How low would you go … ?

[t1no]

In this age of soaring prices, austerity, and as a counterpoint to all the topics on here discussing the relative merits of multi £££ systems (and multi-tap upscalers) … what in your opinion is the minimum “Fi” in "Hi-F" you would be prepared to go to and that you could live with? Of course doing without a turntable helps so my own experience is limited to a digital source setup.

I’ve considered that a single box system (Muso, SF Omnia, Technics Ottava) or wireless stereo speaker set-up would probably be the ideal end setup for me. I have tried a pair of Pioneer active speakers with a low cost streamer (£400), a pair or wireless speakers (£150 for stereo pair), a vintage Yamaha stereo receiver and decent bookshelf passive speakers (£300). I could quite happily live with any of them and not feel too short changed on the sound quality front.

What’s your tipping point?

 

[bencat]

My Kitchen system is used every day and is a pair of Rogers Wall Hanging speakers from 1957 and Raspberry Pi with amphat . Probably £120 in total and I do love with it so it is good enough .

 

[Tony_J]

My 2 main systems are both DIY actives with R-Pi front ends, so already pretty inexpensive for the performance I get. If I was looking for an inexpensive off-the-shelf system I would probably go for one of the increasing number of good and inexpensive active speaker options out there - for example Tannoy Gold 8 - and stick a R-Pi streamer on the front.

 

[audio_PHIL_e]

Arcam Alpha Amplifier, CD player & tuner approx £50 each on eBay, pair of s/h KEFs also from eBay similar price (eg Coda, Chorale) possibly £200 the lot, add a little extra for a cassette player - sounds a bit like the system I had in my bedroom 2 houses ago.

 

[tuga]

In this age of soaring prices, austerity, and as a counterpoint to all the topics on here discussing the relative merits of multi £££ systems (and multi-tap upscalers) … what in your opinion is the minimum “Fi” in "Hi-F" you would be prepared to go to and that you could live with? Of course doing without a turntable helps so my own experience is limited to a digital source setup.

I’ve considered that a single box system (Muso, SF Omnia, Technics Ottava) or wireless stereo speaker set-up would probably be the ideal end setup for me. I have tried a pair of Pioneer active speakers with a low cost streamer (£400), a pair or wireless speakers (£150 for stereo pair), a vintage Yamaha stereo receiver and decent bookshelf passive speakers (£300). I could quite happily live with any of them and not feel too short changed on the sound quality front.

What’s your tipping point?

The market is flooded with used gear, some of it more than good enough and affordable.

There's so much gear around that the reasonable thing to do from an environmental perspective would be to stop manufacturing any more equipment...

 

[Lurch]

A couple of years back I built a 3 source 2nd system for under £300.
Pioneer PL12D with Shure M95ED £100 Classifieds
Pioneer SA-500A £39 Charity shop
Celestion Ditton 15 £50 Charity shop
Sony CDP791 £45 Charity shop
CCA £25
It was very very enjoyable and performed well beyond its cost.
Currently my 2nd system consists of a Cambridge pre/pwr, Sony cassette deck Sansuii tuner (all of which I've had since the mid 80s + the CCA. Recent additions (last 2 yrs) kef 104AB £102, Marantz 63SE £70, Rega Planar 3/R200/P77Mg £200, EEI 555MCP CART £79 and a FiiO Taishan DAC £20, Chifi LPS £34,I also sometimes plumb a Garrard 401 in (owes me £850), even with just the Rega TT and EEI cart in I could easily live with this 70s/80s system.

 

[bigrod]

Secondhand Vitus Audio CD /Radio/ MP3/ Bluetooth.. Built in “sub”
Cracking sound for £100

 

[Beobloke]

I'm not really interested in hi-fi so an iPhone and a Beosound A1 speaker would do me fine.

 

[Carrington]

My system owes me little enough as it is but based on a purely financial point of view, budget would dictate how low I could go.

 

[pmcuk]

I already have my low cost system! Paid £17 for a pair of Wharfedale Programme 30D-6 speakers which I love - early Diamond variants. Source is everything on my existing Mac Pro computer, so I'm not costing that in. My DAC cost me around £30 - an AK4990 circuit from China. So we're up to under £100 if we figure in all the cables, most of which I made myself.

