I've been starting to plan my long term system goals & need a bit of help with research/options around preamps. Thanks to some awesome advice from lovely a member here I've booked in a demo of some active speakers: ATC SMC40a. That would mean going the preamp route rather than integrated, something I've not looked too much into before.
The ATC CDA 2 got me interested as I can ditch cd player (max 10% of my listening time), reducing boxes. Unfortunately stock of that is limited in London: there are 2 ATC dealers near me & both gave me quite different options for preamp.
I thought it'd be a good idea to do some research in this area & go in to the demo a bit more aware. The breadth of features & prices across even the units below is leading me down rabbit hole after rabbit hole:
So why not do some crowd sourcing to confuse things even more!
What kind of preamp should I look to? - if sound quality is my number one deciding factor, is dac/streamer/cd just going to add cost & limit my main goal?
Sources, from most used to least:
Budget up to £6,000
Cheers![Smile :) :)](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)
The ATC CDA 2 got me interested as I can ditch cd player (max 10% of my listening time), reducing boxes. Unfortunately stock of that is limited in London: there are 2 ATC dealers near me & both gave me quite different options for preamp.
I thought it'd be a good idea to do some research in this area & go in to the demo a bit more aware. The breadth of features & prices across even the units below is leading me down rabbit hole after rabbit hole:
- ATC CDA 2 Mk2
- Naim NSC 2222
- Naim NAC 252
- Linn DSM
- NAD M66
- Hifi Rose RS150
- Eversolo DMP-8
So why not do some crowd sourcing to confuse things even more!
What kind of preamp should I look to? - if sound quality is my number one deciding factor, is dac/streamer/cd just going to add cost & limit my main goal?
Sources, from most used to least:
- Turntable w/ external preamp
- CD Transport (into preamp via Wiim pro plus)
- WiiM pro plus for streaming Tidal/Spotify
Budget up to £6,000
Cheers