£4000 budget

[hifi]

Take your time ! look at the price and how reliable they are ! Meaning the diffrent brands, The jap Stuff is very long lasting .

 

[Noddy]

Take your time ! look at the price and how reliable they are ! Meaning the diffrent brands, The jap Stuff is very long lasting .

Amen.

Arcam Solo Movie £1,000: analogue inputs and headphone output faulty after five years. All it did was sit on a cupboard and play music.
Chord Mojo £400: stopped working after three years.
Audeze Sine headphones £300: ear pads fell apart after one year. Digital cable failed after two years. One earpiece failed after three years.

Countless Nikon cameras, all perfect bar one that required a circuit board replaced after 8 years.
Various other Japanese and Korean products, faultless.
Numerous Sennhesier headphones, excellent. The HD600 needed new cable, ear pads and headband pad after twenty years, which is okay.

The poor QC of these boutique audio products is in my experience shocking. And I look after stuff too.

 

[MUSICRAFT]

Can't begin to understand, given the budget, why active speakers aren't in scope?

I've suggested Acoustic Energy's AE1A's

 

[MUSICRAFT]

Concur. I can only assume he has a turntable, not only does he need a full-blown streamer but also a phono stage in a budget ideally below the 4k.

I suggested the following which ticks all the boxes

Acoustic Energy's AE1A actives (RRP £1050)

Naim Audio's Uniti Atom HE pre amp/streamer (RRP £2499)

Dual's CS418 T/T includes built in switchable phono stage (RRP £499)

 

[npxavar]

A general advice for hi-fi budgeting to leave room for going over budget. In you case I would research a £3000 pounds system.

 

[ArtieBucco]

Thanks everyone who chipped in with advice. Ended up well below budget.

After auditioning a few bits I favoured....

Audiolab 6000a and matching CDT
Dali Oberon 5, project debut pro turntable. All the cables (3 metres)/interconnects etc.

Paid £2298 in total and it sounds fantastic in my room.

RRP was over £2600 without cables, so essentially like I got the CDT for free.

 

[Noddy]

Lovely jubbly. I think you made the right decision to get what sounds good, rather than splurging. I’m still gabberflasted by my £1,600 streaming system. It far exceeds the £3,500 system I bought six years ago (I paid £2,000, the items were brand new on clearance.)

Psst: The Wiim Mini feeding the digital in will give you streaming for under £100 if you ever need it.

 

[ArtieBucco]

Lovely jubbly. I think you made the right decision to get what sounds good, rather than splurging. I’m still gabberflasted by my £1,600 streaming system. It far exceeds the £3,500 system I bought six years ago (I paid £2,000, the items were brand new on clearance.)

Psst: The Wiim Mini feeding the digital in will give you streaming for under £100 if you ever need it.

Oh great thanks, I've been thinking what I'll add for streaming eventually. I do tend to play vinyl/cd a lot but have hifi tidal less than £1 a month, so I'll be wanting streaming at some point. How you finding the Wiim mini?

 

[Noddy]

Oh great thanks, I've been thinking what I'll add for streaming eventually. I do tend to play vinyl/cd a lot but have hifi tidal less than £1 a month, so I'll be wanting streaming at some point. How you finding the Wiim mini?

Fantastic. It is no more than a digital feed, hence it is as good as units that cost significantly more. I use Spotify (I can already hear the spitting), but it supports other platforms too. It also has support for internet radio, BBC R4, Times Radio, local radio etc. The unit is tiny, the size of an ice hockey puck, and easily hidden away. The software is very good, at least on an iPhone it is.

The data is read by the Wiim Mini directly from the wifi connection, it does not go via your phone, so it is efficient. And it supports Airplay. Just don’t use the built in DAC, it is mediocre.

 

[matthewpianist]

Thanks everyone who chipped in with advice. Ended up well below budget.

After auditioning a few bits I favoured....

Audiolab 6000a and matching CDT
Dali Oberon 5, project debut pro turntable. All the cables (3 metres)/interconnects etc.

Paid £2298 in total and it sounds fantastic in my room.

RRP was over £2600 without cables, so essentially like I got the CDT for free.

This is great news, and I agree that buying what you enjoy rather than spending your whole budget is a wise move. Funnily enough I watched a YouTube video by Andrew Robinson earlier in which he made exactly this point.

Enjoy!

 

[ArtieBucco]

Fantastic. It is no more than a digital feed, hence it is as good as units that cost significantly more. I use Spotify (I can already hear the spitting), but it supports other platforms too. It also has support for internet radio, BBC R4, Times Radio, local radio etc. The unit is tiny, the size of an ice hockey puck, and easily hidden away. The software is very good, at least on an iPhone it is.

The data is read by the Wiim Mini directly from the wifi connection, it does not go via your phone, so it is efficient. And it supports Airplay. Just don’t use the built in DAC, it is mediocre.

Do they come with the digital in cable?

 

[Noddy]

Do they come with the digital in cable?

It comes with all cables, not the best quality but more than good enough. It is powered from a USB socket. I use my own digital cable as I already had one, it cost about £10.

 

[ArtieBucco]

It comes with all cables, not the best quality but more than good enough. It is powered from a USB socket. I use my own digital cable as I already had one, it cost about £10.

Great thanks.

I've got a spare cline digital in cable that come with all the gear, so I'll look to get one of those soon.

To be fair the Bluetooth sound from the 6000a is pretty good for now.

 

[matthewpianist]

I wouldn't worry too much about which digital cables you use. I'm using a £7.99 Amazon Basics coaxial digital cable between my Node 2i and Audiolab, and it sounds superb.

 

[DCarmi]

Psst: The Wiim Mini feeding the digital in will give you streaming for under £100 if you ever need it.

It is a little bit cheaper today, on Amazon.

 

[plastic penguin]

Thanks everyone who chipped in with advice. Ended up well below budget.

After auditioning a few bits I favoured....

Audiolab 6000a and matching CDT
Dali Oberon 5, project debut pro turntable. All the cables (3 metres)/interconnects etc.

Paid £2298 in total and it sounds fantastic in my room.

RRP was over £2600 without cables, so essentially like I got the CDT for free.

Congratulations, sounds like a good deal.

 

[ArtieBucco]

Yes I'm very happy with it. Will add streaming at some point, but no rush as I'm using mainly vinyl and CD. I stupidly gave away 4 flight cases of CDs away a long time ago. So time to start building a solid collection of my fave albums only.

 

[Al ears]

The KEF LS50 Meta is a multi award winning speaker apparently.
However, I tried a pair and found them to be a little dull and lifeless sounding. The problem certainly had nothing to do with my source or amplifier which was more than capable of breathing life into them.
I also tried B&W 707 S2 speakers. These were a little smaller than the KEFs, but to me, they sounded more capable. Just my thoughts. I'm sure others will not agree.

A bit late to the party this thread is six months old....

 

[gasolin]

6 month