Sitting in the presence...!

[Gazza]

We are agreed then we both need a 500😎

[anon23139555]

At audio east end of last year …kudos indicated to me that if naim didn’t build active crossovers for their speakers soon …then they would do it themselves …so maybe naim had their hand forced a little?

[Gazza]

Some dealers had started to offer Naim active crossover with help from Kudos…
and why not sell some more amps, speaker cables even if you lost the speaker sale already to kudos? Think Charlie worked out rather quickly👍

[ChrisSU]

Given that Exposure stepped in and made one that would work with a variety of amps (which I presume includes Naim amps) perhaps that prompted Naim to make them after all. It would be good to hear an official announcement from Naim, as the last time Kudos demos used these boxes, it all went a bit quiet afterwards.

[feeling_zen]

While interesting, it is too little too late.

The thing with active is, rather than the ultimate goal of goals it is the cherry on top of an existing system. In other words, you have to like the speakers passive to begin with and while the Kudos may be excellent, we all know that speakers are highly personal.

A large wealth of active options are needed for active to have any meaningful future with Naim. Very few (sane) people are going to opt for Kudos simply because they have an active option with Naim. You need to prefer the speaker passive to other passive options first.

I don’t think Naim are a serious active player anymore. With the exception of Kudos, the active options are for legacy speakers out of production.

That said, there are other non Naim active crossovers on the market (including flexible analogue ones). And since they all work within the parameters of an existing signal fed from a NAC, it shouldn’t fundamentally detract from the Naim sound more than the existing non Naim passive crossovers do.

I always thought that active was very special. I hope that Naim can make it so again via a more flexible analogue crossover (like the Bryston one with plugin boards), because this current method isn’t it.

[Ardbeg10y]

I don’t think Naim ever stopped producing the Snaxo, so this Kudos setup was always possible.

Happy to read it continues to be supported.

[JP45]

@Gazza, I went to the same show and I would agree the passive 500DR just shaded the active (2 x) 300DRs, both options feeding a pair of Titan 700s. But I thought it a close competition.

A few weeks earlier however I listened to a passive 300DR vs active 2 x 250DRs into Titan 700s at the very good Audiobarn demo. Here the active option was a winner IMHO.

Interesting times.

Hi Nigel

I came across this photo of the Audiobarn demo which clearly shows a pair of Super 20As alongside the Titans. Did they perform the active v passive test with the S20s as well as the Titans and if so was the result the same i.e. a clear win for the active setup?

Jeremy

[Polarbear]

Hi Jeremy,

No, they only did the comparison with the Titan 707’s. I haven’t heard the Super 20’s active, sorry.

[NigelB]

I arrived for the afternoon session at the Audiobarn but only heard the Titan 700s active vs passive. In fact IIRC they managed to blow a SuperCap and/or a crossover so the Titan 600s were out of action that day.

As I said in my previous posting, the active (2 x 250DRs) sounded a little better than the passive 300DR to these ears on that day. Whereas the passive 500DR sounded just a little better than the active 2x 300DRs into the Titan 700s at the Audio East show the year before last. But that was a closer competition IMHO.

[JP45]

Thank you both for the feedback. It’s a shame they didn’t demonstrate the Super 20s active. I’d love to know how they compare against a passive 300DR. Hopefully at some future event…