Naim Uniti Nova Power Edition

Verdict

Sometimes you don’t even realise there was a problem until someone solves it. If you’ve got the speakers that demand it and the bank balance that allows it, the Naim Uniti Nova PE is as complete a network streamer/amplifier as you’ll hear.

Introduction

What do you do if a product you launched years ago shows no signs of ageing? Do you leave well enough alone? Or do you create a more potent, more powerful version and give it a more potent price-tag? 

Well, given that Naim has called this update to 2017’s Uniti Nova the Power Edition, it’s pretty obvious what the answers to these questions are. 

But is the addition of a lot of power and a couple of letters (Naim likes to call this model the PE) worth the extra outlay? And who exactly was asking for a more powerful version of the Uniti Nova, anyway?

Availability

In the United Kingdom the Naim Uniti Nova PE is priced at £8599. This translates to $9999 in the United States although I’m still establishing the cost in Australian Dollars, you can consider it to be equally considerable amount.

So obviously it’s not a purchasing decision to be entered into lightly – especially if you’re not prepared to spend equally big on loudspeakers, partnering electronics and so on… 

Design

• Lovely brushed aluminium construction
• 116 x 432 x 265 (HxWxD, mm)
• 15.1kg

If you’re familiar with the original Uniti Nova, nothing about the design of this PE version is going to startle you. This is a hefty (15.1kg) device, flawlessly built and tidily finished in brushed aluminium, and at 116 x 432 x 265 (HxWxD, mm) is ideally sized to bring a bit of presence to your kit-rack.

As far as design flourishes go, the Uniti Nova PE has a couple. The first is a big (5-inch), bright LCD display on the fascia – it keeps you in touch with what the machine is up to, and displays crisp album artwork images when streaming music from a source that carries the relevant metadata. 

The second is the big volume dial on the top of the chassis – it’s become one of the more iconic interfaces in all of audio-land, and here as everywhere else Naim deploys it, it’s a tactile, smooth-turning delight.  

Features

• 150 watts of Class D power
• 32-bit/384kHz resolution
• Plenty of wired and wireless input options

The original Uniti Nova has had to bravely battle on with a mere 70 watts of Class AB amplification. So it’s probably not all that much of a surprise that the main difference of this Power Edition is the amount of power it’s got. 150 watts is available, and into a 4-ohm load that figure rises to an even-more-adequate 250 watts. Coping with the physical, heat-related side-effects of all this extra oomph has mostly been achieved by switching to Class D power.

Otherwise, the PE is very similarly specified to its more affordable, less potent sibling. Physical inputs run to a pair of USB-A slots (one at the back, one at the front) plus two digital optical sockets, two digital coaxial sockets, a digital BNC input and an Ethernet input.

An HDMI ARC takes care of any televisual aspect of your system. Analogue equipment is handled by two stereo RCA inputs and a couple of trademark five-pin DIN sockets. As far as outputs go, there’s a 3.5mm headphone socket on the fascia, a four-pin DIN plus a pair of stereo RCAs and connections for a single pair of speakers on the rear. 

Wireless stuff is equally comprehensive. Bluetooth compatibility now includes the aptX Adaptive codec, and thanks to dual-band Wi-Fi the PE is Roon Ready, has Chromecast built-In, features Internet radio, and is compatible with Apple AirPlay 2, Spotify Connect and TIDAL Connect, Qobuz and UPnP. 

Every worthwhile digital audio file type is compatible too, and resolution of 32-bit/384kHz and DSD128 is available if you’re using an appropriate physical input. Multiroom functionality can be accessed via UPnP – the Uniti Nova PE can serve up to four network-attached players at a time.

As well as that gloriously over-engineered volume control, the Naim has both a remote control handset and a control app at its disposal. The ZigBee handset is big and backlit, is logical enough in operation and doesn’t require line-of–sight in order to do its thing. The Focal & Naim control app, meanwhile, is free for iOS and Android, and these days is one of the better control apps around. 

About the only backward step (if you’re being uncharitable) relative to the original Uniti Nova is the deletion of DAB and FM radio reception. Naim is certainly on to something when it says its iRadio internet radio provision offers superior sound quality, but if you’re the sort of person who relies on the BBC ‘pips’ to make sure all the clocks in your house are displaying the correct time then this is not good news. You may need to budget for the optional DAB/FM module…

Performance

• Vaultingly dynamic, full-fat sound
• Articulate and detailed
• Great tonal balance

The short story is this: the Naim Uniti Nova PE gets so much right where all aspects of music reproduction are concerned, I hardly know where to start. The longer story is: I have to start somewhere, so I may as well start with dynamics.

No matter if you’re talking about the big dynamic shifts apparent in a piece of music such as Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring (which goes through huge changes in volume and intensity) or the more minor, but no less important, harmonic, and dynamic variations apparent when listening to a lead instrument (The Durutti Column’s Sketch for Summer, for instance), the Uniti Nova PE handles them with complete assurance. 

It can tease out the finest, most transient details, and it can put the hammer to the floor when the entire orchestra attempts to take the roof off. Adept is too weak a word for what the Naim is when discussing dynamic response.

And it’s just as capable elsewhere. Detail levels are sky-high throughout the frequency range, and the frequency range itself is beautifully balanced – the journey from top to bottom is smooth and even, with no area understated or overplayed. Its tonality is really well judged – it’s neutral and natural, and the Naim is more than willing to let recordings dictate terms rather than stick its oar in too readily. 

The Uniti Nova PE hits hard in the lowest frequencies, but it’s far from a blunt instrument. Bass sounds are textured and varied, and have their attack and decay observed with something approaching fanaticism – which in turns means the Naim is able to give rhythms complete expression, and keeps momentum levels exactly where a given recording needs them to be.

The soundstage the PE conjures is impressive too. It’s deep, wide and open, with more than enough space for even the massed ranks of the Stravinsky orchestra to be able to stretch their wings a little. The layout is confidently described, and the spaces between instruments that are apparent during the course of the Durutti Column recording are given just the right weighting and emphasis. 

And no matter how sparse or how dense the elements of a recording, the Naim is adept at unifying them all into a tangible whole, a singular event rather than a collection of independent occurrences.

In fact, about the only area in which the Uniti Nova PE is anything less than entirely confident and comfortable is that of low-resolution and/or highly compressed music. Its tolerance for the sort of 256kbps MP3 nonsense routinely served up by the likes of Apple Music is limited – and it’s certainly not afraid to make a sow’s ear sound less like a silk purse than some alternative designs. But did you really spend this much money to wirelessly stream Spotify’s free tier? Of course you didn’t.

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