£4/6K Budget for Amp and Speakers?

[gasolin]

amp suggestions

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LemAS22pRk

 

[gasolin]

review of the original sprout

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYC1UGSP6eY&t

 

[RayP]

Consider a Naim XS3 with a few loudspeakers. The Naim Supernait 3 is used at hifi shows as it’s punchy but fairly neutral. The XS3 is £2.5K, has HT Bypass and very close sonically to the SN3.

My 22 year-old B&W CM4s work well with it. Plenty of choice with current 700 series from B&W to keep inside your budget.

 

[RayP]

What does AV/HT bypass actually bring you? I’m unsure if it means you can play your TV or Sky (say) through the Hifi. Or your send some other signal out of the amp.

It gives you an independent hi-fi system which can still be used for home cinema. A source - streamer, turntable or CD player - is connected to your hi-fi amp via RCA analogue cables. Front left / right speakers connect to the amp. Stereo music via a hi-fi system.

But when you want to watch home cinema or TV / Sky pre-outs from the AVR connect to the AV input on your HT Bypass amp. In that mode the amp still drives the front pair but remaining speakers are driven by the AVR.

Makes it possible to have your hi-fi and home cinema systems work optimally. The AVR must have pre-outs and you need an amp with HT Bypass. My 10 year old Yamaha RX-A3010 has pre-outs.

 

[Al ears]

It gives you an independent hi-fi system which can still be used for home cinema. A source - streamer, turntable or CD player - is connected to your hi-fi amp via RCA analogue cables. Front left / right speakers connect to the amp. Stereo music via a hi-fi system.

But when you want to watch home cinema or TV / Sky pre-outs from the AVR connect to the AV input on your HT Bypass amp. In that mode the amp still drives the front pair but remaining speakers are driven by the AVR.

Makes it possible to have your hi-fi and home cinema systems work optimally. The AVR must have pre-outs and you need an amp with HT Bypass. My 10 year old Yamaha RX-A3010 has pre-outs.

i get that just don't know how you work two volume controls....

 

[RayP]

i get that just don't know how you work two volume controls....

You don’t. In hi-fi mode the volume is controlled by the amp. In home cinema mode the AVR controls it as the amp is just used as a power amp.

 

[Al ears]

You don’t. In hi-fi mode the volume is controlled by the amp. In home cinema mode the AVR controls it as the amp is just used as a power amp.

I see, I think, thanks for the explanation. So although the front speakers are driven by an amp of different power output they are still integrated with the rest of the speakers?
How can run the speaker optimisation set-up on the AV amp?
Do you have to set everything manually?
Still confused, must be my age....

 

[RayP]

I see, I think, thanks for the explanation. So although the front speakers are driven by an amp of different power output they are still integrated with the rest of the speakers?
How can run the speaker optimisation set-up on the AV amp?
Do you have to set everything manually?
Still confused, must be my age....

You just run the speaker setup again. No distances have changed and when I did mine a couple of years ago I cannot recall any problems. It’s a one-off action then you’re done. It’s possible the volume is set at the pre-amp level in which case utilising a more powerful amp for the front pair has no effect.

HT-Bypass is the best thing that’s happened to hi-fi in a very long time. No wonder so many amp manufacturers have embraced it. Even esoteric companies like Naim.

 

[Witterings]

I see, I think, thanks for the explanation. So although the front speakers are driven by an amp of different power output they are still integrated with the rest of the speakers?
How can run the speaker optimisation set-up on the AV amp?
Do you have to set everything manually?
Still confused, must be my age....

The amp that has the AV bypass you can set the input level and then it becomes fixed so when you increase the volume of the AVR, it also increases the volume going out of teh preouts.

I had to run audyssey several times although I only did one measurement as the fronts were showing -12 to start with and then had keep increasing the volume on the HiFi amp for that input unti it read about zero and then ran audyssey taking all the readings.

I hope that makes sense?

I did this because I wanted the higher quality of a dedicated HiFi amp but there's no way the better half would ever have accapted another set of speakers in the lounge and all of my stereo inputs just go into the Arcam.

 

[Al ears]

The amp that has the AV bypass you can set the input level and then it becomes fixed so when you increase the volume of the AVR, it also increases the volume going out of teh preouts.

I had to run audyssey several times although I only did one measurement as the fronts were showing -12 to start with and then had keep increasing the volume on the HiFi amp for that input unti it read about zero and then ran audyssey taking all the readings.

