Focal and Naim brought four systems to Audio Advice Live 2026, held August 7-9 in Raleigh, North Carolina. The consumer show filled more than 60 listening rooms, and provided the setting for the first North American public demonstration of the Scala Utopia Evo M.
The Scala is a three-way bass-reflex floorstander built around Focal's new PRISM inverted-dome tweeter, an M-profile W-cone midrange derived from the professional Utopia Main monitors, and a redesigned 10.6-inch W-cone woofer with dual ferrite magnets. Focal specifies 92dB sensitivity and a frequency response of 27Hz to 40kHz.
For the demonstration, Focal paired the speakers with Naim's NSS 333 network player, NSC 222 streaming preamplifier, and a pair of NAP 350 monoblocks. Pricing starts at $50,000 per pair in gloss finishes, rising to $56,000 for the two wood options, so the supporting electronics were very much part of the presentation rather than an afterthought.
At the top of the range sat the $210,000 Diva Alta Utopia, an active wireless loudspeaker with seven drivers and 600W of Naim Class AB amplification in each cabinet, plus onboard DAC, DSP, and streaming. The $3,600 Mu-so Hekla offered a more accessible counterpoint, using 15 drivers and 660W of amplification to deliver Dolby Atmos from a single enclosure.
The fourth demonstration paired Focal Omada loudspeakers with Naim CI electronics in a $5,297 custom-install system. Placing it alongside the Scala, Hekla, and Diva Alta gave the room unusual breadth: conventional passive hi-fi, one-box immersive audio, ultra-high-end wireless, and installed sound were all represented under the same Focal-Naim umbrella.