How much to spend on each component?

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Whe buying a system, I've always worked on the principal that you should spend most of your budget on the speakers, followed by the amp then the cd player. Recently I've noticed people seem to be recommending more on the other components and less on the speakers. To me that makes no sense: why spend £500 on a cd player; £700 on an amp and then only £350 on speakers, when it's the speakers through which you hear the other components?
 
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Anonymous

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There can be no hard and fast rule as it depends to a certain extent on budget.
 
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Anonymous

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Yes, agreed, but to me it makes logical sense to spend, for example, 2/3 on speakers and the rest on the other components.
 
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Anonymous

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It also depends on if you subscribe to the Linn-esque Source first belief.

I heard a unidisc sc into nad c320bee power amp section and B&W 601's - sounded great, far better than the nad c542 and c320bee, but i'm sure that it would have sounded better with better speakers.
 
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Anonymous

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I was always told that the speakers should be about double the amp and cd, then interconnects about 10% of that. Seems like things are changing....maybe better speakers for less money (unlikely) or not so good electronics performance per £. (more likely).

If there is another explaination...I would like to hear it.
 
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Anonymous

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My original point is that if one has a budget of £1,000, one would probably not spend it in the same proportion as one would if the budget is £10,000.
 
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Anonymous

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In either case I'd still spend more on the speakers, followed by amp then cd player.
 
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Anonymous

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i have noticed that the speakers made a far bigger difference when changing from 601's to tab ref 8 sigs than a change of electronics, so am leaning more to spending more on speakers than other parts these days, but in the mean time have still been happy to split the budget equally.

I'm interested in the 10% for cables suggestion that i was told when i first bought my kit and still stands:

10% over what distance? I can buy far 'better' cable with shorter runs and stick in that rule than i can over longer runs.

what do experts use as the standard lengths for this suggestion?
 
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Anonymous

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I deliberately left cables out of the equation - there's already been some comprehensive thoughts in this forum on this topic recently.

Basically, the shorter the run the better, irrespective of the cable brand. Usually I ask the dealer to throw in the cables, which many are happy to do
 
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Anonymous

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Tarquinh:In either case I'd still spend more on the speakers, followed by amp then cd player.

Tarquinh, your principle is that you spend most of the budget on speakers, then amp, then CDP. So for a £1000 budget, you would perhaps spend £650 on speakers, £200 on amp and £150 on CDP? Might be a rather unbalanced system or am I missing something?
 
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Anonymous

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Tarquinh: Basically, the shorter the run the better, irrespective of the cable brand. Usually I ask the dealer to throw in the cables, which many are happy to do

Rather depends on the price of the cable and the length involved.....
 
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Anonymous

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AKL, conventional wisdom was that you'd spend £500 on the speakers, and the rest on the other components. That to me makes some sense, certainly more than spending £500 on the amp, and the rest on the other components.
 
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Anonymous

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AKL:Tarquinh: Basically, the shorter the run the better, irrespective of the cable brand. Usually I ask the dealer to throw in the cables, which many are happy to do

Rather depends on the price of the cable and the length involved.....

The shorter the run the better, irrespective of price. That way any influence by the cable is minimised - for an amplifier manufacturer, in an ideal world all cables would be neutral in effect.
 
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Anonymous

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Sorry Tarquinh, I didn't make myself clear. I meant whether the dealer throws in the cable depends on price/length of cable, and I guess also on how much £££ you have already spent on kit in his shop.
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Anonymous

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Tarquinh:AKL, conventional wisdom was that you'd spend £500 on the speakers, and the rest on the other components. That to me makes some sense, certainly more than spending £500 on the amp, and the rest on the other components.

I guess that would work for some, it all rather depends on the potential buyer's ears, that is what counts I guess. Mind you, I am not "conventional" in the sense that in my Cyrus system, my source is lossless files/DACMagic (£200), completely out of kilter with the £££ of the rest of the system. Maybe that is where we are heading....!
 
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Anonymous

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Tarquinh:In either case I'd still spend more on the speakers, followed by amp then cd player.

