Bought these last week. So far, I'm very impressed with the sound quality from them, and the fact that they have Bluetooth (a necessity since I like to stream music — especially RP — from my iPhone).
A neat feature on this set is the "tone" knob on the right speaker; you can adjust the sound to be more bass-forward or more treble-forward. Granted, it's nothing more than a glorified built-in EQ, but it's nice to have; I have it set more toward the right (treble); going toward the left causes it to be really bass-heavy, and almost muffled to a point.
One annoying "feature" — the Bluetooth light blinks when it's connected to a source (phone, tablet, etc.), but is solid blue when it's looking for a connection. You'd think it would be the other way around...oh well, nothing some electrical tape can't fix. ;-)
this may be the universe telling me to get another set of speakers aallnn bringing up sonos in another thread? coincidence?
would those even work as pc speakers?
Sonos don't work as pc speakers since they buffer everything to get simultaneous output in every room (they do have a sound-bar for the TV so I suppose that might do it). It is a disappointment and I'm not going to expand beyond the single speaker I have. Also their music player interface kind of sucks and hasn't been improved for years. Sounds nice enough, though.
There are wireless speakers that accept an "audio in" line (making them not-so-wireless). On the Sonos line, you have to get to the 5's for that. I have Denon Heos speakers around the house, and they all have the line in plug. When you have 2 paired as a stereo pair, you only need one connection.
this may be the universe telling me to get another set of speakers aallnn bringing up sonos in another thread? coincidence?
would those even work as pc speakers?
Sonos don't work as pc speakers since they buffer everything to get simultaneous output in every room (they do have a sound-bar for the TV so I suppose that might do it). It is a disappointment and I'm not going to expand beyond the single speaker I have. Also their music player interface kind of sucks and hasn't been improved for years. Sounds nice enough, though.
Recently installed new hardwood floor in the living room. (Gotta replace some small furniture now because of color matching) Plus new windows in the living room and 2 bedrooms.
So the new sound system i had in mind is now on the back burner.
The living room is now a bit colder than usual without a rug, but my wife says she noticed right away how much better the piano sounds.
so there's some good news regarding budget and spiffing sound
quality is up and price is down
i follow steve guttenberg's audiophiliac yt channel
mainly because he knows a lot more about this stuff than i do
Recently installed new hardwood floor in the living room. (Gotta replace some small furniture now because of color matching) Plus new windows in the living room and 2 bedrooms.
So the new sound system i had in mind is now on the back burner.
The living room is now a bit colder than usual without a rug, but my wife says she noticed right away how much better the piano sounds.
As far as vinyl is concerned, i just want an audio system the way it use to be, ie: all wired. I got enough wifi and Bluetooth going on and i miss having it the "old way". I can afford a new audio system and i figure why get a new system if i'm not gonna have a TT. I have an old Technics TT, but (again) i can afford a reasonable priced new one. Besides, i'm not even sure if i can get a new cartridge for my old TT.
I have been buying used vinyl for a number of years now. Partly in the hopes i could sell some on Ebay but that just isn't worth it anymore. Shipping costs keep going up and that means your selling price keeps going down. But i have some pretty good stuff laying around waiting to be played. And i do plan on buying new vinyl. For a while there i was using a Bluetooth TT to spin some LPs, but that grew old quick, partly because pairing became a tiresome chore (it would sometimes take up to 10 minutes to pair) and it won't pair to my Bose CD player, only to a small Bose wireless speaker.
Thanks for the ramble, Kurtster.
Da nada. It's about defining your needs and then pulling the trigger. I'm all hard wired here, too. Ethernet and optical. The office / studio is directly on the other side of the living room wall where all the AV stuff sits. I put a small hole through the wall and run the cables directly to what ever. The music computer has optical out on the sound card and it goes straight to the optical in on the receiver in the living room. One of my goals is to get wav files on a pad or laptop and stream files under full control to the receiver by a Fire Stick or something similar for really lazy playing abilities. That stuff has been sitting around for a couple of years, just haven't gotten around to setting it up.
You should go over to discogs.com and see what it is about as a market place for music. This is me there. About a third of my vinyl is listed in my collection so far. Whatever is there will eventually be up for sale once I get it cleaned up and ripped. None of my CD's are listed. Those are too complicated for me right now. CD buyers are too much trouble for something worth less than the shipping charges.
