One could argue that, with the Uniti, this veteran audio manufacturer has set its sights on someone…
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In an industry whose newest products are often as discouragingly unaffordable as they are short of the sonic mark, the Naim Audio Uniti ($3795) stands out. In a single reasonably sized box, the Uniti combines the guts of Naim's Nait 5i integrated amplifier and CD5i CD player with various additional sources: an FM/DAB tuner, and interfaces for an iPod, a USB memory stick, an iRadio, and a UPnP-compatible connected computer or server—all for the price of a very good television set.
As it turned out, the Naim Uniti wasn't supplied with a user's manual per se, but rather with a curiously big booklet that provides, in a great many different languages, the most basic and presumably legally mandated information: Don't dispose of this product with the rest of the trash. Don't bring this product into the bathtub with you. Don't put to any foolish or evil use this product's laser light. A great amount of paper has been devoted to the unlikely, the unfathomable, and the impossible, though that's hardly Naim's fault.
The booklet does, however, contain one indispensable…
For its part, the Uniti's FM tuner was also a pleasure to use. I drove it with the six-element RadioShack FM antenna (ca $25) I purchased years ago for my Tivoli radio, and which resides in the attic space above my listening room. Sensitivity and selectivity seemed about average, and sound quality was fine, given a good enough signal—itself a rare beast in upstate New York. I would expect the Uniti's FM tuner to make urban users very happy indeed.
As for the main event: After being run in for about a week (before which it sounded flat and thin), the Uniti was astonishingly good: tight,…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Solid-state integrated amplifier with built-in CD player, FM/DAB tuner, iPod interface, USB memory-stick interface, iRadio/UPnP interface. Line-level analog inputs: 5. S/PDIF digital inputs: 5. Digital formats supported: MP3, AAC, Apple Lossless, WAV, FLAC, Ogg Vorbis, WMA, MP3. CD formats supported: "Red Book," CD-R. Output power: 50Wpc into 8 ohms (17dBW), 90Wpc into 4 ohms (16.5dBW). Frequency range: 20Hz–50kHz. Signal/noise: 80dB. Analog input overload: 27dBV. Preamp output impedance: 600 ohms (10k ohm minimum load recommended).
Dimensions:…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog Sources: Thorens TD-124 Mk.II turntable; EMT 997, Schick tonearms; Bauer/Ayre DPS turntable & tonearm; Shindo SPU, Ortofon SPU 90th Anniversary, EMT OFD 25, Edison Spirit 78, Miyabi 47, Grace F9E cartridges.
Digital Sources: HRT Music Streamer, HRT Music Streamer+, Ayre QB-9 USB DACs (with Apple iMac).
Preamplification: Auditorium 23 Hommage T1 step-up transformer, Ayre P-5x phono preamplifier, Shindo Masseto preamplifier.
Power Amplifiers: Shindo Haut-Brion & Corton-Charlemagne, Quad II.
Loudspeakers: Audio Note AN-E/SPe HE,…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I examined the Naim Uniti's measured behavior using mainly Stereophile's loan sample of the top-of-the-line Audio Precision SYS2722 system (see the January 2008 "As We See It" and www.ap.com); for some tests, I also used my vintage Audio Precision System One Dual Domain. To test the digital playback performance, I played WAV files on an iPod Touch, the same files loaded onto a USB flash drive or burned to CD-R, or fed to one of the Uniti's optical S/PDIF inputs from the RME soundcard in one of my test-lab PCs. All tests of the Uniti's digital section were taken…
Even katydids are supposed, by some, to drink.—Shirley Jackson, 1959 (misheard)
Review samples, once received, often wait days or even weeks before I can find the time to install them. But turntables and tonearms tend not to gather much dust. Tonearms, in particular, get the fast track.
So it was with the Schick tonearm, made in Germany by Thomas Schick and imported by Oswalds Mill Audio, in rural Lehigh County, Pennsylvania (footnote 1). In recent months I've exchanged some e-mails with OMA's Jonathan Weiss, a nice fellow who seems active in various different artistic pursuits.…
On the other hand, the EMT's spring-actuated downforce makes life a good deal easier than the Schick's uncalibrated counterweights, and the fact that the 997 applies a positive tracking force may confer a performance advantage, especially with warped records. Finally, it must be noted that the Schick's vertical bearings aren't offset to match the angle of its headshell, in the manner of the EMT 997: With the latter, as the arm moves above and below its fulcrum, proper azimuth is maintained.
Schick's online setup instructions imply that the tonearm's spindle-to-pivot distance (304.8mm),…
It's a good thing my Box Furniture rack is so solid and stable: It is now not only a rack but a turntable plinth.
A word for those to whom praise of the new seems rebuke of the old: I haven't yet fairly compared the Schick and the EMT, if only because I still haven't used the latter in the same manner as the former, with its mounting board removed from the noisy Thorens (which is noisy only in the manner of all motor units; in the wake of its re-renovation, my TD 124 is in better shape than ever). Until I do, I can't say for sure whether the things I'm hearing are due to the different…
It was only a few months ago that I greeted Oppo Digital's BDP-83 universal Blu-ray player as a breakthrough consumer component, and it became a Runner-Up for Stereophile's Budget Product of 2009. It now appears that Oppo is using the design as a base on which to develop similar and more advanced products, both for themselves and for a good many other manufacturers. Some may take exception to my use of the word manufacturers—if it's an Oppo under the skin, what, precisely, are these other "manufacturers" contributing? Well, that's hardly a new question.
I've reviewed a number of…