| The HDX reads audio data from CDs, stores it on a hard disk, catalogues the artist, album and track titles and, at the touch of a screen, replays it with utterly uncompromised sound quality. The HDX’s ease of use defines elegant simplicity and it even offers the option of operating as a high-end CD player by directly playing a disc loaded in its drawer.
The HDX is of course not the first hard disk music player, but it is the first to carry a Naim logo, and with it, all the principles of musical audio quality that the logo demands. It incorporates every last thing we know about maximizing the sound quality of digital audio and is the first hard disk player to reach the heady performance levels of the
world’s best CD players – our own.
At the heart of the HDX is a fully integrated CD ripping and data storage system, engineered by Naim – both hardware and software - from the ground up to optimize audio quality. When a CD is inserted in the HDX drawer it is mounted on a specially selected audio grade transport mechanism and each of its data sectors read multiple times at varying rotational speeds to ensure that the subsequently stored data is “bit perfect”. Unique Naim firmware effectively handles copy protected CDs that in most other hard disk music players are likely to be ripped with compromised audio quality. The same firmware also overcomes the track start and end errors that occur in most other hard disk players and ensures that artists’ intended track lead in and out times are preserved – again, in contrast to most other players. The bit-perfect data is stored on two 400GB disk drives – one primary and one back up.
HDX playback begins with a unique Naim designed, multiple power supply PCI interface that feeds the audio data to the digital to analogue conversion stage. The HDX digital audio architecture is not limited to 16 bit and 44.1kHz but can handle bit depths up to 24 bit and sampling frequencies up to 192kHz. The HDX’s playback electronics borrow heavily from the established Naim practices that produce the World’s finest sounding CD players:
- Independent and separately grounded multi-regulated power supplies for analogue and digital stages.
- A Burr-Brown PCM1791A digital to analogue converter selected after exhaustive listening.
- 24 bit/192kHz internal architecture with support for hi-resolution audio formats.
- Ultra low jitter re-clocking circuits.
- A seven pole analogue output filtering using Burr Brown OPA604 op amps.
- Custom designed monolithic air core transformer isolated analogue output stages.
- An optional external XPS or CD555PS power supply for even greater musical performance.
In use the HDX is intuitive, satisfying and simple, and, thanks to an internet connection, automatically catalogues every ripped disc. So imagine your entire CD collection available for immediate replay at the touch of a screen with Naim CD player matching sound quality. You don’t have to imagine; HDX has arrived.
Ripping
Ripping CDs with an HDX could not be simpler. Open the CD drawer, insert
the CD, close the drawer and wait around eight minutes. If you have the
time, you can rip around 600 CDs before the HDX runs out of space. The
technology of ripping is anything but simple however. To achieve its bit-perfect
copy of the CD data the HDX employs some of the most advanced data reading
and error analysis algorithms ever deployed in the pursuit of sound quality.
Searching
Hunting for music with HDX is a breeze. No more peering at shelves of jewel cases and promising that they’ll be in alphabetical order one day. Each CD ripped by the HDX is automatically catalogued through enquiry to an on-line database and its data added to the internal library. So searching is as simple as typing a name.
Extended Music Database
Searching for music is not limited to albums and tracks. Want to search by composer, performer, artist, orchestra? Go ahead. Can’t remember the name of the Kate Bush album you ripped that Eberhard Weber played bass on? The Naim Extended Music database, with the power of allmusicguide.com at its heart will find it for you. Remember the smallest detail and all your music is there at the touch of a screen.
Network Streaming
As well as a stand-alone hard disk music player, the HDX is a music server that can provide up to six different streams of music simultaneously over a home network. Install an HDX and you’ve installed the heart of a multi-room audio system too. You don’t even need to install copious reels of new network wire either as network hardware that uses existing household mains cables can do the job.
The Desktop Client Application
With an HDX connected to a home network you don’t have to be in the same room to browse your music library. The Naim Desktop Client is a Windows PC application that can control your HDX, browse its music files and handle player setup and maintenance easily and intuitively.
Choose Your Interface
The HDX incorporates a front panel touch screen that offers all the control you’ll need. But perhaps you fancy controlling the HDX from the listening position. Well, connect a small display screen, or even your television, and you can operate the HDX with its remote handset. Or perhaps you want to run the HDX wirelessly from your laptop? Easy; use either the Desktop Client application or a web browser. There’s a USB touch screen option too.
Your Music Is Safe
You can spend a long time ripping music, and we’ve all heard stories of hard disk failure and data forever lost. That’s why the HDX has two 400GB drives and an automatic back-up routine that regularly copies the contents of one to the other. A hard disk can fail, but your data will be secure.
Yet More Music
Music from the HDX is not just limited to ripped CDs.
The HDX can play WAV, FLAC, AAC, MP3 and WMA from any connected storage device
whether it is USB or network attached.
Computers and music have drawn ever closer since a hard disk recorder was first used in a music studio. Now, with downloads being part of the everyday audiophile experience, computer technology has become an inherent element of music in the home. It takes immense knowledge, skill and dedication however to design electronic products that can take the raw bits of digital audio and re-assemble them into a genuine musical experience. Naim CD players have long been a testament to that fact and now the HDX hard disk music player has joined them.
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