If I am not mistaken, SIS is indeed connecting his DAVE (and its pre amp) to his 552, and why wouldn’t he as Naim design their pre and power amps to work together.
Only a comparative demo can untangle this one but many have bypassed a Naim pre amp with mostly unsatisfactory results.
It is a nice idea to dispense with the £20k 552, but there is a reason it is £20k!
Perhaps there’s a reason Chord implemented an by pass on it’s 30K Pre-Amp designed to go along Dave’s Blu 2 M scaler!
" Chords new Ultima Pre-Amp
In simple terms, this is a preamp with four balanced and four unbalanced line inputs, plus an AV bypass input , and three sets of outputs, again on both RCAs and XLRs. But you know it’s not going to be as simple as that as soon as you look at the size of the thing, and its array of controls…"
PS. Nice System Nigel:
“NDS/PS555DR/552(Non DR)/250DR/3 x PowerLines, all on full fat Fraim, Monitor Audio GX300 speakers, full SuperLumina cable loom, UnitiServe, Cinnamon and Vodka Audioquest Ethernet cables, Cisco 2690 Catalyst 8-port switch, QNAP TS-251A NAS with Asset and BubbleUPnP server software.”
The design philosophies of Naim and Chord are rather different but that does not mean you can’t mix the two manufacturers’ components. Many have had great results from doing so, including SIS.
All I suggest is that you try to sick to the respective philosophies of each which means that you are likely to get the best results by pairing a Naim power amp with a Naim pre amp.
not my case Nigel 
I was of course referring to the OP’s situation and the topic of this thread.
Absolutely go and try it…i did . Dave straight into a 300 dr or Dave into 252/300 dr. I wanted the former to win out, but no, it was lifeless, all the Naim Prat was sucked out if it. Put a 252 into the mix with a Supercap, night and day difference. But everyone should listen and choose, the Naim preamps are not cheap…but they are a no brainier for me after trying the alternative.
In my view the simpler path feeding power amp from Dave’s inbuilt pream make most sense. That may depend on the power amp, and people claim that Naim power amps are best not fed by anything other than Naim preamps (not that I understand why). As for what a Naim preamp may bring, I’ve never heard one so don’t know. I suppose it would be interesting to find out (no chance where I live), but I struggle to picture it improving on Dave direct…
Hi Simon I had the TT2 and MScaler on loan from Nintronics then borrowed the Dave and with the MScaler amazing
the preamp on the Dave is very good as is the headphone amp enjoy yourself for a week and you won’t want to part with the Dave
If using it with the MScaler dual Bncs are the way to go ( the bncs chord supply are not great)
Sounds like a ‘bits is bits’ argument to me……
You know…'I have never tried it but it can’t be better….it simply can’t
The included an AV bypass so it can be integrated into Audio Visual systems!
Thanks Xanthe, I thought it was a way of bypassing Chord’s $30 Pre-amp allowing an A-B with Pre-Amp and without Pre-Amp.
I’ve done a comparative demo with NAP552 and Chord Pre and prefer using DAVE without double Pre. I might be alone in this preference, but I listened without knowing which combo was in play so fair as I could make it. Chord’s pre is same level as Naim Statement, but I couldn’t tell it was there. I could discern the presence of the NAP552, but didn’t know its identity until after. It’s is totally subjective. I’m sure someone will say the demo was flawed, but result is I’ve no desire to put a pre between DAVE and my power amplifier.
My view FWIW is Blu2 or HMS is better way to go than a double Pre. I do wonder why Chord has introduced an expensive analogue Pre. It does have really nice tone controls.
Have you tried the WAVE BNCs that are specially made for Blu2 to DAVE? Curious if anybody has heard the effect of WAVE cables. I asked Chord, but they were non-committal and suggested I try a few. Only other ones I’ve tried were from Chord Company and preferred my Canare.
That’s not what I said at all - please re-read.
And for reference I did compare Dave direct to through my own preamp (not Naim). Dave’s pre is very capable, and it’s impedance, voltage and current sourcing ability, and ability to limit ultrasonics means there will be no matching issues with with virtually any power amp. On the other hand if a Naim pre adds colouration (does it?) I doubt I’d like it.
Remember Naim amps are made of two distinct parts, the NAC (controller) and NAP (poweramp). The NAPs are not really optimised to workout with their NAC. (appropriate bandwidth, and constant impedance)
Every DAC has a very important component in its architecture, the analogue stage output. Many Chord devices have a level control for this so the optimum level can be used to feed a NAC… it makes a huge difference with Naim… and of course one can use the variable gain output amp to drive a power-amp or even high efficiency speakers. However the latter is not going to be optimal for a Naim NAP as the signal won’t be treated in terms of bandwidth and impedance required for Naim amps… sure it’s not to say some won’t prefer such a mismatch, that is the nature of this space, but the Naim amp will most likely not be running optimally and certainly not operating as intended or designed
BTW the 552 is a NAC and not a NAP.
I thought you could get the Wave cables on a trial basis - might be worth enquiring.
No love on the forum for the Chord Etude Power amp which looks tp be the natural partner for DAVE ?
I was put off when I discovered it’s only 75w into 8 ohms and is fan cooled (noisy).
The designer of Chord DACS, Rob Watts, connects a TT2 directly to his speakers (B&W 803 D3), no dedicated power amp or preamp, for the ultimate purest signal path.
But there is no heat-sinking in the TT2 for the driver stage so I understand … the coupling with a speaker is important… sure you can drive speakers to some extent from most things… it’s a lot about frequency bandwidth consistency, impedance handling, and power dissipation.
Therefore the impedance matching across the frequency spectrum becomes one of the more important things along with driving stability into a reactive load for ‘signal’ purity… if you have a benign, low Q, very high efficiency and large speaker this will be easier to do.
Then manual states “When in Amplification Mode, it is possible to drive efficient bookshelf or horn speakers (with suitable cabling), directly from Hugo TT 2’s outputs”.