Sticking relay on the AV channel on a brand new in February this year. Thanks to the lockdown it cost me a new RCA - DIN interconnect and AV amp before we realised the problem was the 552.
No fault of my dealer but he couldn’t believe the problem was a brand new 552.
Took an age to sort out too but that was Covid related rather than Naims fault.
That was after waiting 6 weeks for my first 552 it arrived damaged at the dealer. He sent it back to Naim and I had to wait a further 8 weeks for the one which ultimately proved to be faulty.
Damage was down to the courier but, as others have said, purchase of a 20K plus item should be a better experience than this.
With active members I meant those whose accounts are in use and not dead, even if they post only rarely.
It’s just that when you draw a conclusion from the number of complaints on the forum, it would be useful to know if the number of members changed. If there are twice the members, then twice the complaints would not be surprising, but may appear so when reading the forum (as you wouldn’t see many of these people post usually).
E.g., I would not have complained a year ago about defective Naim units because I did not have any new Naim gear and was not a member. Now I suddenly would have opportunity to complain about 6 new units if anything came up. (All fine so far however, except for a low-volume imbalance on the 252 that seems to be worse than is to be expected and will have to be sorted)
Can’t respond Suedkiez. Just that in 2015 I hardly saw complaints and today there are a lot. But maybe also there are more members today. Can’t say.
I see a lot of components that have to return to Salisbury since 1 year.
Very little could go wrong with analogue components. Digital or hybrid components are much more complex and never “finished” as such. Thus there will be more issues and there will be more complaints. None of that means that something more fundamental is going on. The cost of the item is irrelevant. Indeed the cost reflects that complexity and so extra risk comes with the cost rather than less risk. A sense of perspective is required.
The old streamers didn’t received so many complaints. Before being a member here, I was reading the forum since 2010. Apart the Unitserve failures after some years and Ndx screen freeze, there were no topics on defective items, issues, and necessity to return components.
Even the SN3 or Xs3 had to be returned recently. They are all analog and very recent products.
Are there some conclusions to be made? I don’t know. But all that is a bit annoying.
However I am a Naim customer since 2002 , have bought a lot of components, and had only one issue with a Nap 200. It doesn’t discourage me to continue with Naim.
Less people bought the original streamers; the screens were much simpler; the forum less accessible.
It was not my point Mike…
It is unfortunate and extremely annoying to have to return twice such a nice piece of kit.
But unless having access to Naim’s sales and returns statistics, nothing relevant can be stated about potential returns increase. It simply doesn’t make sense.
It may be just sheer numbers, at play here. I am very sure Naim Audio are now building very many more actual types of product - and many more of them. So, the maths says its more likely that a defect may occur. Some if not most, of the products are also far more complex, by several orders, than say a NAP160 was/is.
The more functionality you cram into one unit (*), the worse it gets, numerically. Think of the number of stand alone units you need to replicate the functionality of, say, a Unity Nova…? Its at least 3, maybe even 4.
Add in that more and more people are using the Internet - and therefore have potential access to this Forum - and a greater tendency (YMMV) for people to complain… I think that goes a long way.
This is not to excuse or minimise the problems that people report.
I am sure Naim would wish to resolve them - and will aim to learn any lessons, and take corrective action, where needed.
IanM
(* - I used to work on aero engines. Some had their fuel system components combined into a single unit - others/older ones had separate units for each function. Numerically, the combined units always had a higher apparent failure rate. )
I echo what you said here @mikehughescq, the relatively new world of streaming is never finished given the continuous evolution of the streaming platforms, standards, security, protocol, lets collectively call software.
Not being electrically trained please excuse me by my generalisation. Naim is built on a few solid design beliefs, a beefy transformer being one and the result is apparent and loved by many.
At least some of the issues may be attributed to software. I feel Naim has to and is learning to be a robust software development shop. I was drawn to uniti nova because of Naim’s insistence to support everything at the time and that certification process was said to be one reason resulting in the delay of the uniti range release.
