Topic: What do you all use for home playback?

[little birdie]

I was looking to invest in a home stereo; just a reciever, cd changer, and a cheap set of speakers; but now I'm rethinking and might dig a little deeper in the pockets for a nice set of monitors and a nice reciever.  Anyone have any suggestions?  My budget is probably around $500.

[mgleason007]

Playback forum?  You're not going to get a whole lot for $500.

[mgleason007]

D'oh, never though of used.  Thanks Moke, I haven't been too quick these past couple days.  $500 is still going to be a tough price point.  Prolly a Pioneer Panasonic Receiver and see what you can get for $300 in speakers.  Get a CD player later

EDIT: Check out this thread for some receiver stuff.

[Nick Culbreth]

with a $500 budget i'd suggest picking up a nice set of headphones and headphone amp, i think you'll get more for your money going that route.

[little birdie]

I have a pair of Shure e3 and sennheiser hd280 so I'm set on the headphones.  I'm suprised 500$ won't get me much.  How much would you recommend spending for say, an "entry level" system?

[Lee]

you could pick up Johnny's Tannoys in the yard sale (225) and a decent integrated amp (~300?) and be pretty well off

[George]

Depends on what you want, i assume you want to go with a 2 speaker system and you are not interested in a 5.1 rig right now or down the road.  You can always buy used on ebay as well, look for Marantz, Denon, Yamaha and even Onkyo receiver's.  I imagine there's some older 5.1 a/v receiver's on there right now waiting to be scooped up.  Not sure if you'll be able to swing a pair of speakers within your budget though.

[steve-o]

I did see some Marantz receivers on eBay the other day.  Not sure if they're done with...

[mgleason007]

I have a pair of Shure e3 and sennheiser hd280 so I'm set on the headphones.  I'm suprised 500$ won't get me much.  How much would you recommend spending for say, an "entry level" system?

Speakers aren't cheap.  You could very easily spend all of that on a pair of speakers.

[BJ]

You could easily double that $ on cables leading to the speakers

omg.....are you serious?  just on cables?  DOH!  I was just starting to try to ease the question of getting/upgrading a good playback system to my wife.  BUT if the cables alone can run up that much, I might as well bite my tongue for a few years.

[BJ]

i did see that...where the pairs are twisted?  but then following that someone, i believe jp, posted a question as the the sheilding of these cables, which I honeslty had to agree with as cat5/6 are NOT sheilded well at all.  But I have seen several reviews that say they do sound good...im too much of a moron to understand most of this stuff.  I just put hte cd in and push play...torch the bowl...and enjoy my free time.  The more I read in here, esp on playback, the more i get confused.  

[plan of attack:]  send everypenny saved to someone to pick out my playback system.

[backup plan:] keep listening on my kenwood system(plz dont flame  ) and spend that money saved on a v3 (possibly a mme also) and some TL's

[BJ]

+t   thanx...lots more reading

[jpschust]

razor, don't get caught up in this notion of bigger is always better, more expensive always sounds better.  I can name plenty of cases where this just isn't the truth.  What you need to do, honestly, is start listening to this stuff in action.  Go to your local hifi dealer, get some ideas in mind, start from there.  Also, don't forget your local pro audio places, even Guitar Center, so you can hear different monitors in action.  Most GC's stock the Tannoy's im selling, so you can hear a pair there

[jpschust]

that im scared are going to be too much for my room :-)  but never let that stop me before.  funniest part is that im gonna be moving within 8 weeks, im looking at places based upon my listening space and room for a queen bed somewhere- the rest doesnt matter.  its pretty funny when i look at places and start clapping really loudly and the agents dont understand why

[creekfreak]

My playback system is basic, nothing fancy. Good old Pioneer VSX-604S receiver and a pair of JBL book shelf speakers (the one's that are bigger than most any other bookshelf speaker). For the price point I find the JBL's to be warm and musical. I know I can do much better, but that will come some day.

