No apologies necessary as far as I’m concerned LindsayM. I’m most impressed with mine fed from my 202…
That’s quite alright, I accept wholeheartedly the diverse opinions here no matter how ridiculous. I’m glad you and others can keep Naim in business with these products. 
There will never be a consensus on this, and rightly so. We all have different views on HiFi components based on system matching, loudspeaker matching, room acoustics and personal taste. Perceived consensus on a forum is a very poor yardstick by which to judge.
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Yeah, learned that some 20 years ago now. Learning who has poor taste in SQ is obviously the key to success.
Well okay some components are marmite, maybe the old pre DR 250, perhaps a little fussy about speaker matching, but don’t think I can ever recall anyone not liking the 200.
I’ve had multiple 250s from olive to the current DR and I’ve never had one not sound amazing with a spectrum of speaker choices. Unlike the 200 which didn’t work no matter what speaker I connected to it. And I don’t know anyone who’d prefer a 200 to a 250 but I’m sure they exist.
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In fact one day many years back I heard the 200 driving the Neat XL6 and Titan 88s and the sound was sumptuous. Did a fantastic job with my Dyn 1.8s.
If you search the old forum you’ll find there was some misgivings about the old 250.
I was on the old forum in 2000, I’m well aware of the 250’s popularity. It’s legendary.
Okay have it your way I’m not going to divert the OPs thread anymore.
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I have owned every Nap 250 Bolt Down, Chrome Bumper, Olive, 250-2 and 250DR they all had their own flavour and the 250-2 was my least favourite that’s not say it wasn’t a good amp just compared to the other 250’s it was left wanting a bit and I too remember it having a reputation for being a bit slow amongst many members on the old forum.
The Nap 200 I owned was excellent and quick in comparison to the 250-2 but of course we all have different experiences but to find it didn’t work no matter what speaker was used is terrible luck and may have something to do with the room in which it was used.
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Maybe wait and see what the new stuff is like in Jan
Always a difficult question for people to answer. The most important thing would be to decide is there anything specific you want to improve, is there anything you don’t like about the way your system sounds or do you just want everything to be better.
Like all of us we probably want everything to be better. I spent many years slowly upgrading electronics, dedicated mains, room treatment but it was only when I finally changed speakers that everything came together to give me the sound I was after. Having said that I’m sure my entry level electronics (where I began) would never do my speakers justice.
In hindsight for me a better understanding of what I was ultimately after might have given me a quicker and less expensive route but I was fun.
Do I make it sound like I am finished …?
Did you get a SN3?
The OP has been on a fun journey, they started with the XS, different PSU, and Node & Thorens. And after the threads below looks to have followed advice by swapping to a Hicap, adding the 200, and adding a Chord Qutest. If it was me I think I’d finish the journey and add a preamp in place of the XS integrated.
The speakers I assume are a reasonably personal choice, if you like the monitor based sound then it seems strange to change that at this stage.
Node into Qutest seems like a very reasonable streaming front end to me.
Hi there, if you love your Harbeth P3ESR and want to keep it permanently in your system, then by all means upgrade the Nait XS2. That amp is limiting the potential of the speakers. In my opinion you need at least 282/250DR to get the speakers to open up. You may enjoy the sound now which I suspect is a warm sound but one that’s lacking in clarity, separation and detail, although that sort of quality may appeal to you at the moment.
Having said that, I do not recommend going higher than 282/250DR on the P3ESR although you may achieve even better results with say NAP 300DR. If you want better clarity and openness in the presentation, there are other speakers that will do a better job than the P3ESR, and an amp upgrade will not do it.
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I’ve had the opportunity to compare the node in my system with several other streamers, some even less expensive like the Zen Stream, and I can tell you the node will suck the life out of music, IMO it has no place in a high end audio system.
Even a Node used as a digital source into a Chord Qutest DAC?
That’s exactly how I tested it.
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my experience also, the node is functionally nice but that’s about it. I tried with the Hugo dac and then replaced it with a Sonore Rendu. Huge difference in resolution and the music became alive
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