Ok i've heard about 'Replica' watches but

HiFi
1

It seems they are doing it with hi-fi now…
I first saw some naim and quad ‘copies’ on e-bay but was recently looking for some new interconnects and came across this on ‘ali express’

https://www.aliexpress.com/store/product/High-End-RCA-Audiophile-CD-System-Stereo-Golden-Interconnect-Cable/526194_1112898566.html?spm=2114.12010612.0.0.700e114alpiWzI

Expand your search to ‘power amps’ or ‘pre amps’ and there are knock off accuphase, naim, mbl, fm accoustics and all sorts.

Casework ranges from laughable to ‘ok’ and internals look suitably ‘high end’ in some cases and shite in others.

I guess nothing is sacred any more.

Must say i’m tempted by some 14 quid nordost though :joy: just to see what it’s like…

2

They’ll probably sound better than originals anyway…:rofl:

6 Likes
3

They’ll sound exactly the same in fact!

2 Likes
4

But still more than I want to pay for an interconnect.

5

If ThiefBay is bad, Ali Express is like some kind of Alien free-for-all pirate planet populated by all the scum of the Universe (plus a scattering of genuine vendors, to be fair).

I’ve tried (and long since abandoned…) to purchase a variety of fairly straightforward, not-worth-faking generic components (fasteners, packaging, literal nuts-and-bolts), if anything ever gets sent at-all you can be about 80% certain it will not be as described - wrong size, wrong colour, wrong materials etc. and certainly not compliant with relevant safety standards.

The flip side is, if you do get a set of £40 MorcostsTM, you can then do a JANDL and tell the whole world how fucking marvellously giant-slayingly wonderful they are and what a clever little cunt you are, so well worth the punt I’d say… :+1:

3 Likes
6

Bought some of these years ago,not advertised as Nordost though.
Think i paid a tenner off ebay.
Don’t know how there was any profit as it had free shipping from China.

7

For genuine fakes, Nobsound is the only way

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8

And that’s the whole point surely.

9

Worth. Every. Penny.

10

There are loads of amps that use the same circuit as well known ones, so you get Naim circuits, MF A1 and the like. And they’re cheap.

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But do they have that magical elusive Naim sound?

12

Sarcasm says “hopefully not”.

Realism says “even Naim themselves don’t any more”.

In practice, if it’s a “classic” Naim circuit layout, then it’ll depend on which components you use and how you implement the power supply. They used to use a lot of polystyrene capacitors, for example.