Originally it was set up as a data base with the goal of making a listing for every known recording of anything. It's morphed into a market place. That's where I'm selling my vinyl. Took me awhile to figure out how to jump in and go live selling but things are starting to get going. Fees, are what they are, but straightforward. Shipping is 100% in control of the seller, they dictate terms and costs. There is a lot of research involved finding the exact pressing version of what you have so that you can list it for sale properly identified. Things are up in the air there a bit right now. Brand new sales tax collection regulations have gone into effect for all US sales today. So everyone is up in arms and freaking out. But overall a lot of people are there that left ebay behind in the dust. Listing is free.
The ripping is also a part of play grading the stuff so I can represent it accurately and get a fair price. So playing and ripping is just part of that enterprise. Future sales will and are starting to offset a lot of my equipment purchases. My sealed original copy of Wildflowers was just purchased by a lady who bought it as a Father's Day gift for her husband. He's a real lucky guy to have a wife like that !!
In essence, the equipment that does the first read of any signal and creates the source for all the following amplifiers and processors. In the case of vinyl, it would be the following order, cartridge / stylus, turntable which holds and aligns the cart and then to the phono preamp stage that recreates the very low voltage signal from the cart into a usable level for further processing in an amplifier equal to all other "line level" sources like CD's, tape recorders or from a phone.
With vinyl, there are so many choices for listeners. What kind of listener are you ? Someone who thinks it's a cool archaic novelty, a collector who gets into the whole presentation thing, the cover art work and the ritual or someone who wants to put on a side and melt into the couch while listening. Choose your gear accordingly. First do no harm to the vinyl. That means making sure that the cart / stylus turntable choice can get into a basic safe alignment that will not wear down the grooves. That is one of the reasons my vinyl is still in as good of shape it is after decades of playing. Then pick the cart / stylus pre amp combination that will do the best for the kind of fidelity you would like (and can afford). The turntable is still the most important part of this food chain because it is the foundation and host for the rest of the stuff. A good turntable will allow you to keep upgrading your carts to the level you may find that you want down the road. A crappy one will only let you take that so far. Styluses will wear out, some types sooner than others and you will be getting new ones down the line no matter how careful you are. A mid level elliptical stylus will give you 400 to 800 hours depending on the alignment and how clean your vinyl is. Higher level ones such as micro line or Shibata's can last up to 3000 hours in a perfect world. These types of carts require turntables that have high adjustabilty to dial them in so you can get the most out of the sound. The return is worth all the hassle once you get there. I use Shibata's. Only because in the beginning it was what was recommended when I bought my first turntable not knowing a whole lot back then. I later learned how good it actually was and got ruined from day one.
That brings everything back to the sound repro end. You only get one chance to get the best possible sound / signal with vinyl. After that, an amplifier cannot improve the sound, just change it. While that is true with digital, it's more true with vinyl. With vinyl, you are using a mechanical process to generate a signal instead of just reading 1's and 0's. A CD player is a CD player, so to speak. Your Bose will work fine plugged into your receiver. Don't forget that a DVD player is also a CD player. You have a ton of CD's and listen to a huge variety of music. How big is your vinyl collection ? Are you going to buy more or just enjoy what you already have ? If you plan to buy more and grow your collection, then do spend the money out of the gate for a good rig. Iffen on the other hand you're just gonna play what you have, then you can make do with less and still be able to enjoy them. Then ... regardless of what kind of turntable you get, you are still going to need to spend another $300 or so for a nice cart and phono preamp. Sorry, I know of no decent turntable with a built in pre amp that is going to be better than mediocre at best. Best to keep all that stuff modular so if one thing should break, you replace it rather than the whole flipping thing.
In the end, it's hard to do vinyl on the cheap. The threshold for a nice belt drive TT is going to be around $500 USD plus the $300 for the cart / pre. The threshold for a direct drive that is fully adjustable and can handle anything you want to put on it and benefit is going to be $1000 plus the $300. Then around another $100 for good basic cleaning supplies. The last question to ask yourself is are you going to be happy with what you bought 5 years from now ? Would you wish you had spent a little more initially so you aren't wanting then ? Your core is the receiver, turntable and preamp. You will limit your self too much in choices and add cost by requiring that the receiver have a phono input. Worse, there is no guarantee that the onboard preamp is good and will be a good match for your TT / cart. That matters, a lot. Speakers are probably the most easiest to change and improve down the road.
