 (as the 555 seems to like it), and the Rel started to act like a Rel. Even more, now I had to turn the level all the way down to minimum, or it becomes unbearable. Actually if I were to listen at moderate volumes, I should turn it off completely. But unfortunately that’s not usually the case, so I left it on to act as “loudness” on lower volumes.
This is a very unexpected behavior, can anyone explain, in more or less lame terms, why the replacement of a power source completely switched the phasing? No other change was done to the system, please don’t say I somehow accidently changed the phase, because it was always on 0.
Beside this, now the only other thing I need to fix is the highs. There an outstanding level of detail coming out, and at least for now the result is rather harsh, as if all recordings are coming from the 80s with pre-emphasis and there’s no de-emphasis performed in the DAC. Any clue on this one?
Fresh update on the brightness issue. I remember that when I added the SL into the system, the immediate impression was similar - brighter sound, to the point of wondering if I made the right choice. And yes, it took a while for the sound (and/or perception) to calm down.
So I replaced the SL IC cable with the stock one that came with the 250, leaving the speakers SL in place. And the entire scene calmed down to really enjoyable. Indeed some of the details have mellowed (like real brass feelings from the cymbals, out of speakers imaging, distinct isolation of voices in the mix, much deeper stage etc), but the end result is still sensibly above the SL IC + XPS DR. The phasing on the Rel remained at 180, but the overall bass feeling has warmed up and the booming is also gone.
In conclusion - is the 555 DR still a worthy investment on the 272? Don’t know, it does bring significant improvements, it’s a completely different machine. Hearing what I’m hearing now, would I have invested initially in a XPS? Probably not.
Was the SL fully burn in? More than 100 hours working?
Because a lot observed that same brightness and edginess at the beginning with that cable.
I bought the SLs pre-loved more than 2 years ago, so yes, way above 100h working in my system.
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I can agree with so much that has been described in this thread regarding the addition of the 555ps dr, having just added one (used) to my NDX2 in the last few weeks.
The bass does at first seem to be more detailed and as though you hear it more so than feeling it. I also noticed this when listening to another local naimites system. He described it as tighter bass which I now really agree with. At first I wasn’t sure I liked it as it’s not really how you hear bass when your at a gig but I think that was also influenced by his new Magico speakers and 252/300 system.
What I notice to be most prominent a change is the left/right stereo separation. As the op said, sometimes you really hear the stage right outside the speakers and the movement of sound is so pronounced on those particular tracks that have been engineered for this effect and even those that haven’t.
Maybe it’s just me imagining it but I now notice many more tracks where the vocals emanate from left or right as opposed to always center.
The stereo effect really makes sense as after all, it’s the dac which does the separation of the digital code into the two analog channels and the better psu would only help its performance at this task.
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