Spend more on speakers or amp?

[baldy38]

If you're updating components, what is going to give you the most bang for buck – spending more on speakers or more on an amp?

In other words, if you had, say £1,000-ish to spend on one and £1,500 on the other, should you buy a better pair of speakers or a better amp? Would you get more out of better speakers with a cheaper amp, or would a better amp make more out of a pair of £900 speakers than a £900 amp would out of a pair of £1,500.

Logic suggests you should spend more on the speakers – after all, they are the things that define the final sound. But there is so much argument about this subject that it can leave your head spinning.

So, for example, would a pair of B&W 805Ss or Wilson Benesch Square Ones paired with a Naim 5i or Roksan Caspian integrated sound better than, say, a Primare i30 with a pair of Spendor SA1s?

I have a Rega Saturn as source, by the way.

 

[Anonymous]

Hi baldy38, if I - or anyone else for that matter - were to say to you that there is one easy answer to your question, we would be lying.

In hi-fi, nothing is exactly easy to quantify. However, I would suggest spending about the same amount of money on the amplifier and loudspeakers.

My reasoning is:

If the amp is plenty powerful, with loads of head-room yet extremely neutral with minimal or no colouration, but the loudspeakers it is powering are not capable of reproducing all the nuances or subtleties in the music or recording, what is the point?

If the loudspeakers are superb with high power handling, heaps of low frequency extension and nice wide midrange and sweet high freqencies, but the amp is not powerful or good enough to power the loudspeakers that are extremely capable, what is the point?

Price is generally a good indicator as to as the level of various equipment.

I would recommend, for example, if you were spending about 270GBP on an integrated stereo amp such as a Marantz PM6002, I would recommend spending about the same on a pair of loudspeakers.

Personally, I like spending a lot of money on loudspeakers but there is really no reasoning to spending a lot of money on loudspeakers when it is the most inefficient in the chain, and is dependent on EVERYTHING before it. If the source material (CD, SACD, etc) is poor, if the source (CD/SACD Player, etc) is not very good, if the cables and analogue interconnects are cheap and nasty, it doesn't matter if the loudspeakers are high-end such as the Monitor Audio PL300, the end result is not going to be fantastic.

 

[radovantz]

I found that amplifier is the most important machine in hifi system. It is the key factor of high quality and well balanced sound reproduction.

You can enjoy a fair quality and clean sound reproduction even with a non-hifi speakers at average volume.

However, the best hifi speakers will not be able to perform its best sound quality if the amplifier being used is from rubbish products. Lack of detail and over driven sound will harm the speakers too

 

[Anonymous]

Choose the speakers you like and then audition amplifiers to get the most out of the speakers.

I often find that you may need to spend more on the amp because you need power, and this can become expensive.

My friend has 805 Signatures with a stack of big Brystons. It's probably disproportional, but if you used a weedy Nait you'll never get the most out of them.

I would speak to the dealers and manufacturers as well for a short list, but take some of their advice with a pinch of salt if there is an affiliation e.g. B&W and Classe.

 

[Anonymous]

The fashion today is speakers first, which is a viewpoint I tend to disagree with. If you have a cheap amp and source why bother with expensive speakers? A speaker can only reproduce what's gone before it.

I found the most important thing to be the amplifier, once the amplifier can fully control and drive the speaker then you look at better speakers, Ive found that a expensive amplifier driving cheap speakers sounds better than a cheap amplifier trying to drive expensive speakers, saying that, the higher you go up the chain then the speakers will become more important.

 

[Thaiman]

It is not about which item to spend more as such although a very good pair of speakers could be a quickest way of upgrade the sound.

I would find a pair of speakers that work well in your room then get an amp that can drive them properly, not as simple as you think though.

 

[John Duncan]

silly:The fashion today is speakers first, which is a viewpoint I tend to disagree with. If you have a cheap amp and source why bother with expensive speakers? A speaker can only reproduce what's gone before it.

I found the most important thing to be the amplifier, once the amplifier can fully control and drive the speaker then you look at better speakers, Ive found that a expensive amplifier driving cheap speakers sounds better than a cheap amplifier trying to drive expensive speakers, saying that, the higher you go up the chain then the speakers will become more important.

Not sure that it is. I'd advocate spending more money on amp and speakers than on a source, but the balance between the two can be down to personal taste - I've heard spectacular results from a sub-£1k amp and £8k+ speakers together, but with the OP's budget I'd probably end up with amp and speakers that cost more or less the same.

Or more correctly, I'd end up with a Primare i30 and whatever speakers I could afford afterwards.......

 

[Anonymous]

It all depends on whether the speakers are hard to drive.

Some may *need* a better amp than others.

John, don't get too excited by the Primare amps casing. The sound is underwhelming when blindfolded.

 

[fatboyslimfast]

I would say Amp then speakers. There are lots of speakers around the £1k mark that are excellent, but that would benefit from the best amplification possible.

My system is a case in point. I run a pair of MA-RS6s (£600ish) from a Naim NAC102/NAP180 pre/power (new, around £3k, I paid around £1k second hand). It sounds wonderful...

 

[John Duncan]

a4quattro:John, don't get too excited by the Primare amps casing. The sound is underwhelming when blindfolded.

