john curl said:
Oh common John now you are really scraping the bottom of the barrel when you say stuff like that
I think you are being very disingenuous when you single out the Japanese audio equipment manufacturers as an example of market failure because they don't actually 'listen to their equipment'. How would you know anyway ??
There is a simple argument to counteract that fallacy. If something is designed to sound good then everyone should unanimously agree as to what equipment sounds the best. The mere fact that everyone owns and uses different audio equipment because of what they think sounds the best to them indicates that performance metric is an unreliable and unrealistic measure of evaluating equipment performance.
In other words what I am saying is that I don't give a toss what you think sounds good to you !! I'm not going to fork out wads of money and buy your gear just because you say it sounds good to you !!
This is the difference between you and me. I keep audio products at any age that sound good. I use Japanese phono cartridges, and find them equal to anything in the world. What matters is the 'sound' of the product. Once in 1985 when giving a lecture in Japan, I was asked what phono cartridge I used. I said it was made by Nimiki, in Japan. The Japanese were surprised.
My Marantz tuner is vacuum tube and about 45 years old. My favorite portable radio is Telefunken made in 1967, designed in 1955, and is all germanium with both a drive and output transformer. My favorite projector TV is a Sony. My turntable is English, that I first bought in 1974. And I own an Acura and an older Porsche. I could care less where anything is made or what time period. It just has to sound good. Sounding good usually alludes design engineers that don't know the tradeoffs that I CONSTANTLY talk about, and least when I am allowed to, on this website.
My Marantz tuner is vacuum tube and about 45 years old. My favorite portable radio is Telefunken made in 1967, designed in 1955, and is all germanium with both a drive and output transformer. My favorite projector TV is a Sony. My turntable is English, that I first bought in 1974. And I own an Acura and an older Porsche. I could care less where anything is made or what time period. It just has to sound good. Sounding good usually alludes design engineers that don't know the tradeoffs that I CONSTANTLY talk about, and least when I am allowed to, on this website.
I don't much care for Naim equipment and when I look at their circuits, to be honest they look rather dated (Self type blameless, quasi complementary etc). But, JC is correct in his assertion that Julian Vereker marketed Naim very well - and its still around today - now they are doing the sound system for Bentley cars I heard)
In this game (as in many others) branding is everything and I think over the last 20 years or so, the industry has 'disaggregated' into lots of small niche players who build a certain loyal following with each and every customer claiming that their favourite brand is best.
And, as a marketing guy, I think thats wonderful - it means you don't end up with a market full off me too products sold on cost and spec (i.e. lowest common denominator) - everyone has their niche. Sure, the customer pays for it, but thats par for the course with a branded luxury item. BTW, I am not talking here about those trashy hi-fi component systems you can buy at BIC Camera here in Tokyo for about $800 (you know, use a dual 50W class D amp IC etc)
Some examples: Sugden (some guy told me they build about 10 amps a month)
Boulder (how do they survive charging so much!)
Luxman (fantastic stuff - my buddy justs\ spent about $8k on one of their amps here in Akhihibara))
T&A (from Germany)
MBL (also from Germany)
47 Labs (guy runs his business out of a shed in his back yard here in Tokyo I heard)
Lyra
Karan (rave reviews, Karan claiming class A - when tested, definitly class B and c. 1% distortion!)
. . . . .
The art of branding - long may it continue!
In this game (as in many others) branding is everything and I think over the last 20 years or so, the industry has 'disaggregated' into lots of small niche players who build a certain loyal following with each and every customer claiming that their favourite brand is best.
And, as a marketing guy, I think thats wonderful - it means you don't end up with a market full off me too products sold on cost and spec (i.e. lowest common denominator) - everyone has their niche. Sure, the customer pays for it, but thats par for the course with a branded luxury item. BTW, I am not talking here about those trashy hi-fi component systems you can buy at BIC Camera here in Tokyo for about $800 (you know, use a dual 50W class D amp IC etc)
Some examples: Sugden (some guy told me they build about 10 amps a month)
Boulder (how do they survive charging so much!)
Luxman (fantastic stuff - my buddy justs\ spent about $8k on one of their amps here in Akhihibara))
T&A (from Germany)
MBL (also from Germany)
47 Labs (guy runs his business out of a shed in his back yard here in Tokyo I heard)
Lyra
Karan (rave reviews, Karan claiming class A - when tested, definitly class B and c. 1% distortion!)
. . . . .
The art of branding - long may it continue!
Bonsai said:
Naim NAP140 revised circuit
Oh my god how much worse was the original unrevised circuit 
Butler you have made my day you have LOLAn externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
That circuit bears a passing resemblance to the original Naim circuit. No more than that.
The Naim's sold because the sound appealed in a way that the competition didn't. They still do.
Perhaps if the Japanese amps of the day had presented their 'superior' circuits without the myriad of internal connectors and sub-assemblies they may have garnered more audiophile attention. It was (and still is) not unusual to see such power amplifiers consisting of a dozen or more circuit boards interconnected by individual wire harnesses traversing the internal space.
In the intervening years the concept of keeping it simple (but no simpler than necessary, to quote Einstein) has got a little bit more attention. In this thread for example.
The Naim's sold because the sound appealed in a way that the competition didn't. They still do.
Perhaps if the Japanese amps of the day had presented their 'superior' circuits without the myriad of internal connectors and sub-assemblies they may have garnered more audiophile attention. It was (and still is) not unusual to see such power amplifiers consisting of a dozen or more circuit boards interconnected by individual wire harnesses traversing the internal space.
