I've had this machine nearly two years, and I've had problems every month since, waste of money. It has taken nearly two years for me to get someone to answer an email, and is now off to be fixed. Don't buy American rubbish, yes it sounds good when it works. But this simple hard drive can't multi task, it would rather crash on you. Just get your money and burn it, you'll feel better doing that. I've had £50 hifi's that have lasted years. But for the price you pay for this, I expect it to last more than a month. Buy British or Japanese, because America hasn't got a clue. And olive customer service are useless and don't answer your emails

I use my Olive 4HD with the optical output, with FLAC 8 files on its HDD ( from CD's ) and with a Synology NAS through a DNLA streaming with FLAC 8 files. Its musicality and dynamic range is the best i've ever heard. That's a new discover of my cd's. I've not tried the WAV import features, but the iPhone remote app, the network import feature and the remote server access are excellent. I really appreciate it. A must-have to me.

Folks, more details from our contacts at Olive. The company's hugely embarrassed by the temporary problems surrounding its UK distribution, and apologizes for any inconvenience caused.

It's working hard to get a new distributor in place: in the meantime, any reader interested in the product should contact us at whathifi@haymarket.com - we'll be able to put them in touch with a contact at Olive's headquarters, who should in turn be able to point them towards the first UK-available products just as soon as they hit the streets.

The Olive has a USB socket for connection to an external HDD for music backup. As to playing music from an external HDD, I'd suggest you'd be better off transferring your content to the Olive's internal HDD from your computer or HDD. It's a drag and drop operation over your network.

Just as we went to press, Olive's UK distribution changed – the company's in the process of setting up something new. I'll update just as soon as I can: I spoke to the company's Vice-President about it yesterday, but he's on a plane to Las Vegas today…

Thanks for review team. Stunning.

Can existing Apple Lossless (and mp3s) be transferred from a NAS to it's internal drive and played direct with embedded tags? No mention on their website of playing your current collection.

Very interesting, now, where can I get my hands on one?

A small remark,

I believe compairing Olive 4HD to a very good entry level CD player (Marantz 6003, circa 260�) is a bit unfair to Olive , I would have expected a head to head with a CD/SACD player costing 1500� and above.

Looks very very interesting!

How do you go about back-up of the files with the Olive? Would it backup to an external HD?

Would it play from an external HD?

The comparison to the price of the Naim HDX seems a bit odd, given the fact that the HDX has a built-in amp.  

i'm sorry i must put an end to this standing ovation for olive. i purchased the 4hd 2td, three weeks earlier.

set it up with genelec 8050 bi amplified speakers. CD replication is fine not outstanding.... streaming audio no better than on a computer, i also have a pair of genelec attached to my laptop.

unfortunately, the unit is a bit of a nightmare to operate. CD eject button has to be depressed a number of times prior to the cd ejecting, it frequently gets stuck, unit has to be sent back to the shop. software frequently freezes, unit has to be reset.streaming very slow in reading stations.

although, my primary incentive was the built in DAC, i find squeeze duet or sonos with a add on dac would have been a better option.

more news on the olive 4hd....the jam machine>>>

if you have an lg air conditioner, remote can be used to operated olive volume, works at much loner range than the olive. still moves at snail pace when moving through the various net radio stations. keeps going back to the beginning.