No, the previous FW release. Naim have been on vacation since so I doubt anyone has received much communication post 3.10.1.
The 3.10.1 patch was never designed to fix the previous FW problem, it was to fix other bugs. It was hoped it might solve the FW problems at the same time but if it didn’t, Naim would figure out what to do next.
perhaps @Richard.Dane could confirm whether the tickets are closed and people need to raise a new ticket on 3.10.1?
But the feedback was that, with the bug fixes in place, naim didn’t see a need for any tweaks with 3.10.1 as it sounded fine.
Anyway, I admire your optimism and hope any problems are resolved at some future date.
Sorry I have no idea here. However, I would think that anyone wishing to contact Naim about experiencing issues with the latest patch release would be best to start a new ticket, otherwise it could get confusing. Note that Naim are currently on their shut-down and will be back on the 6th Jan.
As discussed at length though, there has been no clear communication from Naim on the sound quality issue, so this is all speculation. There were the emails referenced, then different interpretations about golden-ear testing by the beta group and various technical theories and a clash between the happy and unhappy camp. But no clear communication from Naim as to what may, or may not be done. Whereas lots of input from Naim on Nait50 and I-Radio threads.
All we really know is that firmware impacts on sound presentation.
Happy New Year.
I have already contacted support on the same ticket, since the problem that began with the last update has not been solved. It wouldn’t make sense to me, to request a new ticket each time a new potential solution is tested.
Hi Iain,
I understand from clarification from Naim that the 3.10.1 build didn’t require any tweaking/tuning and went from beta directly to release, which of course meant it could be released before Christmas.
As said above 3.10.1 was about fixing certain functionality bugs, including with Tidal Connect.
I’m basing my expectation on what I was told by Naim Support, in email. I have no idea what action might be taken, but some action does need to be taken. My ticket is open for my case and in my case “if required” is now “is required”. I assume others here have the same problem, requiring a common solution but I (and Naim) don’t know that for sure without further investigation.
“We need to review the feedback we get on any change in sound quality after this release goes live, and from there, we can decide on a best course of action, if required.”
Yes, I understand that. But we had beta testers and others “in the know” saying to be patient, the patch will be “soon” and things will be fixed.
There were a lot of indirect, 3rd party communications, that was massively frustrating in itself. At the end of the day though, I can only hope Naim stay true to their word and take the action if (now confirmed) required. Even though the communication has been appalling, I have no reason to believe they won’t come through and do what they said they would.
Don’t know if it helps but I’m in the beta group and my NDX2 sounds as good as I can remember. I’m sure the team at Naim are constantly changing and improving things, hopefully it’ll be sorted soon. One thing is clearly obvious there no definitive answer for everyone.
We need to be optimistic as our (big) systems are sounding harsh and shrill so that there have to be help for the „dirty dozen“ here.
And naim promised to help anyone.
I am convinced that the change in SQ was not intended with the effect being so huge for some.
As feedback to the recent patch (Lindsey?) mentioned „wow, the textures“ as a former fully happy user (with no intention to get back to 3.8).
When a next patch will tune, this will happen again.
Maybe you will even find the next FW (if so leaning more towards 3.8) better than the current one.
The highly revealing 500 systems suffer most from the overdone „loudness‘.
Maybe this negative tends to a positive effect in the ndx2 range systems. So naim must decide to find something in between or some best of both worlds FW.
Now the situation is unpleasant for me. As there are some wow‘s in the new fw you sit and listen and love it and suddenly an overdone klinky sound kicks in and pulls you out from listening.
As some others mentioned - even if very detailed and airy with a fine bass, the overall tonality is also not correct.
I have no idea what Naim will do next regarding FW. However I will be down at HQ in two or three weeks (date to be confirmed) and I will find out all that I can.
I do know that the guys at Naim in the days prior to the release of 3.10.1 (note the .1) carried out exhaustive listening tests to around 20 alternatives which flies in the face of the theory that the update wasn’t linked to sound quality.
Anyway anything relevant that Naim tell me and are happy for me to disclose I will pass on here post visit.
Without being disrespectful with the beta group, the opinion on sound quality should be made by people who have excellent hearing capabilities, not persons like us that verge on the retirement.
The bets group should concentrate on technical aspects, and sound quality should be done by selected members by Naim , on the criteria of excellent hearing abilities.
Just to be clear here, final decisions on sound performance are made by Naim and Naim alone. There are processes refined over many years and trusted ears within the company who do the listening tests and then give the final sign off before release.
So it seems what is clear is 3.10.0 to 3.10.1 was not an SQ fix but there was ‘hope’ that it would help, which makes not a lot of sense to me.
The question that hasn’t yet been answered (or at least I have missed it) and it a vital question is - was there a deliberate shift in SQ between 8.3.x and 8.10.x??
I haven’t seen that question discussed and it seems to be a critical question.
I for one remain challenged by the glassy shrill elements since 8.3. And I didn’t do a back to back test between 10.0 and 10.1. So I don’t know.
@Elfer @IainO @Cohen1263 @Pete_the_painter I noticed I seemed you had some insight into the Beta group - do you know? Apologies if I was wrong…
Sound quality changes are never “deliberate”, unless there has been some fundamental breakthrough that improves the sound performance, but, as far as I’m aware, at this high level of performance, when you change anything, including the code, it will have an effect on the sound*. I’m told that’s pretty much unavoidable. It’s why so much time spent fine tuning the code at the end to try to get the best sound you can. If you can get an improvement over what went before, then that’s the ideal situation.
(*I guess this goes right back to the early days of refining the CD player code where Naim found that it was best to pare back the code to a bare minimum and that you could affect the performance by the way the code was done.)
Richard, no DSP code is modified, it’s the ARM CPU execution ‘do nothing’ cycle that is modified to adjust the noise floor. I refer you to the FAQ sticky in the Beta forum written by Naim on software tuning. ‘ Sound Quality and Our Tuning Process
Yes, thanks Simon, my error, although you obviously understand more about the nuts and bolts of it here than I do. I shall edit accordingly.