Sounds like you on top of this… yes it does sound like a fault with the NDX2 from your descriptions. Good luck getting it sorted.
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I am having a similar, though less severe problem with internet radio connections. The problem – persistent dropping of the radio station – started with my ND5 XS which we purchased over five or six years ago. At that time we were connecting the unit plus our iPAD controller via Wi-Fi . Four years ago we moved to a new house in which we were able to establish LAN-based connectivity to the ND5 XS, but problem continued. At the recommendation of the folks at Plurison (now Focal) – the North American distributor --we re-did the wi-fi network which is now generated from a commercial grade Ubiquiti access point. When the problem continued, we opted to trade in our ND5 XS and upgrade to the newly released NDX2. Audio was much improved, but radio connections continued to drop. As a last resort, we had a service call from our internet provider who upgraded our gateway modem so that we now have 350Mbps down on our LAN. I believe this has helped, but connections still intermittently drop. When the connection drops, I check the iPAD which displays “reconnect” which promptly reestablishes the connection. Since I think I’ve done all I can with the network (please advise otherwise), I am wondering if there are any settings on the NDX2 that might further address the issue? Many thanks.
Aaron
I am not sure if you have tried, but a wired connection should get rid of any problems.
Aaron mentions “LAN-based connectivity”. I initially assumed he meant ethernet cable, but perhaps he means ethernet over power-line, which is often very flaky. I agree that straight forward ethernet cable and unmanaged switches if needed to fit the building layout would probably fix the problem.
Best
David
I’ve not experienced any such problems with my NDX2, so I don’t believe there is an inherent problem with the NDX2.
I am not aware of any user settings either, such as “buffer level” or such like.
Apologize for not being clear. When I specified “LAN-based connectivity” I did indeed mean to convey a wired connection via Ethernet cable. The cable to the NDX2 actually runs directly from my router (although I am using the router as a switch since I now generate our Wi-Fi signal from our Ubiquiti Access Point). Hope this clarifies the situation; I look forward to any further suggestions. Thanks
Aaron
It might be helpful to know exactly which ISP modem is being used. There are, I believe, some “hidden settings” which may affect performance of some ISP modem/routers, even if you’re using Ubiquity access points and a switch.
Naim told me that some older routers are not up to the task - even though mine was a brand new, just installed one (In a second system).
If the routing is still being done by the ISP router, that might be an issue.
Others are better qualified than me to say what these settings or shortcomings might be, as my network knowledge isn’t the best.
Hi @ASF
RE: the internet radio issue.
Is the problem on all stations, or do some seem worse than others? If you could give me a few examples of problematic stations and we’ll see if there are data throughput issues from their servers.
On a side note, as a good working reference using the app VLC ( https://www.videolan.org/vlc/ ) on a PC/Mac is a good sanity check if there are network issues. primarily if VLC can’t play it reliably then the Naim streamer will also have similar issues.
Best regards
Steve Harris
Software Director
Naim Audio Ltd.
Blythe/Steve:
Thanks to you both for your replies. As to the router, my ISP is Xfinity (Comcast). I used to have an XB3 gateway router which – as I mentioned above – was recently upgraded to the XB6; I believe both are made by Arris. The output from the gateway router is directed to my ASUS RT-AC68U router from which ethernet is distributed by ethernet cables to various wired devices including the NDX2 as well as my Ubiquiti Access Point, desktops, smart TV, etc. I have enabled bridge mode on the ASUS router since I am now generating Wi-Fi from the Ubiquiti AP. As such, I am basically using the ASUS as a switch.
Here are two stations that seem to drop most frequently:
- Ironically, one of the worst is our local NPR/classical station WSMR (wsmr.org) which broadcasts from Tampa, 50 miles from our home in Sarasota, FL.
- The second is Venice Classic Radio (veniceclassicradio.eu).
As I mentioned earlier, since upgrading to the new XB6 modem when the station(s) drop, we now almost always find the the Naim app offers an option to “reconnect”. With the older XB3, we would often find that the Naim app would have to search for our NDX2 first before allowing us to reconnect.
I will try installing VLC on our IPad as well as a desktop to see if we experience similar signal drops with these stations.
I hope this information is helpful and again offer my thanks for your help.
Aaron
Hi Aaron,
Is your AC68 on the latest firmware?
I usually try to keep up with the latest versions. I checked two or three days ago and the latest firmware was installed, but I can check again. That said, internet radio issue has been present for a much longer time.
BTW, XB6 router is made by Technicolor (whoever they are), not Arris.
Thanks
Aaron
It was just a thought. I use that router and remember an old firmware was a bit dodgy. Good luck!
Understood. I really appreciate your help!! 
Aaron
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Hi @ASF
I checked over those two stations. They seem pretty solid and well configured,
WSMR has around 20secs of audio prebuffered in the server, meaning the streamer can suck down 20secs of audio to soak up internet throughput fluctuations. That requires a serious disturbance as the data rate is quite low (256kbit / 40KBytes a sec on average).
Venice Classic Radio - they have about 15secs of audio buffered and the data rate is lower at 128kbit/sec. Again that is all pretty sensible stuff and will need a serious throughput issue to make that drop out as the realtime demands are not demanding at all.
Let me know how you get on with VLC playing the streams. It feels there is another factor to this…
Best
Steve
Steve:
Turns out I had already installed VLC but was using it for video. I had no idea it could also be used for streaming audio. I ran both stations for several hours on my desktop and both were quite stable.
I agree that there is something else going on here. With that in mind, I recalled that when the tech came to upgrade the gateway modem, we didn’t get spec download speeds until he replaced both the ethernet cable between the gateway modem and the ASUS modem as well as the ethernet cable between the latter and my desktop. With this in mind, I plan to replace the cable from the ASUS (switch) to the wall connector for the NDX2 in hopes this will help. I won’t have my new cables until next week, but I’ll let you know how this pans out.
Thanks so much for your help.
Aaron
Steve:
Finally received my new cables and re-wired everything from the gateway modem to the streamer (and the rest of the house). I finished the job around 11AM this morning. While things seemed better (i.e. more “robust” sound and seemingly quicker responsiveness), the signal from WSMR (our most problematic station) had dropped twice by 2PM, I would note that the NAIM app immediately displayed “reconnect” which when pressed VERY promptly connected back to the station. I am struggling for other issues to check. Any further suggestions?
Thanks
Aaron
Forgive me if already covered but have you tried Stay Connected in the app settings and I have to ask is Standby set to Never?
cdboy:
Thanks SO much for these excellent suggestions. I had not known about these two settings. As it turns out, “Stay connected” was disabled and “Auto Standby Time” was set to 20 minutes (which I presume are default settings). I have enabled the former and changed the latter to never. I’ll post a follow-up message in the next couple of days to see if these changes eliminate the issue.
Thanks again
Aaron
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I doubt Stay Connected will do anything other than chew the battery on your iPad. I would turn it off.
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OK. Thanks
Aaron