Finally, all this from someone who knows what a freaking PITA playing vinyl is. It's the main reason I rip vinyl. There are so many variables involved, not to mention coherency when operating the equipment and not scratching them because shit happens. I am not in love with the sound of vinyl. I am in love with the sound on it. How it was prepared to sound for playback is different than for digital. Digital has nothing to do with the quality. Its all about the mastering. I'll playback the rips anytime I want once they are in the can and they will sound exactly the same as playing the vinyl itself. Forever, on demand ... and exportable, bonus. Did the same with cassettes for albums I always listened to. Wear out the tapes, not the albums. I am so committed to the sound repro end that my record cleaner costs twice as much as any single piece of audio equipment I own. You can have the best turntable setup and a dirty record is going to sound like a dirty record on that $35,000 turntable. Once again, garbage in garbage out. I'm trying to keep things as cheap as I can, that's why all my money is tied up at the front of the sound chain. Just like here. The flac feed is going to sound noticeably better on any speakers than the 192 feed. From my reading, if you want to go all the way into improving the sound of standard CD's, rip them and play back the rip file or reburn them to a CDr. That will eliminate most playback errors from any CD and a reburn will be a much better copy for playback in a disc player than the original, if done properly.
You can think outside of the box with vinyl. My turntable is in the office plugged into the computer via USB from the phono preamp. The album rips that you hear from me are the exact same as I hear. You hear what I hear, but on your system. If my turntable was plugged into your computer, you would get the exact same sound I do. The computer sends the digital signal to the receiver and that is how I listen to my albums, either live or a file, on the computer sound system or receiver or both at the same time. Every time I drop the needle I hit record. And down the rabbit hole you go ... but I listen to the albums a whole lot more than if I had to pick up the record and go through all the crap involved just to listen to something for 20 minutes and have to get up again and turn it over or worse find another one to play next. No one ever tells you the other part, that they never put themselves away.
pardon the ramble
As far as vinyl is concerned, i just want an audio system the way it use to be, ie: all wired. I got enough wifi and Bluetooth going on and i miss having it the "old way". I can afford a new audio system and i figure why get a new system if i'm not gonna have a TT. I have an old Technics TT, but (again) i can afford a reasonable priced new one. Besides, i'm not even sure if i can get a new cartridge for my old TT.
I have been buying used vinyl for a number of years now. Partly in the hopes i could sell some on Ebay but that just isn't worth it anymore. Shipping costs keep going up and that means your selling price keeps going down. But i have some pretty good stuff laying around waiting to be played. And i do plan on buying new vinyl. For a while there i was using a Bluetooth TT to spin some LPs, but that grew old quick, partly because pairing became a tiresome chore (it would sometimes take up to 10 minutes to pair) and it won't pair to my Bose CD player, only to a small Bose wireless speaker.
Good point. Never thought of it that way. I am more of a CD person. But i already have a Bose CD player, so maybe if i skip the CD player for the system, i can afford a decent TT. I can always add the CD player later.
What do you mean by "source reproduction end"?
In essence, the equipment that does the first read of any signal and creates the source for all the following amplifiers and processors. In the case of vinyl, it would be the following order, cartridge / stylus, turntable which holds and aligns the cart and then to the phono preamp stage that recreates the very low voltage signal from the cart into a usable level for further processing in an amplifier equal to all other "line level" sources like CD's, tape recorders or from a phone.
With vinyl, there are so many choices for listeners. What kind of listener are you ? Someone who thinks it's a cool archaic novelty, a collector who gets into the whole presentation thing, the cover art work and the ritual or someone who wants to put on a side and melt into the couch while listening. Choose your gear accordingly. First do no harm to the vinyl. That means making sure that the cart / stylus turntable choice can get into a basic safe alignment that will not wear down the grooves. That is one of the reasons my vinyl is still in as good of shape it is after decades of playing. Then pick the cart / stylus pre amp combination that will do the best for the kind of fidelity you would like (and can afford). The turntable is still the most important part of this food chain because it is the foundation and host for the rest of the stuff. A good turntable will allow you to keep upgrading your carts to the level you may find that you want down the road. A crappy one will only let you take that so far. Styluses will wear out, some types sooner than others and you will be getting new ones down the line no matter how careful you are. A mid level elliptical stylus will give you 400 to 800 hours depending on the alignment and how clean your vinyl is. Higher level ones such as micro line or Shibata's can last up to 3000 hours in a perfect world. These types of carts require turntables that have high adjustabilty to dial them in so you can get the most out of the sound. The return is worth all the hassle once you get there. I use Shibata's. Only because in the beginning it was what was recommended when I bought my first turntable not knowing a whole lot back then. I later learned how good it actually was and got ruined from day one.
