Nah, that’d defeat the point of this thread.
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That’s great! They wouldn’t be building ‘em if they weren’t sellin’ 'em!
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I agree; we’re entitled to one bona fide “pure speculation” thread!
I agree with others there will be a 500 update and the statement dev work will continue. There’s a big gap b/w the 300 and statement that needs to be filled. Expensive hifi abhors a vacuum.
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absolutely. and while we’re playing hi-fi fantasy football, I’m all in on a 50-matching shoebox streamer in a throwback shirt. it’s going to happen
Only one, the whole place is speculative!
Statement being almost 10 years on the market and 3 years in development before that, what was the latest and greatest of its day likely isn’t that today. It’s paid for, made a good profit and the tech is now transferred throughout the rest of the line. It’s still the flagship product but no longer a statement of all that is possible and annual increases have pushed the price beyond justifiable in todays market.
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When you think companies always know best (1) Kodak-digital camera will never catch on (2) Motorola-the razr will always be the cellphone (3) Ford- 1974 Mustang (4) Sears (5) Kmart-we can beat WalMart on prices (6) Lehman Brothers-buy more mortgages 2007, and countries Japan 1941-let’s bomb Pearl Harbor, USA Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and many more. Many times group think and “Yes Men” make the decisions. Don’t count out the customers who spend their hard earn money and are passionate about the products to make the right decisions instead of company men who care more about their next bonus than what is the right decision for the company in the long run. I’m not saying this is the case for Naim but in my industry I see it every single day.
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As with most things, things change and normally get better.
In hifi terms, a lot has happened the last few years, especially in the digital relm. So even something just 2 years old can already be going out of date, especially if it has taken a year or more to develop beforehand.
The stand alone pre amp is fast becoming something that’s just not needed, as digital volume control is just getting so much better, plus more are just digital only systems.
Obviously dac, streaming is where all the development is mainly going as that’s the market right now.
But you can really get a great sounding system these day’s for a lot less money than it was about 5 years ago, even with the price increases.
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I can imagine there being another range above the 300 series with no built in power supplies. Not sure it would just be a reworked 500 though. Maybe 600 series? I quite like the idea of a 666 PS.
Guys, a 500 series replacement will happen, of course it will. The volume control from statement has now been applied to lesser products and its definitely an improvement as it fixes all of the alps blue pot problems and is less in the way for the signal path, of course this will applied to boxes with seperate power supplies. I remember when the nap500 came out, the next thing to get updated was the 5 series, then all the products that were in between get the make over, its how naim does things. And its also a reoccuring good thing where performance of a particular range reaches the next level of the previous range. Thats progress and looks fairly consistant to the naim we all know and love.
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I still have my mint Motorola RAZR in the loft. I still think it’s one of the coolest phones ever made 
. I also agree regarding ‘Groupthink’. It’s one of the reasons I retired. The other was ‘Agile’ but happily that’s all in the past now.
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I’ve been investing in Chord Music cables to improve my 552/500 DR system. If a new 552/500 replacement appears in a couple of years time and i want to upgrade,will a few of these cables become redundant, based on what we know so far about the new range? The ones i have in mind are my 4-5 din ( Superline to 552), din- xlr ( from 552) , Snaic ( for 552) and the cable that can’t be named ( 552/552 ps).
I can’t see the new 552/500 replacement being less than 70k ( 35k each) so the cost to change is going to be pretty big, especially factoring in the loss of these cables.
All this makes me think that from a cost viewpoint, its probably wise not to think about what may be ahead and to focus on enjoying what i have.
All speculation of course as the timing/ cost/ sound quality of any 552/500 replacement is currently unkown.
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Given the absolute uncertainty of whether and when . . . I agree that that is wise. Waiting for the next big thing-itis is awfully unsatisfying. Unless it’s a mind-trick to stop you from spending money 
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Maybe just updating software of existing kit to further improve what we have rather than spending big on new kit?
I’m not aware of any software that can change sound qualities outside of the streaming hardware. And that’s a somewhat continuous process with the streaming platform.
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