Like Nikon I also love, it’s considerably smaller than say Canon and much smaller than Sony. Nikon is famous for the lenses it produces. It is claimed Nikon lenses are used in the manufacturing process of its competitors. But Nikon softwares are woeful. I wish Nikon the best and hope it’s mirrorless camera development speeds up and catches up quickly to its older dSLR siblings to become proven field tested workhorses.
I am writing as I am enjoying my naim, wishing Naim the best and look forward to Naim furthering it’s capabilities. To that end, like many here I am in the beta test program happy to contribute and get on the journey with Naim. 
I don’t believe you can draw conclusions from your forum impressions, even if you have gathered enough figures to use for meaningful statistical analysis. In the last few years there has been a steady move towards web based communications for product support, so you would expect a steady increase. (The fact that this is intended to be a discussion forum rather than a support forum doesn’t seem to stop people!)
Add to this the extreme restrictions to visiting dealers in person that have resulted from the lockdowns that have cramped our style for most of this year, and you might expect a rapid increase in online discussion of any issues that traditionally would have been addressed by your dealer.
I can’t deny that it’s always worrying to hear of problems, whether in design, functionality, hardware or software faults…but beware of lies, damned lies and statistics!
But, £20k and problems like this? Not once but twice!
Agreed. And this is being compounded by the fashion for getting online to have a good moan. Nowhere/nothing is safe. There are several Google reviews for a petrol station in Emsworth, for example. Who cares?
I would take issue with regards to the purpose of the forum, though. I think problem solving is part of its charm, and I for one have been helped a few times.
As I tried to explain, I shared more my feelings and impressions rather than conclusions. As you said, it’s impossible to make conclusions without solid numbers and Salisbury statistics.
Conclusions would be a non sense.
I hope the OP gets this issue resolved soon. It seems incredibly bad luck to get two faulty units. I was intrigued by some comments earlier in the thread about dealers installing, or not installing, products at the buyer’s home. Does anyone know what Naim’s current policy is with their dealers? If a customer requires it, does Naim expect its dealers to install purchased products?
Thanks @ChrisSU, good points. I must say I don’t claim to know where the problem is nor do I know the solution. I don’t have that insider information. And stats most certainly need to be interpreted carefully. They can be as misleading as anything!
I think this year is a bad ones for people as everyone is under excess stress nothing happens quickly anymore, lots of people still working from home. The forum is a good place to vent. Some people praise but kore vent. It could just be a case of people needing to let off steam as wait times are now much longer than they were previously and once you have waited and the product is defective its a bit of a kick in the teeth. Its not like there is as much of a life available these days what with lockdowns etc. Lets not forget that. Its pretty bad luck to have 2 faulty ones but online purchasing has gone through the roof and couriers are very busy. That 552 is not being carefully placed! Its getting launched between lorry and vans. No one is catching it! I run a mail order outfit and see it first hand. Boxes are dropped off the back of the trucks. Never carefully carried, the heavier they are the more carefree they are! We get lots more stuff ‘damaged in transit’ these days.
This most likely is not caused by Naim at the factory but in transit which is still on Naim as they choose their partners. Maybe employing a driver and delivering high end stuff could work depending on the volume and routing/planning. A van full of 500 level gear on a daily route is certainly possible. In my industry its done with very cheap products and pays off…
I doubt they sell that much 500 stuff. Maybe a monthly delivery to each region would work, if they packed in some lesser level deliveries to the same dealers to make it pay.
Of course this would be outsourced to a courier company, but with a higher price/higher SLA contract than the usual £20 for anything anywhere.
Best
David
I have recounted on the old forum my experience of 2 faulty CD555s circa 2012. It was the third one that worked properly. One skipped, the other’s door wouldn’t close fully.
Now that I think of it that was the last piece of Naim equipment I have bought.
I actually expected at the time that someone from Naim would contact me directly but this never happened. I didn’t take it to the forum as it was happening, just related it after the fact.
.sjb