I like cheap hifi, my system is cheap, from my pc to my dac,mixer,amp,speaker + stands and of course cable around 970 euros or 760 pounds.
I have just bought a cheap pa amp an disconnected the fan, now it's a perfect low budget high powered amp around 250 watt in 4 ohm pr channel (4 ohm speakers), didn't expected that it wouldn't sound like crap
I have alot more power than my small class d amps and it soo nice since, the sound is cleaner,it doesn't run out of steam for the speakers im using, thought the mixer instead of a very cheap preamp or one of the ultra compact, preamps from nobsound,smsl,topping,fosi audio, would degrade the sound but sounds fine, the same with the amp which im 99.99% shure is a class a/b amp it does the job very well.
My cheap passive speakers (bigger and cheaper than a pair of dali spektor 1) sound amazing for the price, high are not fatiguing to listen to, not to loud, bass is there never to much and is pretty fast, sometimes it could need a little adjustment and is why i have bough a cheap equalizer so i can adjust the bass, since a different mixer would be to tall because my turntable is above my hifi rack, the best is the good clean midrange and wide soundstage (because of my balanced dac ? )
Only thing i would change if i could, would be my spekers in a 6 og 6.5" version, argon doesn't make one in that size and it would only be because of the bass not spl or the general sound.
Cheap "new" hifi can sound more than okay, you just have to find what matches your needs, experince a little and if you don't like it sell it of keep it for some other day where you might have a different system where it could be a perfect low budget "cheap" hifi