[Nick's Picks]

I think you can put something together for $500.
the integrated amp is a great suggestion.  Check out cambrige audio stuff.
speakers are the big one, and that will be a little harder.  There were some reviews in Stereophile last month on some rather inexpensive monitors that were under $300 new.  Do a little research, then find what you want used on audiogon.com

CD player...that will be almost impossible to squeeze in.

[Todd R]

I recently put together a playback system for my home office that is pretty good for just about that budget.  Including shipping it was $540 for the integrated amp, cd player, and speakers.  For interconnencts and speaker wire, I used what I already had lying around from upgrading my main playback system.  But you can do DIY canare starquad or CAT5 and get that done pretty cheaply.

Not necessarily saying this is exactly what you should get, but I'm very happy with it:

Cambridge Audio A500R integrated amp - $240 (closeout from audio-advisor.com)
Cambridge Audio CD4 cd player - $120 (ebay)
Monitor Audio Bronze 1 speakers - $180 (ebay)

I would definitely put Cambridge Audio and Monitor Audio on the list.  Very nice sounding stuff for the money.

A system like this is also very upgradable.  The MA bronze's have sweet highs and very nice detail and imaging.  As small bookshelves they don't go too low, but you could add in a nice sub when you've got more money.  The CA integrated amp sounds nice too, and has preamp outputs, so you could add in a separate amp as you got more money and use the A500 as a preamp.  Likewise, the CD4 sounds good on its own, but it has digital outs, so you could use it as a nice transport and get a good outboard DAC at some point.  So anyway, something else to think about--its nice to invest in a system that you can upgrade and grow around.

[scb]

my system is almost complete now!  the cd/dvd player finally came yesterday, even though it was supposed to be here TWO months ago.  so damon, i finally was able to listen to the dvd-audio discs you made for me.  thanks again for doing that!

and damn, studio dvd-a sounds ridiculous.  once the speakers come i may not leave the house for a few days...

[Lee]

I recently put together a playback system for my home office that is pretty good for just about that budget.  Including shipping it was $540 for the integrated amp, cd player, and speakers.  For interconnencts and speaker wire, I used what I already had lying around from upgrading my main playback system.  But you can do DIY canare starquad or CAT5 and get that done pretty cheaply.

Not necessarily saying this is exactly what you should get, but I'm very happy with it:

Cambridge Audio A500R integrated amp - $240 (closeout from audio-advisor.com)
Cambridge Audio CD4 cd player - $120 (ebay)
Monitor Audio Bronze 1 speakers - $180 (ebay)

I would definitely put Cambridge Audio and Monitor Audio on the list.  Very nice sounding stuff for the money.

A system like this is also very upgradable.  The MA bronze's have sweet highs and very nice detail and imaging.  As small bookshelves they don't go too low, but you could add in a nice sub when you've got more money.  The CA integrated amp sounds nice too, and has preamp outputs, so you could add in a separate amp as you got more money and use the A500 as a preamp.  Likewise, the CD4 sounds good on its own, but it has digital outs, so you could use it as a nice transport and get a good outboard DAC at some point.  So anyway, something else to think about--its nice to invest in a system that you can upgrade and grow around.

I demo-ed some of the Monitor Audio Silver line the other day- very smooth with defined highs (without being brittle).  Definately a great speaker- the floorstanding models are great even without a sub, but the bookshelfs definately need one.  I listened to the bookshelf model (S2 I believe) with and without a few different subs, and they sound great with a ML grotto FWIW.

Although I got a deal on some Paradigms that was too good to pass up, so I went that route...

[Tim]

congrats Lee!

what Paradigm's? I have a friend and fellow taper who has a nice 5.1/stereo Paradigm setup, Anthem pre, amp and 5.1 decoder. Nice stuff!

[Lee]

Studio Reference 20v3

should be here on Tuesday- now if I can just get my cat5 braided before then