Oh I disagree.......

 

[Anonymous]

JohnDuncan:a4quattro:John, don't get too excited by the Primare amps casing. The sound is underwhelming when blindfolded.

Oh I disagree.......

That is the fun of HiFi.

One man's perfect sound is another's nightmare.

Enjoy the music.

 

[Andrew Everard]

I think Darren may be back...

 

[John Duncan]

Can't be, no mention of AVI yet.

 

[baldy38]

This is all great - but why is there no definitive answer to this quandary? Logically, the source and the speakers should be more important, as one creates the signal and the other relays it. Isn't an amp just a conduit with limited influence?

 

[John Duncan]

Ooo no. The perfect amp would be, but the perfect amp doesn't exist. Source used to be most important because a turntable was largely matter of mechanical engineering and the physics is very hard - CD is more (though not exclusively) a matter of electrical engineering, and manufacturers have got rather good at it, which means differences between CD players have become more subtle (though not non-existent) the more you spend.

So given a quality source (my point being that a quality source can be had quite cheaply), it then becomes a matter of finding an amp and speaker pairing that work well together (which is harder). As I say above, that's not necessarily a function of cost relative to each other - generalising (and therefore false by definition), I've found that amp improvement above 1500 quid (ie my benchmark Primare i30) is more subtle, whilst I could just keep on spending on speakers and they'd keep on getting better (cf electrostaics, B&W 802D). Not always true, obviously, as the interaction between the two (damping factor of any given amp versus sensitivity of any given speaker for example) is crucial.

 

[baldy38]

Mmm. I suppose this is supposed to be fun - but it feels like a bit of a nightmare at the same time!

 

[John Duncan]

Nah, s'easy. Take your Saturn to a dealer and say "I have two and a half grand, show me some amps and speakers". They're going to have no more than three amps that fit in that budget, I'd say - probably more speakers. Listen to the cheapest amp with the most expensive speakers, and vice versa, and decide which of the two sounds better - if it's the expensive amp, then stick with that and play around with speakers until you get *the* sound you want. Or vice versa.

On top of your usual favourite disks, take one that sounds sh*t on your current system - if you can find a system that makes it sounds good, that's the system you should buy

.

Course, if the system that sounds best is the most expensive amp and most expensive speakers, you're in trouble.

 

[drummerman]

I think you owe it to yourself to try AVI's ADM9.1, the latest version of their active system. Built in pre-amplifier plus latest version of Wolfson's DAC. All built to extremely high quality, short signal paths etc.

Being an active speaker the sound is different to most conventional hifi. Fast, solid with no overhang on bass (or any other frequency) whatsoever. The designers (ex ATC) have therefore been able to match everthing precisely, no guess work. The (high power) amplifiers have been engineered for the drivers and enclosure, nothing else. You can hear it! Astonishing clarity and power. It makes most components/speakers sound cloudy and muffled. Downsides? Bass is no better (deeper) than you would expect for the cabinet size. Sound is accurate rather than romantic but it is never harsh, partly due to low distortion amplification and quality drivers. Add a small and fast sub though and your off into high end on a budget.

I'm building a new system and the above are way up the top of my short list, having heard systems many times their price. I'm still looking around though (part of the fun) and will have Cambridge Audios 840 series version 2 components (and the new DAC if its in stock) at home this weekend/next week. Another example of products which apparently, if the reviews are to believed, perform way above their respective price points or, as some would say, no ******** stuff. It will be interesting.

 

[Anonymous]

Do you know why AV1 have no over hang on the bass?

Because they have no bass!!! BOOM BOOM.

 

[John Duncan]

silly:BOOM BOOM

Or not, surely?

 

[nads]

back on topic dont forget the throw in the cost of some good interconnects.

 

[drummerman]

silly:Do you know why AV1 have no over hang on the bass?

Because they have no bass!!! BOOM BOOM.

Living up to your forum name silly?

They are rated at -6db 60hz or something like that. I'd say this is conservative but you are right, there are speakers available with more bass (same size). Problem is, often its nothing more than a deep drawn out fart, you know silly, the one with no definition or pitch to it.

Like I said, add a (very) fast sub and the problem is solved. They are active and therefore sound different, some get it (like it) some don't, simple.

 

[Anonymous]

I'm in a similar position, I currently have a Cambridge Audio 540 Amp & CD with Focal JMLab 714 Chorus bought ex-demo for £200. I decided to treat myself and demo'd a few amps. I've finally decided on the Roksan Caspian which I demo'd in my home and the difference hearing even the 540 CD player and the 714's powered by the Caspian was incredible. I will eventually go for the Caspian CD and possibly new speakers but I'm quite content to wait as the amp has made such a difference. I did buy Chord Chameleon and Silverscreen cables before the amp so that has saved me shelling out another couple of hundred quid but definitely factor this into your overall costs.

 

[Thaiman]

JohnDuncan:Can't be, no mention of AVI yet.

I think he sold them already!

 

[drummerman]

Thaiman:
JohnDuncan:Can't be, no mention of AVI yet.

I think he sold them already!

He has'nt. How's your quest going for even 'higher end' buddy? Are those speakers, who's manufacturer charges something like 2.5k more for some upgraded internal wiring and a few xover components any good .... ?