NAD M15HD Surround Sound Processor - Page 15

I owned the original M15 and the Anthem D2 about two years ago. I preferred the NAD for sound quality. The NAD was smoother and more natural sounding. The Anthem by comparison sounded brighter and more electronic. The EQ and the video processing solutions in the Anthem are slightly better in terms of flexibility than the NAD, but the EQ and video board in the NAD are still very good.

wow Ive never heard that before! I have had many pre pros including theta casablanca, I now have the d2. I find the d2 very natural and effortless sounding and dialouge is superb. anthem support is top notch and the arc is great.

I have if paired up with the m25 amp and jm lab utopia speakers and love it!

Really? Anthem is good but most shootouts between the two seem to leave critical listeners preferring the NAD for music playback.

I was refering to how he described the anthem as "bright and electronic sounding. I havent heard the nad pre yet. I have a dealer very close I might give it a listen

I didn't mean for that comment to be taken in definitive terms, rather comparative. And the differences were slight.

This guy was more firm in his assertions however.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...ghlight=anthem

no big deal Tim, but Im curious though, given your extensive sampling of gear what made you choose the classe over the nad?

Well, at the time, NAD neither had the capability for HDMI audio nor EQ.

I'm not one to stay with one thing too long though. Speaking of, the Classe is now gone, and I plan to try out the newer NAD "HD" version.

My reason for parting with the Classe had nothing to do with the sound quality. I just got it in my mind that I didn't need a $9K prepro to get good sound. I'm finding now though, that I miss the quality of high end gear, so I'm slowly rebuilding my system to something that I'm happier with in both sound quality and build quality, but still less expensive overall than my last system.

We have recently installed a couple of the M15HDs. One is in a dedicated listening/viewing space with great acoustics. I have not compared it to other processors,but the sound is really really good. We are feeding a Sooloos Media Server into one of the Digital inputs of the NAD.Music is phenomonal. I think we are going to get more out of this system with some additional tweaking ,but this is by far our best home theater sound ever. The speakers are 7 custom built line arrays.We are driving them with custom Marchand/Hypex Crossover/amplfiers.
I have come to enjoy using the Dolby Prologic 2x Music mode. Having all the speakers working seems to really work in this room with music playback.
At any rate the NAD is great! Better than it should be for the money.

wow! didnt know you were getting rid of the classe! when are you getting the nad? did you change speakers too?

man I wish you lived closer to you, I would love to come along for the ride while you demo gear. lol

Good to hear a bit more first hand experience with the newer M15HD version. I've only heard the previous M15. Well, that is not completely true. I did listen to the HD version about a month ago at the dealer's, but it was with unfamiliar speakers in and unfamiliar room with unfamiliar music, so I have no idea what contribution the M15HD made to the final product.

i just picked up the m15hd from my dealer, ill post my thoughts later this week

Is it on loan or a purchase?

a loan

Nice. Will you be comparing it to an Anthem, or something else? Any chance for a blind test?

"This guy" had a serious hate-on for Anthem, while there was a lot of components he didn't like he was somewhat reserved when criticizing them, but when he discussed Anthem he seemed to go out of his way to cite how bad they were. I question objectivity there.

My take on Anthem is that they never "grabbed" me with their pre-amps' sound despite being a Paradigm fan and hearing them in every showroom I've auditioned Paradigms in. (I loved their PVA amp, a real sleeper IMO.)

The M15 was simply superb for music (over coax) and would still be in my rack if it weren't for the HDMI, or lack thereof. I wonder if anyone has done a comparison of of the M15 over coax vs the M15HD over HDMI with music?

Yup, WB speakers gone too. I hope to pick up the NAD by the end of the month.


You'd certainly be welcome to.

yeah, I'm surprised there is so little action about the NAD Master Series stuff. It is very good sounding gear. But like you, the lack of HDMI audio wqith the original M15 was a deal breaker at the time.

I spent the week with the nad and I must say it sounds very nice!, setup is fairly easy and the layout on the back of the unit is similar to my D2 except the nad has no balanced connections and some other minor things. I did not have the ability to blind test nor do I have the desire to I was just curious of the sound and wanted to listen to it. I think the mc15hd has a bit warmer sound compared to my D2, I do prefer the sound of my D2 in my system it sounds a bit cleaner and more natural sounding especially with dialouge. When I bought my focals I found heavenly sound paired up with my D2 and nad m25 amp the center is spectacular to me. The nad is pretty tweak able but with the d2 you can tweak until the cows come home, I also love the the flexibility of the genum vidieo processor.

bottom line is if I was in the market for an ssp Im not sure I would spend the extra 3 or 4k on the D2. The nad is a great value piece and I definitely would recommend the nad mc15hd, it sounds great and priced right, audessy is a plus too!

Thanks for the impartial opinion of the M15HD. You bring up a very good point that we all need to remember. Personal preference and system matching play an important role in the decisions we each make, which makes it difficult if not impossible to judge any particular piece of gear as better than / worse than any other.

speaking of systems, what speakers are you eyeing now?

Audio Physic Virgo 25's. Ordered them about 6 weeks ago. Not sure when they will arive. Click on the link in my signature for more details. Pics in post #903.

What version is the HDMI on the NAD M15HD, 1.3, 1.4...is it upgradeable?

1.3 and it *should* be upgradeable since the HDMI card in the M15HD can be removed and replaced, BUT there has been no announcement by NAD that they will be upgrading to 1.4 any time soon.

interesting that this guy thought the NuForce AVP-16 processor (released in 2005) was best out of all products tested. Not bad considering it retails for $999.00
http://www.hometheatersound.com/equi...orce_avp16.htm
http://www.nuforce.com/hi/Documents/AVP-16-manual.pdf

Actually, according to Zissou's test, the Nu Force is a class "C" processor, and the M15 is class "A". The list goes from worst to best, top of the post to bottom.

okay, I guess it was too good to be true. Thanks for pointing that out (me stupid)

That's what you get for skimming.

Any news about firmware fix to the forced video fps conversion issue/bug?

My same experience with 2x C275BEE amps. Bridged the midrange is much more detailed and highs are cleaner. I really didn't think there'd be an obvious audible difference but there you have it. I level matched everything before even listening to anything.

Any news on new MDC cards? Are the 150 and 150x just for the t7*5's or are they going to have something for the m15hd with 1.4. Just hoping for something with maybe audyssey xt32 and 1.4 hdmi.