Just occasionally someone needs reminding!
Good post. No hard feelings at my end.
An interesting post - I have a CDX2 and do share your views about it being a bit forward. Would the basic Fraimlite bring some benefit, or is it the glass that makes all the difference? There are two racks being offered near where I am - oneās a Fraim, and the other a Fraimlite (different prices of course).
I stripped down my Fraim today and re-built it for the first time since purchasing it brand new back in March. I have to say here iām a little stunned at how much better my system is now performing, after giving the base and all the levels a re-tautening. Really worth the extra effort, time and patience to get things ājustā right. Boy am i now a happy bunny. I havenāt regretted the purchase of Fraim for one moment, itās a stunning thing to have.
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I donāt know, as I only have full fat Fraim (ie with the glass and ball bearings)ā¦ however I suspect the glass has a lot to do with itā¦
I debated the merits of Fraim for years, and the cost versus benefits was a constant question for meā¦
ā¦after buying the full fat frame I no monger worry that the other investment in boxes is wasted and the nagging doubt has gone. It looks great, sounds superb and on merit is a no brainer for me
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I went from a Target clone to Fraim lite, with CDX2/282/Hi/250-2, plus a few other boxes. The CDX2 had always had an unnatural ring to higher notes of a piano, the Fraim lite cured it of this but only once the power cable wasnāt touching the shelf, the music also made a bit more sense. A few boxes later I bought a full Fraim shelf for the CDX2 following a comment from @Simon-in-Suffolk and this was a further improvement and in terms of enjoyment at least the equal of adding a 555ps to it. Some how the full shelf ended up under my superline at one point and with such a pleasing effect that I had to get another for he CDX2. I now have full Fraim under all my Naim boxes, though there are still some lite shelves with other kit on and the Naim boxes have been upgraded. Iād have been better off just buying full Fraim in the first place but the Ā£4k Iād have needed to do that at the time would have wiped out my reserve and it turned out I needed a new boiler fairly soon after so just as well I didnāt.
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Thanks, a very clear answer.
I like the way the fraim looks. My issue is that itās not deep enough for anything other Naim stuff. And in reverse Naim have locked them selves into mostly only being able to build equipment that is less than 340mm deep, or so. Except for a 500DR which is 374mm deep I wonder how that fits in a fraim? My amp is 460mm deep I guess Iām not a Fraim candidate 
which is a shame because it is very attractive.
It fits just fine, although due to the height of the head unit, if you have a shelf above then you need at least an intermediate level.
Is the Fraim designed to be equally effective any surface: on carpet or is it only really designed to work on hard floor?
Itās fine in a carpeted room, but itās best to ensure the spikes donāt couple to or float on the carpet. A heavy duty stanley knife comes in handy here so you can cut slits through any carpet to allow the spikes to contact the hard floor below. If you have wooden floorboards under the carpet then make the slits wide enough so you can slide in some Fraim Chip floor protectors between carpet and floor, that way the spikes wonāt gradually sink in to the wood and become unstable or couple to the floor.
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Thanks for the clarification
Are there any by Naim upper limits in how many Fraim standard levels you can stack on top of each other?
Base plus six is the general rule.
Base + 6 might be the Naim recommended max, but Base + 5 looks ridiculous. Itās stable enough, just looks awful.
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Base + 5 looks ok IMO but 6 is a stretch. Might look into splitting into a side by side setup instead due to sonic benefits. Looks like the Base is more expensive than a standard level??
It is, by about Ā£300 iirc. 2 x 3 is also preferred for splitting power supplies from their partner boxes.
Trouble is 2 stacks takes up more floor space, so creates its own issues.
Two low stacks both looks and sounds better, and itās much easier to arrange the cables. I once had a CDS3, XPS, 552, 300 and a tuner on a base plus six, and splitting it in two made a huge difference. The problem is that not everyone has the space, and doing it meant a complete rearrangement.
