I’ve given up hope that Roon will ever sound as good as the Naim app. After researching Roon and seeing the favorable reviews I signed on, and bought a Nucleus. The UI was my main attraction, and I liked to nerd out and research the meta-data.
But, for me, the top priority is sound quality and Roon does not match the Naim app. I tried tweaks like disabling the filtering but could never get the sonic veil lifted. the sound is thin and lacks the vibrancy I hear in the Naim app. Is this a PRAAT issue or Naim’s Roon-ready implementation?
I use Roon with my Naim Uniti Atom HE and wouldn’t be without it. I find the Roon SQ to be the equal of other players that I’ve tried (Audirvana, Naim App etc) and the UI far better, but each to their own.
I’ve used Roon with a few Naim streamers (NDX2, NSS333, Atom, QB2) and in all cases sound quality has been a bit worse using Roon compared to native Naim streaming. I wonder if bypassing the Naim streamer’s buffer has anything to do with it.
I find that a single volume nudge on the Naim remote makes all differences evaporate for me on NDX2/555DR/252/SCDR/300DR.
I haven’t measured it but it seems to me that with Roon it’s just a tiny bit lower volume (without Roon DSP; and we all know that Naim uses DSP in Naim streaming).
Such comparisons never make any sense at all without exact volume matching (and measured to less than 0.2 dB difference, not by ear). However, I’m satisfied that I can’t hear any difference if I nudge it up one short press with Roon, so I had no interest in taking it further.
If my ears perceived a difference in SQ and it was enough to matter to me, I would go with what I perceived to be the best. It doesn’t matter how it measures.
Sure, but saying x sounds better than y makes little sense if the only difference is that it’s louder. And measuring is the only reliable way to find a small loudness difference.
Anyway, it sounds the same to me when I compare directly if I make this adjustment, so I get to have great Naim sound and Roon at the same time.
Nothing nefarious. They have a dedicated SHARC chip to upsample before the DAC, and that’s on all Classic and New Classic streamers. Not sure what else they might do. It’s just to say that it’s not completely inconceivable that the Roon and direct-Naim paths can end up with a small volume difference. And humans can’t consciously discern a <1 dB difference as a volume difference, but it does register as a quality difference. (Down to about 0.2 dB difference). So without measuring it, one cannot be sure.
With Mu-So it’s more complex as obviously it does a lot with DSP to get that sound out of these small boxes, and there are posts from IIRC Steve Sells on the Naim forum regarding how the Bentley experience helped them a lot with how to use DSP in such a package.
I compared Asset & Qobuz (via Naim-direct) with Roon as well, which is how I ended up with the solution that works for me, and I’m just lucky that I don’t have to live with such a complication
Between the Roon and Naim forums, others discern a SQ difference. So, if it’s not simply a volume or gain difference what else could account for the subtle drop? I’d love to have a workaround as I like Roon and would love to stick with it.
People discern differences where there cannot possibly be any, so this is not a very reliable ‘measurement’.
If you removed all DSP from Roon path and made it bit-perfect, there’s nothing on the Roon side that can be done in terms of SQ. The difference - if there is indeed one besides gain - is probably in Naim’s DSP. You can try to add PEQ to Roon to try to match Naim’s sound.
Yes, and that’s what prompted me to try it out, and then I arrived at my conclusion. Can’t do much else (and I don’t have much incentive as it sounds fine to me). In any case, there are people discerning SQ difference for every impossible thing, too, so this in itself proves nothing.
And in the end, nobody else knows better than this guy:
I never heard a difference when I had my Uniti Atom. Not heard a difference on any zone I use from any manufacturer . There are always equal amounts of people that hear a difference, to those that don’t and to those that favour Roon over native apps. Same can likely be found anywhere.
I remember him posting that one. Since had my membership deleted as I no longer have Naim and al anyone talked about was bloody supposed Hifi switches.
There shouldn’t be a big undeniable difference in any case. Most people don’t even claim that and Naim wouldn’t be ok with it. If that’s what you hear, then something is off. What’s going on in your Roon signal path?
I much prefer my Marantz, I always found Atom a bit too forward for my liking. Maybe one day when I have more to spend I might try them out again but higher up the food chain.
But I’ve read enough of these threads to understand that my claim can be considered anathema to those who don’t experience or notice the degradation. It’s like trying to convince a political opponent to see your side or an unbreachable religious difference.
I’m not trying to prove anything, I’m just relaying my experience and looking for any insight that can help correct what I’ve found to be a shortcoming. Or just a concrete, fact-based reason for the discrepancy.
This forum has quite a few threads regarding sound quality concerns. Are they all wrong?
Depends on which threads. There are SQ concerns that make sense and others that don’t. There’s a guy on the Naim forum who is convinced he hears a difference between different Naim phone app versions, which is complete and utter bollocks as the Naim app has absolutely zero to do with the streamer‘s playback. But not even the Naim people can convince him.
I wouldn’t use Naim gear if I thought their head of software had no clue and bad ears.
