Had a similar problem when I moved house a few years ago. I can sympathise with your pain. Went from firing across the width in a concrete based construction, system sounded great, excellent bass and engaging music. New house with plasterboard walls and floating parquet had lack of deep bass and with the emotion sucked out. I’ve always wondered whether its the plasterboard having an effect. I already had a 282 but went from a 200 to a 250.2 which helped quite bit and from Proac D18 to D30R which also helped but it still isnt near where I think it ought to be unfortunately. Just bought a microphone to make some room measurements with REW. Hoping that might shed some light on the problem. You might want to try it too. Good luck.
Spud
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I think it’s very unlikely that there is anything wrong with the 250DR. Tripping the mains circuit on switch on is a not in common Naim problem because of the surge if you happen to turn the unit on when the ac mains is at a maximum voltage. It shouldn’t happen if the trip is properly specified, but that can easily be fixed by an electrician.
Also, having a 272 and 250DR I can say there is definitely no shortage of bass. Adding a power supply to the 272 is well worth doing but if it’s not working well in the room without a power supply then that needs fixing first.
So I think this is a loudspeaker issue first and foremost. They may need positioning differently or they may need changing. But anyway the electronics is unlikely to be the problem in my opinion.
Best
David
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Interesting thread…I do think also it’s unlikely to be damaged electronics. The other variable to speaker placement is room reflections. They have can have a huge effect on how you appreciate music… if you are really concerned then it’s worth doing a frequency scan at your listening position to see if you have some deep nulls… (REW is example software that can do this with some hardware)…
You may find moving speakers and listening position changes these nulls markedly. Having much furniture and irregular decorations in a room can also help diffuse strong reflections.
Generally speaking, when a well working system is moved and no longer sounds optimal or even good, the first 2 thing I would look to are mains supply and speaker positioning. Given that alternative electronics does help, I would tend towards mains supply. How are you powering your Naim kit? Standard sockets on a standard household mains ring? Power Strip?
The fact that powering up your 250 causes your mains to trip is a certain sign that all is not well. Your mains should be strong enough to cope with the inrush current without any problems and certainly should not cause the power to trip. Also wall plugs may be old and dirty, while mains rings wiring will have dozens of crudely made twisted joins in the cables so power is poor and earth is high impedance…neither good for audio.
Personally, if it were my system I’d start by giving it a dedicated mains supply with proven (tested) low impedance earth.
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When turning on a Naim power amp causes the MCB to trip, that is not at all unusual. Once successfully turned on, it is no longer an issue. Changing a type B MCB for a type C of the same rating generally prevents this from happening, but it is not a sound quality issue.
I moved my system from its usual room to a larger room expecting it to soar, and had the same as you - all the bass energy and drive disappeared. For various reasons it can’t be in the bigger room anyway so it went back to its smaller cell until this week when it had another run out in the bigger room. This time with more careful positioning of speakers etc it was a lot better, still not great but listenable.
Try some judicious speaker repositioning as a start. There was a thread on here recently all about that, I’ll have a look and put the link up shortly.
Found it. Speaker Placement thread.
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I suspect the change from brick to “cardboard” walls will have altered the sound significantly from what you heard in your previous room, though I acknowledge this does not explain the comparison with the Cyrus. I agree with those who have suggested you will probably need a change of speakers, but before looking into that, is there a Naim dealer close enough to talk to and perhaps ask to come round and take a listen?
If you do go for new speakers and the budget allows you might want to audition active ATCs which are not typically bass shy.
Roger
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I used to run a six pack of 135s. How would I manage to get that lot turned on if each power amp tripped the mains? When the mains trips it highlights that the circuit breaker is at or over its limits. If its not functioning well at switch on, with the extra in-rush current the chances are very good that its not functioning well while playing either. It may be common for Naim amps to trip circuits. That doesn’t mean its desirable or a sign that everything is healthy. It simply means that a lot of mains circuits are under specified for moderately powerful hi-fi amps.
I’ve noticed that with almost every thread that involves sub par performance, a proportion of all answers are that an upgrade is required. I simply don’t buy this. In days of yore I’ve heard systems based on Naim amps with Linn Kans SBLs or LS3-5As sound perfectly good in large rooms, listened to in the near field obviously.
Amps are specified with flat frequency response, ditto speakers, so they shouldn’t need room reinforcement to sound decent. Generally speaking, poor rooms will cause bass frequency anomalies or poor imaging due to reflections. Poor speaker positioning can effect bass, but if swapping amps to something less powerful resolves bass issues, you can logically rule out speakers and speaker positioning and start looking for something that affects the amp, hence mains power. When the mains is tripping at switch on, it may be a common occurrence, but I would take that as an indication that there may be some current limiting going an. And what do amps need to produce bass? Current.
Start with a system that’s been on a week or two, then try try the ideas in the speaker set up thread mentioned above. I’ve had several things sound off when recently moved, my 250 sounded slow and flat the day after I brought it home on the back of a motorcycle and I’ve had speakers sound really harsh after a 1000 road and ferry trip, in both cases the solution was to let them settle for at least a week. You might just need replacement speakers at the end of it but don’t give up without a fight.
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Just to say, contrary to what several people have said in this thread, I completely agree with Chris that Naim units sometimes or even often tripping a circuit breaker at turn on isn’t a sign of a poor or inadequate mains supply. And it doesn’t affect sound quality once on.
It’s because the wrong type of circuit breaker has been fitted in the consumer unit for an application where there are high transient peaks. It’s a trivial job for an electrician to change the circuit breaker.
