Sorry... Newbie who needs some advice.

[admin_exported]

OK, any suggestions would be welcome. I am not clued up on hi-fi, but stumbled accross some good gear 10 years ago which now needs updating/replacing.

My set-up:

Naim NAP160, Ion Nexus with X-Pak2 driving Mission 753's and until recently an Arcam Alpha 1 CD.

The current situation:

The pre-amp/power supply have failed (I personally think it has something to do with recent electrical storms). I recently sold my Arcam CD to my brother and as a stop gap have been using a Sony DVD to play CD's (I know, I know).

My insurance company have agreed to negotiate a cash claim pending an engineers report, the estimate to replace the (let's face it - old) pre-amp with a modern equivalent to go with my 20 year old power amp is a Naim Nap 200 with a flat cap, rrp £2750.00. So if they pay up, great - but I will still need to drop a grand for a new front-end.

The thing is, for a while now I have been thinking about trading down to something a little smaller and simpler. I bought this gear second hand 10 years ago (about £1500 for the lot iirc) and it was a bargain. But I simply cannot afford to invest these levels of cash for a hi-fi that I only occasionally use.

So I was thinking of taking whatever cash the insurers offer me, selling my 160 but keeping the speakers and buying a quality integrated amp and speakers. So far I have a shortlist of:

Naim Nait 5i-2 and CD5i-2

Roksan Candy Integrated amp and CD

Arcam Diva A90 with CD192

These all fall roughly with the same budget. I know these things are subjective and I will demo all the gear with my own speakers. Have I missed anything else that is worth looking at? Are the technical specs of these packages similar or is there a stand-out winner? Some buying advice would be much appreciated.

 

[Andrew Everard]

If it's just the preamp that's gone, I'd suggest the CD5i and a NAC112x preamp would be the way to go.

 

[John Duncan]

Well you may not have a choice, as some insurers insist on buying the equipment themselves through their preferred suppliers - you may have to beg. All of the above are good combos to one extent or the other, but I would add the Creek Classic and Primare '21' pairs to the list for similar prices, and while you're in the shop demo a Marantz CD6002, PM7001 (550/600 for the pair) and a grand's worth of loudspeaker.............

 

[drummerman]

My choice would be to sell everything incl the missions unless you really dont want to loose them.

Then purchase Cyrus8vs2, 8CDx, Rega R3. With discounts its not so far outside some of the above but imo better than any of them. You should be able to get the whole shebang for around 1.8k perhaps a little less.

 

[drummerman]

[quote user="JohnDuncan"]Well you may not have a choice, as some insurers insist on buying the equipment themselves through their preferred suppliers - you may have to beg. All of the above are good combos to one extent or the other, but I would add the Creek Classic and Primare '21' pairs to the list for similar prices, and while you're in the shop demo a Marantz CD6002, PM7001 (550/600 for the pair) and a grand's worth of loudspeaker.............[/quote]

... or a supernait. Not my cup of tea but if you like naim you will like the big nait. Its built in dac is said to be at least as good as the one in the CD5i so just use your dvd player as transport