I make all my own amplification, so a really nice 2a3 amp with amorphous core OPTs probably cost around £700 in parts. No preamp. So I'd say around £800 all in. I've probably fogotten some bits and pieces, but that's basically it. Sound is just what I want, so I'm happy.

But I wouldn't say that building your own stuff is cheap despite that. I have thousands of pounds spent on valves, transformers, chokes, capacitors and everything else including a lot of tools. So in the end it's no cheaper than just buying a system, though it can be a lot more interesting (and frustrating at times).

 

[t1no]

The market is flooded with used gear, some of it more than good enough and affordable.

There's so much gear around that the reasonable thing to do from an environmental perspective would be to stop manufacturing any more equipment...

I agree … I would say I 80% of what I have is pre-owned, ex-demo or NOS

 

[t1no]

Secondhand Vitus Audio CD /Radio/ MP3/ Bluetooth.. Built in “sub”
Cracking sound for £100

A Vitus for £100! … do you mean one of these … ?

 

[mikeyb]

If things were really bad I might consider Naim or at a push, Linn

I'm kidding

I have a Pi/DigiAmp setup for our Gazebo with Polk outdoor speakers that I really enjoy listening to especially in the winter evenings when we have the wood burner going too.

Simple, cheap, and very listenable

 

[JANDL100]

Currently happily listening to a system that cost about £500.

B&O CX100 speakers, refurbed £200
Jamo SUB200 £50
Phonic Max 500 power amp £80
Lexicon MC1 DAC / pre £130
Bluetooth receiver £40
Phone (which I would have anyway)

It sounds really good.

Or if I was really skimping, one of my headphone setups...

Technics F50B Bluetooth headphones. £90
Phone.
Sounds excellent.

 

[bigrod]

A Vitus for £100! … do you mean one of these … ?

Mine has a CD player in it .

 

[Klassik]

a vintage Yamaha stereo receiver and decent bookshelf passive speakers (£300)

Klassik is basically using something similar to this and Klassik is perfectly pleased with the results. Granted, Klassik would also need a CD player at the minimum, but it's not too difficult to get one of these affordably if one wants one.

Klassik has put away the 1970s and 1980s vintage amplifiers for now and has switched to a 1990s higher-end Kenwood AV receiver. This is from the Dolby Pro Logic era when receiver makers were still taking 2-channel music performance on AV receivers quite seriously so it's not a bad receiver. It has a ton of inputs, lots of power, and while Klassik has had this Kenwood since it was new in 1995, these things can be purchased for very little on the used market since there's practically no demand for a 1990s AV receiver from the video-end of the market and these receivers are quite under-appriciated from the vintage audio end of the market.

Klassik's speakers were a bit more than £300 if Klassik had bought them new, but Klassik got a great deal on the DCMs when they were discontinued. Even otherwise, Klassik has heard speakers such as the Polk Signature S20 and ES20 at $350 USD and they are certainly more than acceptable for any system Klassik would use for serious listening.

If one is patient enough to visit many thrift stores, one can assemble a fine system from thrift store components. Klassik purchased a Luxman component in perfect working order, though a bit rough looking, for the price of $7.99 USD.

 

[Le Baron]

wait a minute... the title is 'how low would you go...?' So isn't it the 'Hi' component of Hi-Fi we're talking about rather than the Fi?

(Also why is there no option for underlining in the tools?)

 

[audio_PHIL_e]

Also why is there no option for underlining in the tools?

Highlight the text you want underlined then type control-u

 

[Klassik]

(Also why is there no option for underlining in the tools?)

Highlight the text you want underlined then type control-u

The option is there in the menu, but it's under the 3 vertical dots button next to the color palette.

Alternatively, one can manually code it by using [ u ]underlined text[ /u ]. Remove the spaces Klassik put in the brackets, Klassik had to put those in so it wouldn't actually be code for the sake of the example.

 

[audio_PHIL_e]

The option is there in the menu, but it's under the 3 vertical dots button next to the color palette.

Alternatively, one can manually code it by using [ u ]underlined text[ /u ]. Remove the spaces Klassik put in the brackets, Klassik had to put those in so it wouldn't actually be code for the sake of the example.

That works but my way is less keystrokes Similar method works with control-b for bold, control-i for italic and control-s for strikethrough. You can also combine them.