Ruark Audio R5 All-in-One System Review & Comments

...or you can do what I did and buy a Majority Oakington which does pretty much the same.
Granted, it probably won't sound as good but you'll be able to do a lot with the £900 you'll save.
Purely my two pennerth, but when the only change you'll get out of grand for a glorified dab radio/cd player won't buy you a Greggs steak bake then the world's gone mad.

















for a dab/radio then the world's gone mad.
 
...or you can do what I did and buy a Majority Oakington which does pretty much the same.
Granted, it probably won't sound as good but you'll be able to do a lot with the £900 you'll save.
Purely my two pennerth, but when the only change you'll get out of grand for a glorified dab radio/cd player won't buy you a Greggs steak bake then the world's gone mad.
for a dab/radio then the world's gone mad.
Quoting the Majority you are not really comparing like for like here. One prerequisite I need is internet radio.
The world is changing, even the steak bakes, they once even used to have steak in them:)
 
...or you can do what I did and buy a Majority Oakington which does pretty much the same.

Quoting the Majority you are not really comparing like for like here.
That's an understatement. The Ruark isn't just in a different ball park, its in a different ball park on another planet where the aliens are playing a completely different sport.

I think the Ruark stuff looks and sounds fantastic. I can only stretch to the R1 but this has made my kitchen a much more tolerable place to be for many years. If I could afford one of these for the living room I would get one in a heartbeat.
 
Oh don't say that I am trying to keep my hand away from my bank card. This bloke Withers cost me a fortune. At least it is a bit more affordable than the speakers he reviewed the other day;)
 
I have a devialet reactor 600 and it's an amazing piece of kit, this is a similar price and adds a cd player, I'm sure it will an excellent all in one system and although it probably won't replace a full size system, it'll be more than capable for enjoyable background music and entertaining people. Nice review. And to the bloke saying he saved £900, well done pal.
 
i Must say I prefer the look of the much more modern grey version.

And I expect it would make a very fine stereo sound bar for tv. It is a versatile piece of engineering for the fellow with a hard to please lady.

If speakers are a no-no then why not an excellent sounding piece of furniture?

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Ahh, if that's what you are after, you need the R7....

Just had a peek... what a fine and mighty beast!

£2300... phew...

Thankfully, being splendidly single, I’m allowed to fill my house with all sorts of nonsense in big boxes.

I have to say though that if I ever became a grown up, I wouldn’t mind the R7 in the grey finish.
 
I have to say though that if I ever became a grown up, I wouldn’t mind the R7 in the grey finish.
I am a grown up with all that entails and unfortunately this is way beyond my means, but a man can dream. Maybe I can pick up a second hand one when I retire.....
 
How about a swift robbery and this here...?

 
Just had a peek... what a fine and mighty beast!

£2300... phew...

Thankfully, being splendidly single, I’m allowed to fill my house with all sorts of nonsense in big boxes.

I have to say though that if I ever became a grown up, I wouldn’t mind the R7 in the grey finish.

Ah I was single once:rolleyes:
 
Have owned their R2 for a few years now when they were “Vita Audio” and really impressed and still am. All their units give a “warm” and very high quality sound which I prefer.

Would be more interested in this WITHOUT the CD which I think is superfluous in this day and age. The less moving parts the better in units such as this in my opinion. But conversely I would be interested if the CD slot was SACD (or even DVD/BR/UHD) compatible as I still own some of these but they I think they have never been compatible with that format.

A few years ago the central volume jog dial on the top of my R2 became really sticky. I spoke with them and they sent out a replacement jog dial even though well outside of warranty. I like that type of manufacturer back up.

I also own first gen Naim mu-so and Qb. Although they sound good they are far too slow to turn on and just listen to music via the iPhone app and the app for them is so flaky sometimes.
 
I have been intending, for quite some time now, to transfer all my CDs onto a NAS. I have the unit and the HDDs ready but as yet still looking for time to transfer. I have a Spotify account but nothing is perfect. I cannot find some of my CD music on Spotify, though I am sure it exists, and/or I cannot get Alexa to play what I want , very annoying. So for me a CD player is still a requirement.
Oh and the 4 leg approach reminds me of a 60s stereogram.
 
An App 'that gets the job done' but 'occasionally crashes'. That is not a finished or complete product then, leaving beta testing to the poor user who has shelled out £999 for this. But hey it still gets 9 out of 10. Not mentioned in th 'cons' either.

If the system crashed because of a hardware issue would it still justify that rating? It's about time apps were properly reviewed as an integral part of the system and not left as a nice to have but 'oh dear it's broken but doesn't matter'. Otherwise there is no pressure on manufacturers to do the job properly and stop pushing out unfinished apps on customers.
 
Saw the R7 MK3 in John Lewis (walnut version), and my what a beauty that is! Almost had me tempted to ditch my surround sound system and just use one of those instead.
 
How did you think it sounded linked up to the TV? I'm toying with the idea of replacing my amp and speakers and trying one of these but I need it to do a decent job with TV as well as music.
Thanks
 
The only reason I can think of why anyone would want to buy this would be if you must have a CD player otherwise you could do better elsewhere.Last year my Pure Avanti died and I was in the market for a table radio.I bought an immaculate ex dem 1st gen Naim Muso for £599.For background listening it really is excellent and I can access all my music through Minimserver using Naim app which has never crashed.Another bonus is that all BBC radio stations are available at 339kbs without having to set up an HLS playlist.
 
How did you think it sounded linked up to the TV? I'm toying with the idea of replacing my amp and speakers and trying one of these but I need it to do a decent job with TV as well as music.
Thanks
It sounded good but I didn’t have a proper demo. Better than any sound bars I’ve heard.
I think I’d miss surround sound and HD soundtracks too much though.
 
I bought an R5 to replace an older R4 and a Naim Muso QB.

The R5 sounds excellent, I’m very pleased with its overall sound quality. It’s Beautifully detailed, warm with a surprisingly wide / big soundstage! It’s a big improvement to the older R4 and sounds more detailed then the slightly boxy sounding mark one Muso QB.

I have a large CD collection, and like someone else mentioned, Spotify/ Tidal etc don’t have everything, so a system with a CD player was a must for me

My R5 is the grey finished model, it’s excellent build quality and its retro design look stunning in the lounge.

The app is basic compared to a Sonos app, but it seems to work okay for me. However the rota dial remote is a pleasure to use.

All in all, I completely endorse the review and can highly recommend it.
 

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