I am hopeful that Naim pre and power amps will continue to be available; and to be developed. Maybe weāll even be treated to replacements for the 552 and 500 family!
From a naim factory visit last year it was apparent that there is a huge focus being applied to the digital consumer market - both for research and production. Like Porsche have done with the Cayenne and Macan, Naim have done with the one box products which must surely provide the main cash flow revenues desperately required to maintain their existance. But, like Porsche, Naim need to run their aspirational lines of separates (911ās and Caymans in Porscheās case) as exemplars of what they are capable of.
I suspect that Naim may have over reached the market with the Statement range which provides colossal engineering at a price point which sits well outside the budgets of mere mortals and I suspect there will be second thoughts given at board level as to the merits of the investment required vs returns. And I guess this thread is asking - but do they need to do so?
I have a cd player and record player and, apart from my first naim single box nait, have developed around the multiple box approach. My speakers demand a bit of power, so all things considered, the mutli box set up suits me just fine.
Whilst I get that the new generation of single box products provide a great quality sound against the competition, I think there is a decent argument to be had around the sheer speed of development of digital music and the redundancy it imposes. The NDS was a top line digital product - many still revere its qualities however, with the advent of the ND555, sound quality has significantly moved on in the digital sector. To the point where an NDS sold on fleabay in recent weeks for less than Ā£3,000 - the particular model was less than a year old. That represents one heck of a hit. Dealers may be able to offer more attractive incentives, but digi tech can be financially cruel for those who wish to keep pace with it.
Whilst I am not contending that the NDS is no longer relevant, you can see that the model cycle/ speed of development may raise questions about the investment required for the ND555 and how long it will be king of the naim pile. This is not a criticism of Naim - Nikon and Canon suffer similar redundancies of their models in the digital slr market making the cost per year ownership of such top line products relatively high.
Imagine if a top line one box product were to be offered - within a couple of years the whole unit could become a relative antiquity because of the digital element becoming old tech. This is coming from an ignoramous who has no knowledge of the digital products future development cycle - Iām simply assuming there will be more of the same for the next 5-10 years. Much better to be able to upgrade the pre-amp and power amps aka DR and take a hit on the digital box, than chuck the whole lot away.
All this from someone who has just ordered a HomePodā¦!!
Peter