Seconded. Once you have an amp with enough power and a half decent CD player you should chuck everything you have at the speakers, because they are always the limiting factor sound wise. Audition wherever possible before buying.
 

shado

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I was always under the impression (back in the 80's) that you spent most of your budget on the electronics you could afford and then your Loudspeakers would be the last upgrade. So I made do with Wharfedale Diamonds Series I, but because the Pioneer A400 had Spkr A & B input I still used them when I eventually bought the Sony APM 22ES. In purchasing my new system I was thinking in equal outlay per item - for argument sake 1K per item excluding stands and leads.
 

jaxwired

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Great topic. As you can see from my sig, I am a poster child for ignoring the 1/3, 1/3, 1/3 rule and I have been politely chastised for it more than once.

As you would expect I entirely agee that spending the most on speakers makes sense within reason. You need to a least spend enough to buy quality electronics. I consider NAD to be good quality electronics.

I entirely disagree with the common statement that you should spend heavily on the amp and source because quality speakers will reveal the bad electronics. This is a non sequitar. What people are saying is, if you have a mediocre amp and cdp, better to buy cheap muffled speakers to mask the bad sound. LOL! No thanks, I'd rather hear the poor sound quality clearly via good speakers, then mask it with cheap speakers.

Also, I do not think that quality and price necessarily correspond among the various components. What I am I saying is that an 5 star amp does not necessarily cost the same as a 5 star speaker. So, in fact a better match might be had by ignoring price.

Also,if spend your money lopsided, it is cheaper to build a high end system. Take me as an example, if I want to eventually have a plinius level system, I only need to upgrade the amp and CDP, keeping my already great speakers, where someone that had split their budget equally 3 ways would have to upgrade all 3 components. Plus, while I'm saving up I get to enjoy the great speakers.
 

idc

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When starting and buying everything at one go (say it is £1000) I would be inclined to spend £300 on CDP, £300 on amp, £150-200 on speaker and the rest on cables etc. The speaker costs less to make and there is way more competition than for any other componenet, so I do not think that you need to spend as much on speakers as on the rest of the system.

I want as good a source and amp as I can get. For speakers........................................

505497-elec_lg-resized200.jpg


I ended up with B&W DM302s at £120 on the end of a £400 CPD and £500 amp, all auditioned together and with other kit. To me they sounded the perfect match. For a bit of fun the dealer hooked the B&Ws to the end of £15,000 Naim (they did not stock B&W and I had taken them with me) and we were blown away. Ultimately it is about system matching and proper auditioning, who cares about what cost what!
 
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Anonymous

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idc, have you heard expensive speakers? The gulf between a £150 speaker and a £1500 one is a yawning abyss.
 
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Anonymous

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Would i not be right in thinking that the amplifier can only amplify the signal it receives from the source,therefore the source being the limiting factor there, and the same principal with the speakers and amplifier, with the amplifier being the limiting factor?
 

Gerrardasnails

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AKL:
Tarquinh:AKL, conventional wisdom was that you'd spend £500 on the speakers, and the rest on the other components. That to me makes some sense, certainly more than spending £500 on the amp, and the rest on the other components.

I guess that would work for some, it all rather depends on the potential buyer's ears, that is what counts I guess. Mind you, I am not "conventional" in the sense that in my Cyrus system, my source is lossless files/DACMagic (£200), completely out of kilter with the £££ of the rest of the system. Maybe that is where we are heading....!

I'm with AKL on this. For instance, my speakers (RS6) can be bought for £650ish. A £300 amp is not going to get the best out of them. A Dacmagic with lossless files (£200 when I bought it) is much better than many cd players out there at three, four times the cost. I think that as long as your speakers are relatively good, your amp is the most important piece. You can get a £1k amp working well with £500 speakers but the other way around may make you feel underwhelmed.
 
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Anonymous

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Gerrardasnails, my current systerm is v-dac or Marantz SACD 7001 into a NAD C320BEE with Sonus Faber Minima speakers. I'd certainly agree that the speakers could benefit from a much better amp, but it still sounds good to me.

Many moons ago I had a £1000 amp (Musical Fidelity) going into some £150 speakers, and while it sounded better than its predecessor, a cheap sony amp, it wasn't brilliantly so. The speakers were from the Tannoy M6xx series - can't remember which ones.
 

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