Topic: Total Playback Newb, seeking wisdom

[Stagger]

also...
go demo gear.  go to a tweeter (they have martin logan, jmlabs/focal / sonus faber...among others).

another recommendation would be the Cambridge audio integrated amps.  they sound very decent and would make for a pleasing starter system.

dont listen to the Logans first though.  way too infectious and nothing measures up to them (on certain levels).

Tweeter does not deal with Sumiko (Sounus Faber and Vienna Acoustics distributor) so no SF.

[Nick's Picks]

ah well.
they used to.

[Matt Quinn]

then just pick your speaker flavor.
what do you want out of your system ?
total accuracy of what you feed it ?

Yeah, pretty much. Looking for as neutral a speaker as possible, at least at first.


Thanks everyone, I've got some reading to do, but I will bump this thread when I have more questions.

[Lil Kim Jong-Il]

I'd like to add one more thing:  when you audition gear, take some material you recorded with your rig and that you have listened to many times.

In my case, DPA4023 and MK41 sourced tapes sound good with my current playback system (VSA VR4jr and CJ gear) but MK4 sourced tapes tend toward lifeless.  Neumann and AKG sound very good, sometimes more appealing than the DPAs. When I was using Thiels with CJ, the Neumann and AKG tapes leaned toward bright, DPA and MK41 were sweet and the MK4 tapes sounded less dark than with my current speakers.  Best case is you audition for a week in the room where you expect to use the system.