My personal experience and minimal contribution after a couple of long, attentive listening sessions.
To my ears, the Nait 50 has:
Extreme focus
Extended frequency response
Is airy and full of details but also coherent and flowing
Has occasional, never invasive deep, controlled and tuneful bass
Has a voice of its own yet gets out of the way of music somehow
Is perfect for vinyl
May give a long time of musical pleasure to the buyer
It’s difficult to the point of being meaningless to define a direct difference with the SN3; they are not meant to be in competition with one another. The Nait 50, paradoxically, seems to me to be aimed at people who may not be interested in Naim’s long history, heritage, sonic traditions. You buy it, plug a turntable of great quality and that’s it.
Would that have made any sense, commercially and sonically? I too have been surprised by the 50’s quality. A great little amp if ever this stale description has been appropriated.
On the contrary, large bass drivers are nearly always much easier to drive. This is why so many high sensitivity non horn loaded speakets are massive. My 8" driver Omegas are rated at 98db and recommended power 2 - 50 watts. My 10w tube amp never goes above 10 O’clock in a good sized room.
I’d expect the Nait 50 to work great with classic JBLs or even the current L100s which have massive bass drivers.
Seems to me that they would have to have made an almighty mess of the Nait 50 if it sounded no better that a slightly cheaper amp which has been squeezed into a box with a whole bunch of digital electronics.
Acoustic sensitivity is no indication of how difficult it is to drive a loudspeaker electrically. It just affects the maximum volume and the relationship between amp volume and perceived sound.
have only heard some clips of Nait 50 on YouTube
it sounds fast,airy and detailed
hopefully if demand is high
naim will produce similar products in the future
i previously used the Uniti 1 as and office system
have compared it to a McIntosch 6900 in my main system
the Naim is uncolored, fast , detailed with deep bass
amazing that a 50 wpc amp can give full rich sound
Running the Nait 50 into a pair of 96dB efficient Devore O/96 which do have a 10“ woofer. Works surprisingly well and better than any other Naim combination into the Devore!
This would be a combination I’d love to hear. DeVore and Naim sound great together from my experience with DeVore Gibbon series speakers and a Supernait 3 with HiCapDR.
I’ve gone back and forth on which speakers to pair with the Nait 50. I decided on ProAc k1. This system is going to be a bedroom system (18’x21’). The speakers had to pass the wife’s approval for “furniture”. I love my K10’s so let’s see, can’t be that terrible.
I traded my SN3 (which was sitting unused due to upgrade to 282 Hicap DR 250DR) for a Nait50 I was offered such a good trade in deal I couldn’t resist. I find it is a more musical amp than SN3 it has a more neutral tonal balance and I have never heard vocals projected with such clarity and emotion. And the soundstage is much wider with no channel imbalance at low volume which I have consistently had from SN3 through to the separates. It is the best hi fi purchase I have made for a long time and is making me question whether I need to keep the separates.
I have SPL meters however on this occasion I’ve not used them.