Ipod only Solution with around £500 budget plus or minus

[admin_exported]

Hi there,

I only use my Iphone and Ipad recently for music. I have spotify premium and whilst higher quality options will be available - this suits me perfectly...

Unit

I have my eye on a few units and nearly bought the m38 from denon.

Since then I have also seen that the Yamaha as300 (£200ish) and yamaha as500 (300ish) also have a dock and thats all I'd need for playing music from my ipod/phone...

With the yamaha's i saw that they have a new wireless dock that really really appealed to me so I can control spotify/search for songs etc from wherever I may be in the room. Would i be able to do anything like this with the denon?

Sound Quality?

I imagine that the two yamaha units would sound better than the denon due to them being dedicated amps without the cd player?

Would you advise me to look at any other units for my purposes. It doesn't need to be woodstock volume but i'd like it to fill a larger sized room and be loud enough also for a party....

Speakers

I have been looking at the q acoustic 2010 or 2020 and don't have a clue where to start to be honest.

I don't have a need for bookshelf only and quite like the look of floorstanding speakers but dont know which ones to look at.

If you could help me with a suggested setup vaguely near the £500 that would be awesome! - I also don't mind buying used from places to get more from my money.

Thanks so much for your help.

 

[Anonymous]

I'd start with one of these; it made a massive improvement to my iPod classic, all for £75 and fully remote controllable (including menu functions):
http://www.whathifi.com/Review/Pure-Digital-i20/

I personally think its well worth 5 stars because of its price, compared to say the Onkyo digital transport (no DAC).

I wouldn't be persuaded by the one-box solutions, they may look neat but you'll lose out on sound quality and can't upgrade...

So, I'd recommend adding a good value separate amp; Cambridge Audio would be a good place to start, though I haven't seen a review of this one: http://www.richersounds.com/product/amplifiers-receivers/cambridge-audio/topaz-am10/camb-am10-blk

Or spend a bit more on something well reviewed by Nad (C316BEE is £240 RRP) or the Rotel RA-04 at £250, both 4/5* WHF products.

Add a pair of decent entry level speakers:
- Roth Audio OLi1 £100 (5*)
- Q Acoustics 2010 £110 (5*)
- Cambridge Audio S30 £130 (5*)
- Wharfedale Diamond 9.1/10.0 £130+
- Mordaunt-Short Avant 902i
...basically loads to chose from.

Leaving you with £50/£75 for some stands and a decent interconnect and speaker cable (don't go mad on cables, entry level QED will be fine).

Don't forget to try and demo the set-up (perhaps bring along your iPod and dock to test the speaker/amp combo's?). At this price point I'd expect to find a lot of differences.

Have fun