chris guevara
Novice Member
Hello All,
I've been making do with a cheap as chips arrangement for years which consisted of an ancient NAD amp and Warfdale Diamond speakers, streaming from an iphone via my Nvidia shield. The amp was unable to survive the upheaval of a recent house move and I need a replacement setup.
I'm going to give the Warfdale's to my son for his bedroom so am looking for a complete system. The more I research though, the more confused I seem to become. I've not researched hifi gear since I bought my first and only system over 30 years ago and it's all doing my 50 year old head in now!
So, what am I looking for? I ditched my cd collection in the move and currently stream from Spotify premium only. I've been reading about the new lossless Apple music format so that may be an option although I'm not sure my aging ears could notice much difference.
2.1 which I can plug my TV into. The room is approx 5 x 5m with a bay window which houses a large unit with my TV on. The speakers would have to sit on this unit either side of the TV, so would be close to the side walls of the bay. A 5 month only pup and clumsy child rule out floor or stand speakers I think so I'm looking for smallish bookshelf speakers.
I listen to everything from rock, metal, reggae and electronic to the occasional bit of classical!
I read the advice given on another post which said that active speakers are the way to go given their impressive detail at low volumes and this sounds like the right thing for me as I will rarely get the chance to shake the room. I like the simplicity of the KEF active speakers and they seem to get very good reviews but the LSX is probably too small for my room (????) and I'm not sure I want to spend £2k+ on the LS50 wireless II, although I could probably stretch to them if they blew me away.
I'm happy to buy used if it makes sense but by doing so it is unlikely I would get the chance to try before I buy. So...can you make some suggestions for a setup in the £1,000 - £1,500 range. Would a streamer like the Bluesound Node that folks on here rave about make a huge difference compared with streaming via a device like an Nvidia Shield (I'm guessing yes) although if I do add a dedicated streamer it would obviously limit the amount I had to spend on the amp & speakers. Is that a worthwhile arrangement or am I better off saving on the streamer and investing more on the other components?
If I went down the used route, what makes of amp and speaker pair well? Or am I better off with a KEF active speaker or similar?
Thanks in advance...
I've been making do with a cheap as chips arrangement for years which consisted of an ancient NAD amp and Warfdale Diamond speakers, streaming from an iphone via my Nvidia shield. The amp was unable to survive the upheaval of a recent house move and I need a replacement setup.
I'm going to give the Warfdale's to my son for his bedroom so am looking for a complete system. The more I research though, the more confused I seem to become. I've not researched hifi gear since I bought my first and only system over 30 years ago and it's all doing my 50 year old head in now!
So, what am I looking for? I ditched my cd collection in the move and currently stream from Spotify premium only. I've been reading about the new lossless Apple music format so that may be an option although I'm not sure my aging ears could notice much difference.
2.1 which I can plug my TV into. The room is approx 5 x 5m with a bay window which houses a large unit with my TV on. The speakers would have to sit on this unit either side of the TV, so would be close to the side walls of the bay. A 5 month only pup and clumsy child rule out floor or stand speakers I think so I'm looking for smallish bookshelf speakers.
I listen to everything from rock, metal, reggae and electronic to the occasional bit of classical!
I read the advice given on another post which said that active speakers are the way to go given their impressive detail at low volumes and this sounds like the right thing for me as I will rarely get the chance to shake the room. I like the simplicity of the KEF active speakers and they seem to get very good reviews but the LSX is probably too small for my room (????) and I'm not sure I want to spend £2k+ on the LS50 wireless II, although I could probably stretch to them if they blew me away.
I'm happy to buy used if it makes sense but by doing so it is unlikely I would get the chance to try before I buy. So...can you make some suggestions for a setup in the £1,000 - £1,500 range. Would a streamer like the Bluesound Node that folks on here rave about make a huge difference compared with streaming via a device like an Nvidia Shield (I'm guessing yes) although if I do add a dedicated streamer it would obviously limit the amount I had to spend on the amp & speakers. Is that a worthwhile arrangement or am I better off saving on the streamer and investing more on the other components?
If I went down the used route, what makes of amp and speaker pair well? Or am I better off with a KEF active speaker or similar?
Thanks in advance...