The thing that stands out for me, not that I am likely to be personally affected, is that the difference between classic finish and 500 series finish for a 555 PS is a cool £1000. How can that be right?
It’s not just Naim, when pricing speaker finishes, the mark up on different veneers is eye watering! Talk about diminishing returns, it gives hifi a bad name.
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Expensive man hours coming up with the end result. I guess it’s not made in China and instead locally somewhere. If 1000 for the end user I will expect the cost of manufacturing is somewhere around 3-400 which is not many hours of work.
Some speaker manufactures do the cabinets in China since +10 layers of hand painted gloss is a huge cost if done in say UK.
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Often there are hidden costs that aren’t so obvious unless you are familiar with the processes and the problems associated therein.
IIRC, the 500 finish on the extruded sleeve is difficult to get perfect. Basically, you have the extruded sleeves which come from Switzerland, they then arrive in the UK where they are either anodised for 500 series or powder coated for the rest of the Classic range. The anodising is rather more involved and unfortunately it also shows up any flaws in the fine surface finish of the extrusion that are otherwise invisible (and irrelevant when powder coated) until anodised. Typically you get faint tramlines showing up where the extrusion ran along the rollers when it was made. You also sometimes get some areas of “stitching” where the brushed finish shows rather more obvious little dashes. Because of all this, the anodised sleeves have a very high rejection rate and are hence considerably more costly to produce. But when they’re perfect, they do look fabulous.
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I was tempted to do just that, but for a non Naim turntable, on my recent trip.
I didn’t in the end, but it was a close decision, the saving was around $2000
Very few, if any, UK retailers will do this, I used to know of two that did, but then the manufacturers “forced” them to stop - or thats how it was explained to me
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if i don’t manage to pick up a 250 before I go to the UK in oct I’ll be getting one while I’m there…
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How was the holiday?
I got one from Paul Money last year, they should be able to sell you one?
Maybe you should buy the used 300 that’s up for sale at the moment! (I have no connection to the seller, to be clear.)
Yeah same, and i’d probably get out of Naim gear if it came to it without RMC being around for support. i think chris is still doing servicing in wellington though for now at least. i don’t have a ton of confidence in the other guys based on my experience.
As it happens, I tried to get a home demo on that, but alas, no.
It’s probably not fair on the local dealers also if something goes wrong you are exposed.
Well, a lot did, hence the big second hand market a while back. I’m too heavily invested now to change though, and I haven’t anything else as good.
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It’s a bit different in Aussie, you have still have the same long established dealer selling Naim. Our guys are completely out of it now except for a bit of old stock and trade-ins.
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Just superb thanks Mike
We packed a lot in - Scottish highlands were the highlight - stunning scenery and towns/villages
- we both have post holiday blues now
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i’m after an Olive 250, there seem to be more options in the UK than here…
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No more naim or linn for me.
You are allowed to give more detail, reasoning or context to comments like that, if you want!
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I feel the same. Just serviced what i bought in 1985 and 2004 last year. No urge to get on the Naim upgrade train at all. The service and recapping was not cheap and that was before all these daft price hikes. I think having the HiFi done and not doing daft things with savings is right for me.
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I cannot justify the price hikes for both naim and linn. It as taken me over forty years to aspire to the lp12 /ekos and kandid. It was a turntable I could only dream of all those years ago, same with the pre and power amp (nac 282 /nap 250dr). Although I am still waiting for the 250dr 
. My next purchase maybe a pair of speakers.
Thanks for your replies 
KRO
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