Bought the Hi Line cable in November 2023 from one of the naim dealers which are at present not representing naim. I think this was the very old stock lying with him and was not sold. In only couple of months the cable automatically started to fall apart, I have already raised a concern with the naim technical support team and the case is under review now, I’m very much upset about the issue. Does this compromise the sound quality? Should I replace them with the lavender cables till the cable is fixed. Photos of the cable new when received from the deaker back in November and the current ones now.
From what I have read on here, Hi Lines do tend to do that.
I would put the Lavender in until the HL is fixed. Or… get the HL fixed… and sell it… 
Nothing Wrong With Lavender.
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This issue appears to be par for the course with hi-line cables. The plastic is pretty weak (now then, is this a beneficial acoustic property or just cheap material?) They tend to break with very little pressure so best avoid and grasp by the metal part only. Mine was responsibly repaired free of charge which for an 800 quid cable you’d expectantly appreciate.
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I’ve just had my HiLine RCA to Din repaired through my dealer. Same issue as you are having.
They repaired it for free and returned it within 3 weeks in January this year.
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Have a Naim dealer send it back to Naim, the older “metal tin” ones like yours, used an ABS plastic formulation that was prone to failure of the plastic rings, if they’ve been sat in direct sunlight for any length of time that doesn’t help either.
The one I had repaired was actually fixed by Naim 3 times, after that I just got a brand new one for the trouble from Naim, shame as a decent cable otherwise. (I no longer have any, all sold on now).
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Mine went back to Naim too due to the same problem and they fixed it. Eventually switched to SuperLumina.
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Mine went back four times. Twice for a broken earth connection and the other times were for broken rings. Glad i’ve kept mine, it sounds excellent. Since my last repair (about 3 years ago) my HiLine somehow feels sturdier and has been fault free.
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I never really got on with the HiLine in my system, but in its defence I didn’t experience any problems with breakage.
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There is no authorized dealer here in the country where I reside, I hope to get positive response and support from Naim as usual, @Richard.Dane appreciate if you support me to get an early resolution.
I’m not sure what I can do here to help out. It needs to be handled by the dealer or, failing that, the distributor. Otherwise, if there’s no distributor, you could try contacting Naim directly and explain your predicament.
My Hi-Line broke once, through my own clumsiness. I was sliding the SuperCap back into place and compressed it against (I think) a power distributor. I still cringe when I recall the crunching sound it made. I was charged $200 for the repair.
After that I was extremely careful with it. Nonetheless, a couple of years ago I noticed a hairline crack in one of the rings, which only opens enough to be visible when the cable is hanging freely.
I’ve recently replaced it with an AV Options interconnect. It’s only partly burnt in (AVO say it takes 150 hours), but it already sounds much better. While the Hi-Line was a sonic improvement on the standard cable at the time, I felt it was only barely worth the price, and I’m relieved to be rid of it.
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Yes it’s an inherent weakness of Hiline (DIN) because of its design. Naim fix free of charge via your dealer. I have had two such repairs now. However I find the sonic benefit of the Hiline cable connector decoupling beneficial given the relative weight of the Hiline cable. As we know the most critical part of an interconnect is the physical connection rather than the cable itself
Edit… just seen Richard’s response to your latest post… hopefully Naim themselves can advise a resolution.
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Bit strange they haven’t been able to improve the weakness of the Hiline still today. Their RMA cost on this cable must very high.
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I do believe the weakness is inherent in the design. I suspect to remove it, the interconnect would reduce its effectiveness or need to rely on materials that are not available to consumer markets or become too expensive.
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Must be possible to re design it with same functionality though. After all it’s just a strain with a floating design. Not rocket science to make such a thing reliable 
The cable in the Hiline is very stiff and heavy compared to superlumina. But I guess the yacht products are more important to Focal than a cable.
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The Hi-lines are fine as they are but you do need to treat them with great care and also ensure they’re dressed carefully to avoid damaging the decoupling rings. The manual points out that great care must be taken when connecting and also handling the Hi-line.
FWIW, I’ve had my Hi-lines in daily use for 15 years with plenty of plugging and unplugging during that time, and not had a single issue with any of them.
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Different schools here maybe 
But IMO if a product is about to fail because you don’t have the manual on hand throughout the years and sales between different parties then the design is flawed. It’s bit of reality distorsion to rely on that a manual covers your back when the design is not 100%. And since Naim also cover this on goodwill they silently agree on that the design is actually flawed. IMO the naim community would go bananas if new speaker, power and interconnect cable came a long to support all boxes onwards.
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The cables were never touched after connecting back in Nov’23 and were followed instructions as asked in the manual. When I ordered the power lines and needed to change that time I noticed and immediately raised the concern with the technical team directly as the cables where I bought was a dealer previously (from a neighboring country where I reside) and he has asked me to contact the technical support team as now said can’t help as not representing naim currently.
…and for what its worth - I have also had mine for around the same time - with almost daily use - and plenty of plugging and unplugging - and in that time only two failures on two different Hiline interconnects. One of the failures was when I was unplugging and there was a bit of extra pressure on the cable… the other failure - the most recent case - appeared to fail of its own accord - as over time the articulated cable reliefs seemed to malform - that is repaired now and waiting to pick up from my dealer.
I can’t say they are unreasonably fragile, but yes you should be careful with them - treat them with respect … and for those with a regional Naim dealership they are repaired free of charge should they need it.
Simon-in-Suffolk, in my mind’s eye, two failures is representative of a flawed design. Mine suffered the same failures and I was convinced the problem lay with the dead weight of the fairly chunky cable on the relatively fragile connector ring construction. I had rather assumed Naim would have taken some elements of the Super Lumina and applied them to produce an upgraded Hi-Line. Must have cost Naim a relative fortune for all those good will repairs. IMO the flaw outweighs the gem in flawed gem to describe the original Hi-Line.
Peter
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