[Johnny_Fi]

Hi folks - I've been lurking from southeastern Michigan for a while. Just bought a set of walnut M5's. Any thoughts on how they'll sound with a Naim Uniti Atom?

[Johnny_Fi]

Correction - I am NOT a new M5 owner. 

[musicdre]

welcome.  and at this point you probably have knowledge about how this spatial/naim pairing sounds in your system.  any insights?

[Johnny_Fi]

Unfortunately, not. I don't have the speakers yet. Clayton was great in email and over the phone tho. I am hoping to see the new speakers in two to three weeks!

[geerock]

I have a family member that bought the Atom about a year ago from Crutchfield and mates it with the Spatial M3's.  He had been streaming through Tidal and realized that the Atom did not support Tidal Masters so he was limited to CD quality sampling only.  He has since solved the problem by going to Qobuz. Just be advised that the Atom does not support MQA.  He very much loves the ease of use and the all in one package that the Atom offers, and is very happy with the sound quality.  The 40 watts is more than enough to drive the speakers without breaking a sweat.  If you are looking to simplify the whole streaming, DAC, music service thing then the ATOM is a very nice piece of equipment. 
PS.  He had a problem with the first one he bought and Crutchfield stepped right up to replace it and offer all the tech support to get him up and running.  Good company.
Best of luck with your new Spatials.

[Johnny_Fi]

I have a family member that bought the Atom about a year ago from Crutchfield and mates it with the Spatial M3's.  He had been streaming through Tidal and realized that the Atom did not support Tidal Masters so he was limited to CD quality sampling only.  He has since solved the problem by going to Qobuz. Just be advised that the Atom does not support MQA.  He very much loves the ease of use and the all in one package that the Atom offers, and is very happy with the sound quality.  The 40 watts is more than enough to drive the speakers without breaking a sweat.  If you are looking to simplify the whole streaming, DAC, music service thing then the ATOM is a very nice piece of equipment. 
PS.  He had a problem with the first one he bought and Crutchfield stepped right up to replace it and offer all the tech support to get him up and running.  Good company.
Best of luck with your new Spatials.

Yes, it's a great all in one package. I run Roon from my Macbook, which handles the MQA file, but I've honestly found Qobuz to sound better lately. Thank you!

[529proaudio]

I don't have Spatials (yet), but I just got a great deal on a dealer demo NAD M10 and am absolutely blown away with its performance driving the inefficient but great sounding ELAC Uni-Fi 2.0 bookshelf speakers.  It is Class D, but I think it sounds way better in my room than my sister-in-law's Naim Unity Atom, and the Blue OS interface works amazingly well.  The NAD M33 was named stereophile product of the year for 2020, and the M10 looks to share most of its features in a still-powerful 100wpc instead of 200wpc.  When discussing the M-series with Clayton, he said they tested them with the NAD M10 and assured me it would sound great.  Same feedback from Ron at New Record Day, which is what tipped me off.  Oh, and it is has DIRAC room correction built-in which the Naim doesn't.  The only thing I dislike is that the analog inputs are digitized, but that is the only way that DIRAC can be used on an analog source. 

 

[doggie]

I have a family member that bought the Atom about a year ago from Crutchfield and mates it with the Spatial M3's.  He had been streaming through Tidal and realized that the Atom did not support Tidal Masters so he was limited to CD quality sampling only.  He has since solved the problem by going to Qobuz. Just be advised that the Atom does not support MQA.  He very much loves the ease of use and the all in one package that the Atom offers, and is very happy with the sound quality.  The 40 watts is more than enough to drive the speakers without breaking a sweat.  If you are looking to simplify the whole streaming, DAC, music service thing then the ATOM is a very nice piece of equipment. 
PS.  He had a problem with the first one he bought and Crutchfield stepped right up to replace it and offer all the tech support to get him up and running.  Good company.
Best of luck with your new Spatials.

Slightly off topic but I would like to give a shoutout for Crutchfield. I sold off a bunch of really good equipment and bought a pair of the new KEF LS50W Mk2's from them in hopes of "simplifying" my setup. KEF advertised them as "Roon Ready" "Coming Soon" when they were released last Fall, 2020. After 6 months they still had no Roon. Add to that the modest sound quality and I decided to see if Crutchfield would take them back. Even though they were way beyond the stated return policy Crutchfield did take them back, I believe because of KEFs broken promise. The KEF's were fine for casual listening and very good for TV but were not audiophile quality...to my ears.


I now have a Linear Tube Audio Z10 Integrated tube amp in-house and a pair of Spatial X5's on order. As my order has reached the 6 week mark I look eagerly each day for the shipping notice.


On topic. I would not buy an "All-In-One" solution before having the Spatials in your home and broken in so that you could judge the new electronics within their return window. Although I like the concept, I am no longer a fan of Swiss Army Knife devices as they limit your options with no easy incremental upgrade path. YMMV

[Aoleon]

I use the NAD T778 9.1 surround receiver that is the ultimate swiss army knife for all things HIFI. It does streaming from Tidal/MQA has a built in DAC, has Dolby Atmos surround decoding, Dirac Live, and 80 watts per channel for 9 channels. I use them paired with my new X5s and love it so far. Upgrade path for the NAD is you can upgrade the modules in the receiver over time. Also you can use it just as a power amp for a 2 channel system if you add an external streamer, DAC and Pre-Amp. The NAD has a very transparent soundl which means it doesn’t add or subtract anything from the music. This is perfect if you want to say add an external dac and tube pre-amp to it to get that tubey sound, but use the Class D power of the NAD to keep all the detail and punch. That’s what I am doing with it. I recently purchased the Kitsume KTE Holo May DAC and an Atma-Sphere MP-3 tube pre-amp to use with my NAD receiver for 2 channel listening. And when I want to watch a movie i just use the NAD receiver linked to my LG TV.