Best
David
We’re talking an 80 watt amplifier that draws around 350 watts operationally, so your current surge could be ca 10x the operating current without triggering a 15A MCB.
BUT…you don’t know the current draw of the other items connected to that ring, nor do you know if the MCB is good for its rated current. In fact all you know is that switching on your amp triggers a fault condition. Over the years I’ve owned a fair number of Naim boxes including stereo, bi-amp and active arrangements and probably a dozen power supplies and they’ve never once triggered an over current situation despite sometimes being used on standard household mains rings. Triggering an MCB is a fault condition and should be looked into…assuming you care about optimal performance
Apologies if your first response to this question is ‘of course, that’s the first thing I checked, you fool’, but from the symptoms it could be the speakers on the Naim system are connected out of phase - are you certain this hasn’t happened?
Mark
You obviously don’t know much about the way electrical circuits work. The switch on current surge on Naim equipment is well known, often rupturing equipment fuses on switch on. It’s caused by the very low resistance of the primary circuit of the toroidal transformers that Naim uses. The resistance increases rapidly when the winding warms up and of course there is no current surge if the user happens to turn the unit on as the ac voltage crosses zero. A peak at switch on of more than 10 or 20 times the static current is entirely reasonable.
This is not a fault condition in the Naim unit and it merely indicates that the circuit breaker in the house electrical supply us not correctly specified for high peak currents. It’s not a fault in the supply, just poor design, but of course the designed wouldn’t have known a future user’s liking for Naim equipment. Changing the circuit breaker is simple and cheap, but something for someone with electrical knowledge to do, not a DIY job.
Best
David
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@davidhendon is spot on… you may need to look to changing your MCB to a higher surge curve rated type. Remember we are talking AC not DC, and the large toroidal transformers used in the larger Naim power supplies are highly inductive with high efficiency, that is low resistance., so the surge current is significant.
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We moved 18 months ago, and I found much the same problem, the new room which was about the same area seemed to absorb more sound than the last house. Both homes were drywall on block and brick outer skin, but the new home needed more volume and as I say seemed to absorb sound, less life. I put it down to the lighter blocks they use in new construction.
Over time I have got used to the new sound and more recently I bought larger speakers which probably goes some way to heal the differences
With regard to tripping circuit breakers, Naim amplifiers use comparatively large, high duty transformers and can give rise to high inrush current which may trip sensitive MCBs, the type which are intentionally installed in domestic dwellings. Commonly type B.
You should check with a professional before changing the circuit design in your home by fitting an Mcb with a higher inrush capability, for instance a type C.
Transformer inrush varies and is dependant upon when in the mains 50Hz cycle the amplifier switch contacts close. It may appear ironic that the highest inrush current occurs when the switch contacts close at zero volts, that is when the mains voltage cycle crosses zero volts. This is because the inrush current is dependant on the rate of change of voltage, which is highest at the zero crossing point.
In my system I have only managaged to trip my Type B mcb twice in two years using my nap300. It is down to luck as to when the switch contacts close in the mains cycle and whether the mcb trips.
A change to larger speakers might not be the best option in a flat with cardboard walls for neighbour relations.
I’m wondering that the new room is giving out a more neutral tone, and that the old smaller room was reinforcing bass reflections that gelled with the Naim kit. Cyrus might seem bass light in some systems, but has most probably a larger bandwidth that your hearing more of. Maybe switch the new listening spot more nearfield and with speakers closer together.
With respect, there’s not much to know about a simple domestic ring mains…an RCD, an MCB, a few bits of cable and a few cheap sockets.
Logically, if I brought a previously good sounding system into a different environment, installed it and found it sounded crap and tripped the mains at switch on, the very first thing I’d do is make sure that it wasn’t the mains that was causing the problem.
You want to make a Naim system sound really bad, connect it to a cheap and nasty surge protected power strip. Given it’s (and practically any amp’s) sensitivity to mains quality, checking the ring supply is an obvious place to start troubleshooting its performance, especially when its related to lack of liveliness and bass drive.
To the OP. Do you have another room in the house that has similar dimensions to your old listening room? Yes,it will be different due to different construction etc, but I think that briefly trying it i. There would help you determine if it is the size of the roo. That is the issue, which might justify considering different speakers, or if it might be so ething else.
Interestingly I used my old IMF TLS 50 speakers in a range of rooms, of dofferent constructions and dimensions, the largest room double the size of the smallest, and they never sounded bad. And I then used my IMF RSPM speakers also in a range of rooms, and they only sounded bad in one - due to cancellations, which I resolved with the help of REW, resulting in a complete re-evaluation of room layout.from that originally envisaged, then sounding good. I don’t know if this is a characteristic of transmission line speaker loading, my insensitive ears, or luck, but by and large I am not convinced that with decent speakers it is not possible to find a solution. (However, with compromised speakers life may be different…)
Regarding mains and whether the circuit breaker has adequate peak capacity, I don’t think that has anything to do with it: it might affect nuances, but not the ability to deliver the basics. Indeed, if the circuit breaker hasn’t adequate capacity to deal with the demand when music is playing, it will trip in use, not just with the switch-on surge, something for which torroidal transformers are renowned for presenting as a challenge to the electrics.
The bad sound is a clue that something in set up is not correct. The MCB tripping at switch on could be an indication that it may be the mains supply that is not altogether healthy. A bad contact somewhere on the ring, a contaminated socket, an incorrectly wired socket, bad earth contacts, a noisy component on the same ring, a worn out MCB with burned contacts…any number of things could be causing the problem…the MCB is just an indicator that its worth investigating the mains supply, given its unknown and untested quality and the negative impact it can have on sound quality.