NADCS1 Endpoint Bluetooth Network Streamer

Front End Nad CS1The affordable Frontend NAD CS1 is not designed to connect out of the box with the integrated Bluetooth for example to my Apple neighborhood (Mac mini, iPhone 15, iPad 8) and a Klipsch Bluetooth speaker.First you have to let start the automatic soft-/firmware download in an adequate area (Internet) then you have to make a setup at the rear side of the NAD CS1: below ‘Setup’ you’ll find that tiny hole!Now the NAD CS1 Bluetooth is enabled I had to find and connect the NAD CS1 in the iPhone Bluetooth register where it appears with an additional four digit code.Besides Bluetooth and Internet connectivity the NAD CS1 has RCA, optical, Coax and Ethernet connections.There is only one button and a multicolor LED: learning by doing! Blue light - Bluetooth ready!It’s a Frontend and there doesn’t exist any App to access the Nad frontend. But the NAD CS1 is Roon Ready and works with this Music Service (and other) out of the box.If you have trouble with the NAD please read this:‘NAD CS1 review: a bare-bones network streamerBy Simon Cohen’At last I’m exited with my NAD CS1 it’s amazing how smoothly it works in a surrounding with Internet and Bluetooth and besides furthermore connectivity there areremarkable useful utensils for international electrical connections.All in all 4.9!

Never knew streaming audio could sound this good!

I really wanted to like this unit because I have an NAD 20 year old receiver that still works and sounds great. Looks wise it’s a great match. They claim easy to connect, but I had to search several places online to find a way to get it to connect to my iPad Pro, and iPhone 13 Pro. Trying to reconnect after turning off was difficult. When it was connected, sound quality was lifeless and compressed compared to DAC and Bluetooth adapter it was to replace because after a few years something stopped working. I’m returning the unit the next day, and renewing my search for a better solution.

Bought this lil guy to match up to my c368 and with it coming in 200 bucks cheaper than NAD’s MDC card to stream, I feel like I lucked out. I also prefer the dac in the CS1 compared to the amp. Matches great, although it’s super tiny on top of that big amp but that’s ok: it isn’t blocking and of the breathing holes on top!I plugged an Ethernet into it from my gigabit switch and voila! It’s never shutdown or lost connection in the 8 months I’ve had it and we’ve put hundreds of hours on this thing as we don’t watch tv. Can’t speak for its WiFi but I prefer the sound of chrome cast by way of ROON but idk if we chalk that up to the cs1, Google or roon.My only complaint would be no aux out but that’s ok, I can plug laptop directly into the amp.

Could not connect my phone to it. Both the quickstart instructions and the latest manual of the NAD website were useless. iOS app never found the device, even when i successfully connected to its Soft AP. Could use it as an airplay receiver using wired ethernet but could never connect from iOS to adjust any settings using the app. Returned. Shame too because the hardware and features look nice. I especially liked having a 12V trigger output.

This was an upgrade for me from a Belkin AirPlay adpater. Sound quality is much better, plus this device works better with Roon and allows me to control my attached NAD D3020 DAC/AMP via Roon. It's more expensive than most solutions, but rock solid. Worth it for me!

The sound quality seems better than the Topping DX3+. Does has some shortcomings though. I had to scale back to WAP2 security on my WIFI router in order to use the CS1 because the CS1 does not work with WAP3. WAP3 came out in 2018 and it is 2023 now. If I don't use the CS1 for awhile, I can no longer connect to it via WIFI. NAD support said that was deal for for now, but they notified their quality assurance team. They said to unplug for 2 minutes, and then wait for 5 minutes after plugging it in before trying to connect.

I bought the CS1 for the MQA features detailed on the NAD website. I returned it after getting a different story from NAD Support...From NAD website: "It supports resolution up to 24-bit/192kHz and has full MQA decoding and rendering capability for playing Master Quality music from Tidal."From NAD support: "The CS1 does not contain an MQA DAC and simply acts as a passthrough. If you want MQA using the CS1 you must send it from your phone at full volume to the CS1 and you must go digital out (COAX or OPTICAL) to the CS1 to a DAC that supports MQA and volume will be controlled by the amp on the other side of that DAC. If you are not doing that you are not getting MQA."