Better sound for speakers and headphones from digital source?

[admin_exported]

I am a little confused about the best investment to improve my sound and would appreciate some advice.

At the moment, I am playing apple lossless from an original apple tv through an RX-V1800 Yam AV amp which powers some Pro-ac response D15 speakers. (the speakers are left over from when I had better stereo kit). I also use spotify premium to listen to other stuff wirelessly streamed from a mac to the apple tv or direct into headphones. Anyhow, I am craving some better sound again with not too much investment that remains convenient. I tried a dragonfly DAC on the Mac into headphones and this was a big improvement but short of what I wanted.

I am expecting listening time to be half and half in terms of headphomes and speakers. Headphones currently are AKG451s but might upgrade these to something of order of 250GBP as part of this investment.

So, where do I go:

i) Something like a CA stream magic 6 doing the DA conversion of lossless o and feeding the Yam amp and use my headphones from there.

ii) Something like an Arcam rDAC and A18 arcam amp fed from rDac and from Yam amp. (I had an A32 in past and know Arcam amps can be used as poweramp from AV amp)

iii) A different streamer and/or DAC with a different amp in same price bracket for total outlay. If amp cant have fixed vol to act as power amp from av amp then I would need a speaker switch.

iv) something I havent thought of.

Many thanks for wise words.

 

[nopiano]

Welcome, jonp. If you found the Dragonfly DAC wanting then I imagine you'd need to be looking at £1,000 plus DACs, and personal listening would be vital. There are great products by Naim, Musical Fidelity and Rega (amongst others) reviewed here.

I'm not familar with your amp, though I have heard top Yamaha AV amps and they are very good. But personally I don't trust them for hi-fi rather than AV - just my bias though.

 

[nopiano]

As a postscript to the above, I've just seen that Meridian have launched a device similar to the Dragonfly, at £250. Worth a look as they are digital experts.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for that advice. I will try that out. However, I guess that is really only a solution for listening on headphones from my PC. I still wonder what is the best option for investment for driving my speakers. A DAC fed from apple tv vs Streamer with decent DAC abd the even harder one of whether a stereo amp (such as Arcam A18) rather than the AV amp might boost both headphones and speakers compared to my Yamaha AV amp.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for that advice. I will try that out. However, I guess that is really only a solution for listening on headphones from my PC. I still wonder what is the best option for investment for driving my speakers. A DAC fed from apple tv vs Streamer with decent DAC abd the even harder one of whether a stereo amp (such as Arcam A18) rather than the AV amp might boost both headphones and speakers compared to my Yamaha AV amp.