Well, the crappiest part of any sound system in any car I'm in is my 70 year old ears! Between hereditary hearing loss and chemo induced tinnitus most music without earbuds isn't very good but the NAIM is not as good as our other cars.

 

What I am saying is, yes it should sound great with High res music but it shouldn't sound terrible with Satellite. You analogy is off since the car isn't designed for regular gas. In fact its detrimental. The radio is designed to play all sorts of audio formats including radio, satellite and disc.

 

I dont disagree with you Nader, Im simply offering my experience.

However, my analogy is general and simple. Maybe like Bentley, Naim have designed it only for high res, in the same way as Bentley havnt deigned it for low octane/regular gas. ...... just a thought.

 

Hello All,
I am not suggesting that this is the problem that all of you with the NAIM system are having, so.

I have to add to this as I had the same feeling as to the sound after installing the NAIM sub woofer in the vehicle, I also added the (3) NAIM tweeters, but the bass was lacking compared to when I had my old Bazooka tubes in place for testing before I installed the NAIM sub system, so I double checked, triple checked, and quadruple checked my wiring, as it sounded like back in the day as when I had mistakenly wired my subs or DVC subs out of phase, in which case if some of you are not familiar with speaker wiring, if you do not keep all your +/- the same to each speaker, you will be out of phase, and with the subs out of phase you will have a lack of base, as the polarities are switched to each sub, they cancel each other out, so after all my checking to be sure that I had followed the diagram to the t, I said screw it and swapped 2 of the 4 wires feeding the NAIM sub box, and BOOM, I got bass 🔊 ...

Now this would only be for the twin sub system as in the hardtop, unless, and I have no clue at this moment, that maybe, possibly the convertible may have a DVC sub (4) wires, as it only has one in the center rear.

I am not sure if anyone was ever inside the NAIM sub box I purchased, I opened it up and all looked good, could it just be a mistake at the factory making the harness, or the box maker, just one of them getting their wires crossed 😀 🤔.

Also, the way to tell if your subs are out of phase is to turn the balance completely to the left or the right, if you get more bass when set to either side but less when centered, the subs are out of phase.

Johnny

...

 

I really wish I could just add one to my car with a nice aftermarket amp! Save me some trunk space in the future. Maybe even find some subs within specs of the box and swap them out too.

 

I had a chance to fool around with the setting as posted below. Keep in mind that i have a 2010 supersports and the settings below are obviously from a newer model, I did follow a similar tone setup and found that it helped considerably. In fact I turned the mid level down as far as it could go. Now it sounds much better, tighter with more definition between lows and highs.

While it still is lacking a bit using SAT, CDs sounds impressive...

Thanks for the help!

 

You're very welcome, glad I could be of some help to you .

 

I also am having issues with my NAIM sound system in my newly acquired 2010 Bentley Supersports. I formerly had another 2010 super sports with the standard stock Soundsystem which was amazing and felt like I was at a concert and the bass was incredible in addition to being quite clear sounding. I traded that car towards the same exact car but with much less miles however the one I have now has the NAIM sound system. Very underwhelming! I thought there were blown speakers since it had almost no subwoofer bass response at all. It sounded like blown speakers or speakers that were out of phase. I took my car to the shop for repair to the system who sent the amp out at great cost and replaced one subwoofer bass speaker, I noticed that it’s slightly better now however it definitely sounds better if you open the trunk which tells me that the subwoofers might be out of phase.I also noticed that the loudness button when pressed in and out does absolutely nothing whereas on my standard sound system in my former Supersports that would cause the subwoofer affect to kick in greatly to the point of moving my pant legs with subwoofer action, what is wrong with my NAIM sound system in my super sports and can anything be done with it since I am totally dissatisfied with it?
Thanks!

 

@jeffreylee , I had the same issue my 06 spur sounded exactly with the standard equipment. When I got my 2010 speed with Naim sounded weak and substandard to the basic system. I never got satisfaction from my naim system. Idk what to tell you.
btw I did add a bass box in the trunk it sounded a little better. But the concert 🎵 sound was in my older standard sound system from Bentey.

 

@jeffreylee ,
Did you see my post number 38 ?
Please tell us what the bass sounds like when you turn the balance fully to the left or right, if you get more bass when set to one side, the the sub box in the trunk is wired out of phase, note, one can not wire the sub speakers inside the box itself out of phase because each sub has different size connectors for +/- on the subs themselves, I found that the wiring at the 4 pin plug feeding the sub box to be wired incorrectly, now mind you, if you read my rebuild thread you will see that I wired all of it myself, BUT, I followed the 2010 wiring diagram for the NAIM system to a tee, as I stated above, I checked my work 4 times over because of the lack of bass from the NAIM sub box itself, and by changing the balance to either side gave me the correct bass effect I decided to swap two wires, now in center balance I have much bass, to the point that I have turned down the bass in tone settings, and to prove it to myself, I put the balance back to left or right and now have less bass that way, so, it was out of phase.

So there is either an error in the diagram, or the NAIM amp maker did not follow the diagram pinout for the subs, which ever came first, or who followed who... 🤔

Johnny

 

Hi Jeffreylee,

Being a 2010 SS, can you confirm which head unit / infotainment display you have. You say you "noticed that the loudness button when pressed in and out does absolutely nothing" Im assuming therefor youre on the older gen 1 system as the gen 2 doesn't have a loudness button.

I also went from standard to Naim and went through a similar disappointment ....initially. I posted earlier my settings which greatly improved the sound, coupled with the correct input (quality cd or high def) Im now completely happy with what I can only describe as ALIVE sound. Allow me to explain,the bass on the Naim is very different to what weve all been programmed to listening to for years. Its how the sound was originally recorded in the studio was always meant to be. The bass should not just be banging away on all tracks, thats simply what weve been conditioned to listening to on lower end systems, whereas Naim reproduce the original recorded frequencies .So if the sound producer deleted any bass in his track, Naim wont let you hear it, whereas a lesser quality amp will synthetically enhance it. Just like high end amps in a media/cinema room, the bass is not always there, but when it kicks in .... with a quality input. youll know about it. I may also add, the vocals are like the singer is sat on the armrests next to you. Perhaps take a look at my settings and see if you can replicate them if that helps.