Thanks T-elmi. In your comparison did you pair them both with a chord dac as well by any chance.
Yes, with the TT2 that I owned from new (Jul ‘19 to Feb 21).
Thanks for the detailed breakdown for your response. I have also being offered a new zenith for under £3000 to throws spanner in the works. I can stretch my budget to £3000 but the advantage of better sound quality from the nd5x2 to the Hugo tt2 sways my decision towards nd5xs2!
You know you want to go Naim. Just think of all the lovely chats you can have with everyone here re how to get the most from it. And you’ve got a firmware update due for it any day with even more functionality, too 
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I also vote Naim ND5 XS 2 and then, when you recover of all this stress, you could try upsampling and let us know if it really works.
With the Diablo and 802s it will be the ultimate test.
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And just think how much fun you can have pestering @Naim.Marketing by asking her every day when is it going to arrive? 
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Thanks Claire… any insights into what the new update might have!
TIDAL Connect support is the main one. Some other improvements and fixes, too - i’ll share the full release notes when the software is signed off. It’s in final listening stage now. Hope to have good news very soon!
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Thought they might 
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Go for the ND5XS2 its an excellent transport and streamer. I own two one direct into a Nait 2 CB the other into an MScaler. Rock solid performance with the backing of Naim HQ if things go wrong.
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Having owned an ND5XS2 into a TT2, I can confirm it is a top level source. There are other options besides Innous too.
Antipodes and Grim are two servers I am looking at as end game candidates. Then there are a few nice units from DCS I am drooling over.
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Can you say what the mscaler does to the sound? I have a qutest and already wonder if I am changing the sound, rather than releasing it.
Technicaly any DAC adds some noise to the output depending on the source frequency. Low frequency, say, 44khz give the noise that can be audible by your ear. Upsampler increases just the frequency keeping all detail of your content. In this case the added noise is a bit easier to filter out. So, upsampler + DAC give you cleaner output.
Of cource, this approach will not reduce the noise that was added before analog-to-digital conversion(ADC). However, it will reduce the noise added by the DAC itself.
Thanks for the explanation. I ask because I recently found that new vinyl of Leonard Cohen is revealing greater detail than the same digital version streamed via bluesound node and qutest. That raises a number of questions around recording, production, and remixing, as well as player capabilities, but I will start a new thread when I have listened a little more and marshalled my thoughts.
The MScaler adds more of what the Qutest does well but with extra depth to the sound, sound stage is wider too with added micro details to tracks that makes it worthwhile.
I would struggle removing the MScaler from my setup now and it’s a keeper, it’s whether you can justify spending 3.5k to add to a 1200 quid DAC, for me the answer is yes.
Thanks.
Thanks for all your thoughts and help. I pulled the trigger finally and went for theND5XS2 yesterday. Excited to see how it sounds in my system with the TT2. My TT2 is connected to the gryphon through Chord reference RCA cables.
Might look a used Mac mini to act as a roon core as it seems an inexpensive option. Do most prefer an optical digital output from the ND5 to TT2, as the best for SQ?
It’s worth experimenting with different connections, but Naim streamers are generally optimised around electrical SPDIF rather than optical so I suggest you try that too.
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I’d tell that the node is far from the best compadre for the qutest. It is definitely a bottleneck in your system. What if you try to attach the qutest via usb to some proper transport?
BNC!