At the heart, or at least in the middle, admittedly I do have two audiolan 8000A mid 80's vintage, but they've not been re-furbished other than replacing the RCA sockets which crumbled. I am bi-amping with these, using one as a pre-amp.
But the bread around this meat is a circa 20 year old std Marantz CD63 (not SE, not KI) and a pair of Kef IQ1 (yes one, the cheapest in the range).
Speaker cable is Maplin 12AWG stranded OFC - £2 / metre.
Interconnect I made myself 20 years ago from some hi quality interconnect cable and some gold plated connectors.
Stands are Atacama Nexus 6, albeit with £80 worth of lead shot in them now.
And, to complete my sins, I have an EPOS M Sub-Woofer, trimmed to seem inaudible.
Esoteric, NOT !
So, that's my membership of this forum cancelled.
But I can tell you, this lot sounds exceptionally good.
I had been looking to replace most of it, because the sound was fine on detailed stuff, but when the music went up tempo it seemed to fall all over itself. But the lead in the stands seems to have fixed that.
I did however go out to audition some other stuff, including the new Audiolab 8200CD. Now that was good and on some music quite noticeably better than my CD63 in a back to back comparison with my actual machine I took along. But that was through some very expensive amp and speaker set up costing about £5000.
And the rub is that the whole system sound did not really grab me compared to this "mish mash" I have at home, which most of the time sounds sublime. The same was true of another audition with components each costing £800 - £1000.
What's my point? Don't knock it till you've heard it, don't throw it till you've compared it, don't assume new is better and why not give a sub-woofer and small bookshelf combo a try - it really works. I am told the Epos is one of very few musical subs under a grand, so I guess that's the hard bit for people. I bought one for £200 end of line when they had been £650 and they don't make them any more.
I know I'll be acused of heracy, but I think speaker makes have been getting it wrong all these years trying to push their standard speakers down to low frequency - they just can't do it and all sorts of compromises are made to extend the base that far, or worse give the impression of base extension. A sub is desigend to do that and if designed for music can sound very good indeed - the speajer is freed up from trying to wobble like a jelly and the amp is releived of all that power sapping LF stuff. I don't like boom in teh base and this avoids that - you can also trim the base down how you like it.
I will still be looking for some new gear, but I am going to be very wary of what I buy and I think will have to demand a home audition or I could spend hundreds for a new and shinier system sounding less good than the old.
But the bread around this meat is a circa 20 year old std Marantz CD63 (not SE, not KI) and a pair of Kef IQ1 (yes one, the cheapest in the range).
Speaker cable is Maplin 12AWG stranded OFC - £2 / metre.
Interconnect I made myself 20 years ago from some hi quality interconnect cable and some gold plated connectors.
Stands are Atacama Nexus 6, albeit with £80 worth of lead shot in them now.
And, to complete my sins, I have an EPOS M Sub-Woofer, trimmed to seem inaudible.
Esoteric, NOT !
So, that's my membership of this forum cancelled.
But I can tell you, this lot sounds exceptionally good.
I had been looking to replace most of it, because the sound was fine on detailed stuff, but when the music went up tempo it seemed to fall all over itself. But the lead in the stands seems to have fixed that.
I did however go out to audition some other stuff, including the new Audiolab 8200CD. Now that was good and on some music quite noticeably better than my CD63 in a back to back comparison with my actual machine I took along. But that was through some very expensive amp and speaker set up costing about £5000.
And the rub is that the whole system sound did not really grab me compared to this "mish mash" I have at home, which most of the time sounds sublime. The same was true of another audition with components each costing £800 - £1000.
What's my point? Don't knock it till you've heard it, don't throw it till you've compared it, don't assume new is better and why not give a sub-woofer and small bookshelf combo a try - it really works. I am told the Epos is one of very few musical subs under a grand, so I guess that's the hard bit for people. I bought one for £200 end of line when they had been £650 and they don't make them any more.
I know I'll be acused of heracy, but I think speaker makes have been getting it wrong all these years trying to push their standard speakers down to low frequency - they just can't do it and all sorts of compromises are made to extend the base that far, or worse give the impression of base extension. A sub is desigend to do that and if designed for music can sound very good indeed - the speajer is freed up from trying to wobble like a jelly and the amp is releived of all that power sapping LF stuff. I don't like boom in teh base and this avoids that - you can also trim the base down how you like it.
I will still be looking for some new gear, but I am going to be very wary of what I buy and I think will have to demand a home audition or I could spend hundreds for a new and shinier system sounding less good than the old.
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