Adding some music ability to AV setup

Rickyj at Kalibrate

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I am interested in adding some extra musical ability to my current setup which is listed in my signature.

It is basically an old Sony cd player hooked up to the RX-V1400 AV receiver, which is then connected to the Kef Q1 speakers.

I am thinking that the best upgrades I could do is add a M-audio 2496 sound card to the htpc, and run this to a stereo amplifier, which will be connected to the preamp outputs of my AV receiver.

I was thinking along the line of a second hand Arcam, maybe 5, 6, 6R, 7 or 7R. I then came along a power amp while searching, and am now wondering whether I be better off leaving the integerated amp, and using a power amp instead, along the lines of the arcam 7P etc.

What do people think, will this improve the current musical ability of my receiver. And feedback will be greatly received.

Ricky
 
A power amp or an integrated amp will definetly improve the sound in music. Which one more? Depends on the budget and your experience. You should try the setup with an integrated and with the power amp and see.
Why don't you buy a new CDP instead of the sound card?
 
Have you thought of going down the Squeezebox route?
Power amp:smashin:
 
Some of the better PC coundcards such as the RME and Lynx,whilst very expensive,are capable of results rivalling good standalone DACs.

The M-Audio isnt really in that league,but is a perfectly reasonable card....there are obviously several routes that you could use to improve the system for music sources,and adding a decent power amp +/- a better CD player would be a relatively cost effective way to begin,although a better way in the longer term would be perhaps to overhaul the system as a whole,doing one item at a time,as funds become available.
 
Just a quick message to say thank you for this information.

I have now invested in a second hand Arcam 7R integerated amplifier, which is going to be the first step.

The squeezebox option is very interesting, and I will be looking into that at a future date, as I should be moving soon, and would like to have a server to send music throughout the house, and using the squeexebox looks like a possible option.

As for the new CD player, this is an option, but I really don't have much in the way of funds, and thus I thought that the maudio 2496 may be a good step up from my current Sony 510 CD player, but from the sounds of things, maybe not.

Thank you for your time and suggestions.

Ricky
 

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