In the intervening years the concept of keeping it simple (but no simpler than necessary, to quote Einstein) has got a little bit more attention. In this thread for example.
That is a rather simple and outdated circuit, i built it some months back, just on veroboard, a lot of members here said it sounded good, had to listen for myself. Built it using modern semiconductors, and i agree with them, this simple outdated Self based circuit does sound rather good, no stabilty problems. A lot has to do with that little rc circuit at input into driver output transistors. What can i say, wish i had one of these back in the 80s rather than my hitech pioneer.
Equipment used for testing was Marantz cd17 KI cd player, BW 804 speakers, Reference amps Electrocompaniet Nemo, electrocompaniet AW250, pioneer x400, Modified Rotel Ra 971, modified Self blameless amp.
Alex
Equipment used for testing was Marantz cd17 KI cd player, BW 804 speakers, Reference amps Electrocompaniet Nemo, electrocompaniet AW250, pioneer x400, Modified Rotel Ra 971, modified Self blameless amp.
Alex
VivaVee said:
There is plenty of pommy audio gear which is wired like that as well with nice looking squared off wiring looms !! I hardly think the wiring loom would be a major issue to performance if it was properly thought out.
I've got a Japanese preamp and it is all layed out on one board. Somehow you'd still find fault with that in comparison to the simpletons circuit
AndrewT said:
I gave you my opinion and I backed it up with evidence including a circuit diagram and some of you still choose to be totally delusional
If audio design of the 21 st century has transgressed back to the design practices of the 50's then I don't see much scope for it advancing much in the future
What I have observed on this thread is a lot of people with little or no engineering qualifications trying to make up for it by reverting to audio witch craft and paranormal science that can't be explained in any rational way.
More's the pity
Naim
Hi Snoopy,
Maybe I've missed it, but can you also put a link to the original schematic, so we all can see how badly it was designed.
BTW, the revised circuit still contains an error: the collector resistor of TR2 should be zero Ohm instead of 22kOhm.
Cheers,
Edmond.
snoopy said:Naim NAP140 revised circuit
Hi Snoopy,
Maybe I've missed it, but can you also put a link to the original schematic, so we all can see how badly it was designed.
BTW, the revised circuit still contains an error: the collector resistor of TR2 should be zero Ohm instead of 22kOhm.
Cheers,
Edmond.
Re: Naim
Hello Edmond,
It's in a new thread
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=125941&perpage=25&pagenumber=1
Yes it looks a bit funny but that is probably one of those secrets that only the audio gurus know I wonder if that was in the original design ??
Edmond Stuart said:
Hi Snoopy,
Maybe I've missed it, but can you also put a link to the original schematic, so we all can see how badly it was designed.
BTW, the revised circuit still contains an error: the collector resistor of TR2 should be zero Ohm instead of 22kOhm.
Cheers,
Edmond.
Hello Edmond,
It's in a new thread
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=125941&perpage=25&pagenumber=1
Yes it looks a bit funny but that is probably one of those secrets that only the audio gurus know
I wonder if that was in the original design ??AndrewT said:
I gave you my opinion and I backed it up with evidence including a circuit diagram and some of you still choose to be totally delusional
If audio design of the 21 st century has transgressed back to the design practices of the 50's then I don't see much scope for it advancing much in the future
What I have observed on this thread is a lot of people with little or no engineering qualifications trying to make up for it by reverting to audio witch craft and paranormal science that can't be explained in any rational way.
More's the pity
I liked the Naim gear
A local friend had a nice setup back in early 80's. It was overpriced, under powered, and looked very understated (cheap).
The owner felt the Naim gear sounded more like real music than anything else on the market. He might still have it.
I thought it sounded very good. Better than my Carver Cube and NAD 1020 I had purchased in early 81. The Carver/NAD combo listed for 550.00. Paid list. Another friend had a 50 watt Threshold and original Magnpans, cira 1982. His combo blew away my Carver Altec system even more than the Niam. I started moving up the food chain in electronics and speakers.
Naim did a great job marketing, and really a good job building a system. Guess you need to play by their rules, and stick with the system approach.
About 1990 another friend picked up a Naim preamp and NAP250 or whatever fairly cheap used. Big, expensive to me, and lots of power. He hooked it up, cranked it and it blew in less than 30 minutes. He was using MIT speaker cables.
I feel the same way about a large percentage of the English electronics. Tailored to sound very nice. But reliability is a real issue.
Making a product bulletproof should be a high priorirty. There is no way to compete in the market with reliability issues.
George
A local friend had a nice setup back in early 80's. It was overpriced, under powered, and looked very understated (cheap).
The owner felt the Naim gear sounded more like real music than anything else on the market. He might still have it.
I thought it sounded very good. Better than my Carver Cube and NAD 1020 I had purchased in early 81. The Carver/NAD combo listed for 550.00. Paid list. Another friend had a 50 watt Threshold and original Magnpans, cira 1982. His combo blew away my Carver Altec system even more than the Niam. I started moving up the food chain in electronics and speakers.
Naim did a great job marketing, and really a good job building a system. Guess you need to play by their rules, and stick with the system approach.
About 1990 another friend picked up a Naim preamp and NAP250 or whatever fairly cheap used. Big, expensive to me, and lots of power. He hooked it up, cranked it and it blew in less than 30 minutes. He was using MIT speaker cables.
I feel the same way about a large percentage of the English electronics. Tailored to sound very nice. But reliability is a real issue.
Making a product bulletproof should be a high priorirty. There is no way to compete in the market with reliability issues.
George
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