A neat system for the price of a Naim power cable!

Streaming Audio
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It may be a bit cheeky to post this here, but hey ho! I have just put together a small streaming system for my son and realised it cost less than a Naim Power-line (£749), so I wanted to share my experience if only to highlight how very expensive some of our wires have become!

I purchased a WiiM Amp Ultra (£499) and a` pair of Wharfedale Diamond 12.1s (£249), so £748.

So is it any good? You may want to check my profile for my regular listening to see that the bar is set quite high!

The WiiM Amp arrived nicely packaged including all cables (bar speaker cables and here I cheated and recycled some QED cable and 4 banana plugs; 4 were included), a very nicely made metal remote control and the amp itself a robust shoe box sized, well finished metal box. Instructions were easy to follow and the app whilst still work in progress works well. It found my NAS drive and subscriptions quickly and gave me all the information I needed both on the small colour touch screen and on my phone via the app. So far so good. Wharedale speakers have always been a favourite of mine going back to my first home made boxes in 1974 and the Diamond 12.1’s are nicely made and look very sophisticated.

And so the acid test, does it sound any good? With no warming up it sounded clear, good pace and rhythm a little less attack than I am used to but the system quickly had me searching for tracks to stretch it which is a good sign. It is a well balanced system and good to listen to.

For fun I plugged in my Spendor 7.2 speakers (£4500) which are normally driven by a Naim Uniti Nova. The WiiM acquited itself well with a little more of everything and showing it is no slouch driving good clean high volumes. I didn’t let it drive my Kudos Titan 808’s though, I bottled that!

And then the mismatch from heaven the Wharfedale Diamond’s on a Full Naim 500 set up (552/SC, ND555 + 2x PS555. NAP500DR, Chord speaker cables….) and I do not need to tell you the price of this lot! What a great small speaker this is. Great clarity and imaging, seamless midrange to bass integration, fast delivery and maintained room filling volume with ease. Yes, deep bass was absent, but the WiiM amp has a sub out, phono stage and HDMI port for TV fun.

So what, I hear you ask. Well, Naim and others please be fair in your pricing, WiiM an others are making really good kit at a fraction of the price asked by others. I have a high end Naim based system as well as a Uniti Atom and Uniti Nova both are really good and out perform the WiiM but the margin is less than you might expect.

I would love to hear what system you might create for this budget of £749. So why not share the system you would buy, used equipment can be included and recycle some of that huge box of old cables that we all have lurking somewhere!

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Friend sent his Nagra 300B back for repair and thought the Wiim would do as a good stop gap. Both of us thought it very competent and quite comprehensive but goodness it was unengaging. The Nagra was away for far longer than anticipated but nothing got better and he ended up just not listening to music.

Amusingly, my 300B then went away for repair and he thought it might be worth my having the Wiim as my stop gap. My system is not cheap but it’s not at his levels. Suffice to say it lasted two weeks before I gave it back.

Guess it cones down to what we value as good. For me it’s about PRaT, timbre, soundstage and coherence. If you value detail above those things then, yes, the distance between the Wiim and other stuff is big but not as big as you might think/hope. If you value the other stuff then, honestly, it’s nowhere near. It’s certainly not terrible but I think there are far better systems to be built for the price.

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Earlier this year, for a bit of fun, I decided to try to build a system around a Nait 50 to see if I could best my Atom at around the same cost. I ended up with a WiiM Pro Plus, to be used as a streaming bridge into a Chord Qutest. The WiiM came a few days before the Qutest which gave me a chance to try it on its own into the Nait. It sounded remarkably good for the price, but when the Chord went in, the upgrade in SQ was substantial, especially those hard to define qualities like musicality and engagement. As Mike says, it’s subjective but well worth the expenditure for me.

Roger

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I’ve mentioned this a couple of times on the forum. I needed some music for our garden room and purchased a cheap pair of Edifier active speakers for £89. To be honest I wasn’t really expecting much but how wrong was I. Of course they can’t do bass and scale on the same level as a 500 system but they have an uncanny ability to present music in a very natural and unforced way that reminds me of listening to my old Linn Kans with a 52 and 135’s. They are beautifully balanced and provide a real insight into every piece of music played. They were so good I now have a pair in the kitchen and another pair in the workshop and all for £89. The ‘disrupters’ are coming to the hifi world!

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A Linn Classic and some Mission 752 Freedom speakers can be purchased for around £500-600 second hand. Add in some QED speaker cable and you have a ‘Hi-End’ sound for very little money.

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Last year I tried a BluSound Node with a Qutest and it was very , very good.

Your comments are not surprising , they highlight the changing face of the audio business

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I went with a pair of Q Acoustics 3020i speakers to partner my Nait 50 for short term background music until a house move and more room for some nice floorstanders. Didn’t expect much but was quite taken aback by how good they sounded. £149 brand new. Puts into perspective some of the crazy prices being charged in the hifi world today especially with regards to cables.

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I didn’t think the Wiim Ultra had an amplifier? And the Diamond isn’t Active is it? Is it a Wiim Pro rather than Ultra?

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It doesn’t but the Amp Ultra does.

Roger

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Thanks - and interesting : I wasn’t aware of that model, it not appearing in their “Which WiiM product is right for you?” comparator on their website page

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Please dont post unauthorised commercial links here.

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Sorry Richard, I thought I’d removed the link and just had an incomplete web address - r does that count the same?

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For many years, most of my music listening was with a Node X into Marshall Stanmore in the garage, rather than my 500 series naim system which sat there unused.

I think I should go back to that since I need a workout more than a nice sounding system…

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£160 you know where.

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Cheap as chips but lovely.

These have been my study desktop system for years. Various USB DACs have been employed. The HRT Streamer was one of the first asynchronous designs if I remember correctly.

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If you don’t count the laptop the student will have anyway you can put this nice nearfield listening system together for less than £400 I should think.

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I sold my parents naim system and they now have a par of meridian M2s and a wiim ultra. They are delighted with it.

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How would you compare the naim atom to the Wiim amp ultra?

Currently have the naim atom with elipson planet L speakers plus dali 12 inch sub. It feels like it’s lacking in power. And a def no go without the sub.

Been looking at the Wiim amp ultra but can’t find a showroom locally that has one on display.

Wondering how they compare?

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Only just seen this thread, as you might have seen it have also been experimenting with a wiim ultra and wiim amp. Just like you I have found them to bring extremely pleasant results, especially for the price. They certainly punch way above what you might expect.

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If you want to go cheaper still, try FosiAudio. The Z3 doesnt do much detail but the noise floor is super low. I’ve got it with a node nano into Some neat speakers - the tiny ones…

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I have a Uniti Nova and an Atom in different set ups. The Nova is running Spendor D 7.2s which really do benefit from a sub (Room size is 5.5m sq solid floor). I compared the WiiM Pro in that room and found the Naim to be better in all the key areas, at a price though. Like Dunc I have been very surprised at how good the WiiM is for the money. In another property I run an Atom with refurbished Linn Kan II speakers on original Kan stands. This is an apartment where the listening area is only about 3m wide and high volume and thumping base could be a problem. The WiiM did OK with the Kan’s but an easier drive such as Wharfedale Diamonds worked better.

As you might expect the two Naim amps were better by a margin but in a much smaller space and with efficient speakers the WiiM is really quite a surprise.

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Bit the bullet and purchased a Wiim amp ultra.

Once setup will update