Naim cables - £7255 - Shock!

Having tried a few different cables on my system and one being the super lumina over the highline i was using at the time, i didn’t see the performance gained against cost and so looked elsewhere.
I ended up with witchhat phantom speaker cable and witchhat morgana interconnects (RCA to din). I found these very similar to the high end naim, great quality as well at a fraction of the cost.
But just try for yourself and see how you get on, as the options are vast

The HiLine was developed for the 500 series. Specifically the CD555.

Yes will take it back next tuesday…i just took back a full SL loom. I thought i would be buying the SL, but as mentioned when i put my old standard loom back in…it sounded great…could not justify SL, very small improvement. The Kudos KS-1 is a bit brighter, with a lot more detail, and still very musical. I am running it in 24/7…unless it all goes pear shaped i will get Alistair to order me a set. I think it might be our room is heavily damped with Axminister carpet, 2 sofa,s, wallpaper and heavy curtains. The Kudos seems to be able to cut through that and give me the sound improvement i was looking for? Anyhow its Signals only set, but i promised i would run it in and bring back next tuesday.

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Thanks all for you responses, looks like in general, for me and my system, it may not be cost vs performance beneficial to go to the expense of SL cables. I will have a play with SL cables when my dealer has demo units but probably will not buy but may consider alternatives, I suppose I could get 3 Naim power line cables for a little under £1k with the 50% discount that I can get.

You know when I look at the cost of the SL cables they are effectively the cost of an AudioQuest Niagara 5000 power conditioner or an Innuos Zenith, probably a better use of funds when compared to interconnects.

Thanks Gaza. I’ll ask to try it out when I go down there next month.

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I am active with a pair of 300s and need about 7-8m runs of speaker cable. SL would be something approaching £20k for me :scream:. Am interested in the kudos offering and would probably get a better improvement from a pair of 707s and kudos speaker cable and a solar panel installation :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: for that sort of money!

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This is one of the reasons I chose a passive 300 rather than active 250s. I have an SL full loom, which with a 272 means that no interconnect is needed - just the din to XLR pair and, in my case, a pair of 4m cables. I was rather sceptical about these cables but after trying them was rather smitten. They work fantastically well with DR, which is perhaps no surprise as both came from the Statement project. Their ability to get out of the way and let the music flow is uncanny. I think they are brilliant and not at all out of place with my middle of the road system.

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Continuing the discussion from Naim cables - £7255 - Shock!:

Wasn’t the HiLine originally developed for the 500 series CD player? It is still supplied with the ND555. I realise that most people will have upgraded that to a Super Lumina interconnect, so maybe the HiLine would be a good option for the Classic range?

Of course, if you were to opt for Super Lumina, they’d certainly withstand every subsequent box upgrade!

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Using Hi-Line on the new system will certainly be complimentary and ultimately you can add the cabling improvements incrementally anyway rather than all at once. The electronics alone are a significant upgrade from the starting point of a SN3 based system and as others have pointed out, a dealer will typically be able to make the cabling cost more manageable should you do that one at a time or in multiples, that’s certainly been my experience.

About 3 years ago I decided to replace my NAC5 with SL speaker cable on my 500 system/B & W 802Ds. I did this as the NAC5 snaked all round the room and was not that wonderful to look at. That’s what my wife said!
As our listening room/living room has parque flooring with a large rug we decided to run the SL cables straight under the floor suspended on cable ties. Also cheaper than running it all round the room My dealer did all this for a nominal charge so the margins on cables must be fairly healthy. That took all morning and in the afternoon the system was pulled apart, cleaned and cables re-dresssed. There are no visible cables in the room apart from the back of the black boxes at the other end of the room. We even put pipe wrap around the cables where they exit the floor into the speaker rears.
So, after all that, was it worth it? From the de-cluttering viewpoint. Yes. From the sound point of view I was and still am less sure. Cost on a 500 system is not a major issue?
Perhaps its back to source, as a new Powerline at about the same time, on my fairly early CD555 made more of a difference.

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Hi Mwomwell, Like all high end and Music lovers, it is a long way, before we find the ultimate sound. And this sound is very personal. Anyway. My personal experience
with cables is a very long adventure. And is against the usual rules of Naim (against Logic of technic, But for the Logic of ears and musical emotion).
I had the same setup as you have. I was upgrading in components, and the more I upgraded, the less I was listening to music. But Why? Details were perfect, etc. But I lost the trill and emotion.
I went back from 300DR/SC/252 to 300DR/Hicap/282. And invested my return on money on cables and resonance products. And this made the word of difference.
I will never go to another brand as the Naim brand for my amps and streaming components. But for my phono amp, cables and resonance products I needed to think out of the box.
Your journey will be different from my, as so many people prefer so many different interprestations of musical emotion. But cables and far more important,resonance products, make all the differents to a system. With the Naim power cables you should get the ultimate
technical match and the prat. But it did not work for me at all. Cables and resonance should go together as the gasoline and tyers of a car (your system). The Nice thing is, that many audio dealers can provide you with demo products.
The safe way to go would be product lines wich are strongly connected to Naim (chord, focal etc.) This works for many critical music lovers. This did not work for me. But good cables, distribution blocks and resonance products are expensive and Made all the difference to my system. Greetings Mike

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Interesting but good information and sharing. I use 282/Hicap Dr/250DR and spent a considerable amount of money on cables too and was thrilled with the results. I have no desire for any change after reaching this level with Naim.

I thought the aftermarket cables brought a rather noticeable and important difference in comparison to the standard cables and really completed the system. To each his own I guess. As few might have highlighted, there are other cheaper options and it may not necessarily need to be Super lumina.

Here we go boys and girls some cable porn to feast your eyes on, book price over £10k. Have managed to borrow from my local retailer some Naim cables (power line, super lumina and hi line) plus a chord RCA to DIN signature cable (AV to 252 duty) to play with over the lock down period, well I have to Keep myself occupied don’t I lol.

Be interesting to see any audio differences between the standard and the much more expensive Naim cables.

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I have always used standard cables an A5 on my CDS3/252/300. I am sure SL sounds great but I would rather spend the cash on something else… Each to their own of course.

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Will you be reporting your findings on here?

Will do, I have currently replaced all of the standard cables with the higher spec ones and will gradually replace each to see what difference they make.

Have these been in regular use in your dealer’s demo room? The reason I ask is because I’ve found, as with all things Naim, that they do improve with time. That could complicate your evaluation. Best of luck and have fun!

I think the power line cables look new, not sure about the rest, they only arrived at the retailer the other day direct from Naim.

Chord Signature came from Naim? :thinking:

Ah, I understand…Chord, not!

No from Chord obviously lol.