Do you still remember the great excitement I shared here in July? Nimitra was reviewed by Stereophile in July and I thought that’d be the biggest achievement of the year. And today I’d like to share joyous event that Nimitra is now included in Stereophile’s Class B Recommended Components!
Nimitra is the first hardware product from Fidelizer, introduced in 2016 without so much of marketing. I told myself that some days Fidelizer products will be included in Stereophile’s Recommended Components but I never imagine to have Stereophile’s Class B product in first year.
I’m very thankful to Mr. Kal Rubinson who contacted me for reviewing Nimitra as multi-channel server in Stereophile right after seeing Mr. Steven Plaskin’s review in AudioStream. I’m so fortunate to receive so much support from passionate reviewers for all blessings I received in this year.
A fanless implementation of an Intel Celeron J1900 2GHz processor, the Nimitra is the first server from Thailand-based Fidelizer, who specialize in using Windows as a music-playback platform. Measuring only 8.9″ by 7.9″ by 1.7″ and supplied with an outboard power supply (a 12V brick; Fidelizer’s larger and reportedly better Nikola supply is a $495 option), the Nimitra is bundled with dBPoweramp’s Asset UPnP file access and the JPlay app for streaming output—and is, as KR reported, multichannel-compatible. Kal used the Fidelizer Nimitra with his miniDSP uDAC-8 multichannel processor—”setup was almost trivial,” he said—and found the combination “absolutely delightful,” and “easily the equal of” his Mac mini–based server: “Finally, a great-sounding and affordable multichannel server that works with USB or with HDMI!” (Vol.40 No.7 WWW)
I wish I could have provided better support during Nimitra review with exaSound e38. I’ve published testimonial from Nimitra customer using exaSound e38 for multi-channel audio. Thanks to experience I gained during review, I could support real customer better. 🙂
Since I was reviewing the SOtM sMS-200 Mini Network Player at the same time I was evaluating the Nikola, I decided to try this combination given that the 12 volt output was within spec for use with the sMS-200. After extended listening with the SOtM sMS-200 / Nikola, I felt that many of the sMS-200 owners will love this combination. The overall sound was smooth, detailed, and free of hardness. The bass and mid bass were extremely well controlled with good dynamic qualities. The soundstage was quite large with good depth and width. The overall transient speed and pitch definition were very impressive. Voices and instruments were very well focused and had a life-like presence with wonderful transparency to the sound. And yes, background silence was perceived as being excellent.
For me the asking price and feature set of the Nimitra are extraordinarily attractive. Sure, you probably could build your own custom server for less but keep in mind that the Nimitra ships with several hundred dollars’ worth of software. Windows 10 Pro, Asset UPnP, Fidelizer and JPlay will cost you over $400 already. The Nimitra ticked off all my check boxes with respect to my ideal of a reasonably priced music server. It’s small, completely silent, supremely flexible, easy to use and plays back music with greater authority and naturalness than a general purpose computer. Buy with confidence as did I.
In my exploration of digital music playback, which so far has included a PC optimized with Fidelizer, a Raspberry Pi streamer with onboard DAC, and several open source software operating system options as alternatives to Microsoft Windows, this is the best sounding setup, as I expected it would be. The sound quality is crisp, very dynamic, very detailed, and the sound is natural, big and open. Especially impressive is the separation of instruments and voices and the believability of the soundstage image.
With the new Obsidian album by Mika Sasaki, a 24bit/88kHz download from www.highresaudio.com, no extreme attention was needed to experience palpable difference between Nimitra and a typical computer based setup. The expansion of soundstage, transparency, and more detailed focus were repeatedly of no small portion. Nimitra managed to preserve balanced sound across a complete spectrum and a tonal balance much closer to reality. It just felt more complete and believable with Nimitra in action.