I hope that makes sense?

I did this because I wanted the higher quality of a dedicated HiFi amp but there's no way the better half would ever have accapted another set of speakers in the lounge and all of my stereo inputs just go into the Arcam.

Got you, thanks.

 

[RayP]

I’m watching ITV via my Sky box with the sound through the AVR. Adjusting the volume knob on the Naim has no effect. This is because it being used as a power amp for the front pair.

Volume is controlled by the pre-amp which is the AVR. Thinking back to my Audiolab 8000C/P what controls did the power amp have? A power button. No volume knob.

So any HT Bypass amp is being used purely in power amp mode as long as the input used is AV.

 

[nopiano]

You don’t. In hi-fi mode the volume is controlled by the amp. In home cinema mode the AVR controls it as the amp is just used as a power amp.

Thanks for the several explanations. Much clearer now.

 

[Witterings]

Got you, thanks.

Just some extra info and reasons for possibly doing this, I was using my AVR for music as well and as my interest in stereo quality increased I started noticing some traits I didn't like.

Initially I was using multispeaker surround, I found certain songs the bass was incredibly "boomy" then went to stereo which still uses the sub and it was the same so then went to direct mode, and the same again. I tried this with a few pairs of speakers and it was the same with all.

I bought the Arcam for stereo and it instantly stopped happening, it may be that the Arcam just controls the speakers better but I wonder if AVR's are developed mainly for the Film / Movie audience and when there's an explosion / building collapsing they want it to make the room shake so you feel like you're there and it doesn't constrain it enough ... even in direct mode. In case it was the sub I switched it to no sub and no difference.

Only thing I'd add is, I've literally only just found Pure Direct on my AVR which I didn't know existed before 2 days ago.
The Xmas tree went up 3 days ago and has made it virtually impossible to get to the back of my amp to swap the speaker leads out and try it to see if it makes a difference.

I've only done a long reply as I'm guessing it's something you're possibly considering or you wouldn't be asking questions about it.
Whilst I haven't found my perfect combo in terms of sound if you have any other queries on the set up side let me know.

 

[RayP]

@Witterings , my Yamaha £2K AVR bought back in 2012 was used for stereo music in Direct mode for years. I wondered why my floor standing B&Ws produced so little deep bass.

That was solved by adding a Naim XS3. The control, attack and rhythm was brilliant. Also, the bass extended further than I’d ever heard before. If you look inside a XS3 the whole right half is the transformer. In comparison the one inside AVRs is much smaller.

A dedicated stereo amp is the answer.

 

[Zakhele]

If you were starting from scratch and had a £4/6k budget for Amp and Speakers what combos would you be looking at?

One absolute ..... the Amp must have AV/HT Bypass ... nice to haves would be digital in / decent DAC but really not essential.
Other notes would be, don't like bright, prefer richer / warmer and love tight / punchy and detail of instruments.
It's quite a large room / open plan area so really looking for floorstanders rather than bookshelf / standmount as I've tried some in there and they just don't enough air.

Would consider both new and 2nd hand.

SPEAKER----Dynaudio Emit 50 ( £1 750 )

AMPLIFIERS

------NAD C399 ( £1 799 )
------Cambridge Evo 150 ( £2 499 )
------Rotel RA1592 MKII ( £2 599 )
------Parasound Hint 6 ( £3 799 )

COMBINE AV RECEIVER + STEREO POWER AMPLIFIER

------Marantz SR6015 (£1 299 ) AV Receiver used as a pre-amplifier and then drive the Dynaudio Emit 50 speakers with a NAD C298 power amplifier ( £1 749 )

 

[gasolin]

@Witterings , my Yamaha £2K AVR bought back in 2012 was used for stereo music in Direct mode for years. I wondered why my floor standing B&Ws produced so little deep bass.

That was solved by adding a Naim XS3. The control, attack and rhythm was brilliant. Also, the bass extended further than I’d ever heard before. If you look inside a XS3 the whole right half is the transformer. In comparison the one inside AVRs is much smaller.

A dedicated stereo amp is the answer.

Did you set the fronts to small ?

 

[RayP]

Did you set the fronts to small ?

Yes.

 

[rainsoothe]

Hi! Try a sub first.

 

[Emark600]

Start with a pair of PSBs T600s, but maybe a couple of K more for good int/PA combi, in my view…