For the past 3 years when powering up my ND5XS2 from standby it has always made a slight mechanical clicking noise which I assumed was normal.
However, the last couple of days, it had been silent when going from standby to fully powered-up status. It still seemed to work fine and sound much the same so I was slightly bemused.
I checked the settings and noticed that inadvertently Server Mode had become selected. I normally keep this off as I have no need for it. It seems that when this is selected, the power up from standby is silent but if it isn’t the mechanical switching noise occurs.
I’m guessing all is as it should be but still quite interested in why the difference.
I think I’ve seen similar discussion of other Naim products that have a server mode. If server mode is on, the unit has to stay awake to the extent of responding to other devices that want to access it.
With server mode enabled the main power supply remains powered up when the unit is in network standby mode. This is to allow the server to continue functioning which it could not do if only the tiny standby power supply was running.
The benefit of this is that the streamer remains warmed up, which may have a small beneficial effect on sound quality. The disadvantage is that it uses a lot more power in standby.