The air ? I don’t understand, sorry.
Maybe non DR customers are less affected negatively?
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Apparently it’s a glitch in the ‘matrix’ caused when Naim make a patch for the fabric of our reality!
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updated my 222 yesterday and yes some female vocals were piercing followed forum advice to turn off all unused inputs and that did tame things a bit - now listenable , tho i think not as enjoyable as pre update
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Maybe separation is a better word for it.
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Thanks for the recommendation for the album and have added it to my favourites on Qobuz.
I don’t have a Naim streamer, so not affected by the latest update.
Listened to it on my Linn Selekt and as you’ve mentioned there is a nice bit of prescence to it, thanks again.
DG…
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That can happen if the type of filter used is changed - you get ringing in the passband and it will be just like this.
I don’t know what has been done if anything but I hear a change in HF presentation that accords with edges being over-emphasised (brighter) which will accentuate the ‘gaps’ between edges and make more perceived ‘space’ but at the expense of the natural background low-level detail also present. It is very much what is done for some photography image processing so it is a good analogy.
Chebyshev filter
Bessel Filter
If you do a search for Chebyshev filter, Bessel filter and Butterworth filter and ignoring all the maths just look at the passband gain and phase and you will see that there can be issues with trying to get too sharp a roll-off. The thing is that people have different preferences in what they are willing to strike a compromise with in presentation. For classical piano the natural decay continues in the background while new notes are laid-down as a kind of mesh and if that is distorted you get the abrupt decay ‘plinky plonk’ effect people have described.
I again say I don’t know what has been done but it is very different.
It could be nothing in the filter has been altered by intent but ingress of noise is impacting.
DB.
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Good explanation, thx! And I agree, we do not know what has been done, but it feels like being a step too far.
Indeed, I don’t believe the filter has been changed since the NDAC days, I understand Naim have constantly looked at new filter architectures, but none yet has improved what was designed with the NDAC. These is achieved with a few specific operands (five I believe) instructing the SHARC processor the low pass filter to adopt, which is an IIR Butterworth filter to which poles have been added to help reduce the phase shift in the upper part of the audio band. This Naim programmed SHARC low pass filter is in place of the filter in the converter chip(s) such as the PCM1704K which are disabled and not used.
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I think it’s highly unlikely there will be a rollback or a fix for the sonic changes.
They said they didn’t intentionally modify anything about the audio processing, so any audible difference is an unintended result of the firmware code. I think it’s implausible that they could rewrite the firmware in a way that will predictably control this effect, if the effect is even measurable.
Even subjectively controlling the effect with further audio processing is going to require a helluva lot of regression testing, on many many devices - and is unlikely to satisfy everyone.
So I’d say we’re stuck with it - which I’m fine with - that is, until it changes again unintentionally - which may be better or worse again for some.
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Here’s another favourite track of mine that no longer works it’s magic after the FW update. This normally sounds really emotional and intimate when played at realistic levels. About a minute into the song the vocalist really uses the full power and range of his voice. It sounds magnificent in its purity. Not any more. Once again his vocals now have this edginess on the upper registers that were just not there before. This edginess also seems to mess with the presence and the depth of the image that I could previously hear, and it all becomes a bit flat and two dimensional. Then, about another minute in, there’s an awesome guitar riff and sax solo. The sax, on the old firmware, was literally in the room with you. Again, the effect has disappeared and it now sounds edgy, harsh and more like listening to the track on a rather moderate hi-fi system. All in all another real disappointment!
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A stunning performance, with many well-realised production qualities, but something is definitely not quite right with the vocals and sax parts. I’m too out of practice to say for certain if it’s mechanical overload of the mics or very heavy handed limiting… perhaps both.
Maybe whatever change has happened with the new firmware is allowing you to hear previously unnoticed inadequacies in certain recordings?
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You really think they will left long date Naim forum members with their dissatisfaction with their Naim streamers?
The forum impacts sells. If several members who post regularly will not give enough desire to new customers to buy Naim streamers, I doubt Naim will let things as such.
Of course many customers don’t read forums, but many yes. And probably many are members of the forum.
Todays social medias have a lot of influence.
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Hey, thanks for pointing out this album. I’m quite enjoying it on a moderate hifi → Atom/Spendor speakers with the new firmware and Tidal Connect.
I hope it gets revolved for you.
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We were quite a while waiting on Max.
Going on what we know about the change that has caused the “problem”, a “fix” will likely not be predictable or reliable. I’d say they’re assessing the risk of any further changes simply moving the frustration to a different cohort of the customer base.
Just a reminder, if you are one of the 7% from this poll who are experiencing a deterioration in sound quality after the latest FW update, it could point to another issue coming from the update process. In this scenario, Naim recommend performing a hard factory reset. Please note, this will clear radio station preferences, and app settings. If the symptoms persist then please contact Naim Support via email or phone. Thanks.
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They certainly could write the code in a way to do this, I paraphrase, but several years back I was informed by a then senior design engineer at Naim when I had volunteered to help on some aspects that they had nearly perfected the code patterns to act as subtle tone controls through the interaction of noise profiling and shaping from the very low level code execution on some modules.
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I’m struggling to imagine how exactly this is causal. But assuming it is…
They just didn’t do it this time?
Or it had unintended consequences on some systems?
Or perhaps they didn’t have time and will refine?
I think likely 1 and 3 as the imperative was getting the web radio resolution out there…
For me given the feedback, I would expect the next software release to have more focus in this area.
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You are not wrong, a new update can not please different customers who were pleased before.
But maybe they can just decrease the high frequencies hardness ?
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