That brings everything back to the sound repro end. You only get one chance to get the best possible sound / signal with vinyl. After that, an amplifier cannot improve the sound, just change it. While that is true with digital, it's more true with vinyl. With vinyl, you are using a mechanical process to generate a signal instead of just reading 1's and 0's. A CD player is a CD player, so to speak. Your Bose will work fine plugged into your receiver. Don't forget that a DVD player is also a CD player. You have a ton of CD's and listen to a huge variety of music. How big is your vinyl collection ? Are you going to buy more or just enjoy what you already have ? If you plan to buy more and grow your collection, then do spend the money out of the gate for a good rig. Iffen on the other hand you're just gonna play what you have, then you can make do with less and still be able to enjoy them. Then ... regardless of what kind of turntable you get, you are still going to need to spend another $300 or so for a nice cart and phono preamp. Sorry, I know of no decent turntable with a built in pre amp that is going to be better than mediocre at best. Best to keep all that stuff modular so if one thing should break, you replace it rather than the whole flipping thing.
In the end, it's hard to do vinyl on the cheap. The threshold for a nice belt drive TT is going to be around $500 USD plus the $300 for the cart / pre. The threshold for a direct drive that is fully adjustable and can handle anything you want to put on it and benefit is going to be $1000 plus the $300. Then around another $100 for good basic cleaning supplies. The last question to ask yourself is are you going to be happy with what you bought 5 years from now ? Would you wish you had spent a little more initially so you aren't wanting then ? Your core is the receiver, turntable and preamp. You will limit your self too much in choices and add cost by requiring that the receiver have a phono input. Worse, there is no guarantee that the onboard preamp is good and will be a good match for your TT / cart. That matters, a lot. Speakers are probably the most easiest to change and improve down the road.
Finally, all this from someone who knows what a freaking PITA playing vinyl is. It's the main reason I rip vinyl. There are so many variables involved, not to mention coherency when operating the equipment and not scratching them because shit happens. I am not in love with the sound of vinyl. I am in love with the sound on it. How it was prepared to sound for playback is different than for digital. Digital has nothing to do with the quality. Its all about the mastering. I'll playback the rips anytime I want once they are in the can and they will sound exactly the same as playing the vinyl itself. Forever, on demand ... and exportable, bonus. Did the same with cassettes for albums I always listened to. Wear out the tapes, not the albums. I am so committed to the sound repro end that my record cleaner costs twice as much as any single piece of audio equipment I own. You can have the best turntable setup and a dirty record is going to sound like a dirty record on that $35,000 turntable. Once again, garbage in garbage out. I'm trying to keep things as cheap as I can, that's why all my money is tied up at the front of the sound chain. Just like here. The flac feed is going to sound noticeably better on any speakers than the 192 feed. From my reading, if you want to go all the way into improving the sound of standard CD's, rip them and play back the rip file or reburn them to a CDr. That will eliminate most playback errors from any CD and a reburn will be a much better copy for playback in a disc player than the original, if done properly.
You can think outside of the box with vinyl. My turntable is in the office plugged into the computer via USB from the phono preamp. The album rips that you hear from me are the exact same as I hear. You hear what I hear, but on your system. If my turntable was plugged into your computer, you would get the exact same sound I do. The computer sends the digital signal to the receiver and that is how I listen to my albums, either live or a file, on the computer sound system or receiver or both at the same time. Every time I drop the needle I hit record. And down the rabbit hole you go ... but I listen to the albums a whole lot more than if I had to pick up the record and go through all the crap involved just to listen to something for 20 minutes and have to get up again and turn it over or worse find another one to play next. No one ever tells you the other part, that they never put themselves away.
That shop looks pretty comprehensive. Wharfedales are dirt cheap right now for some reason. They have a great heritage name.
When you visit the shop remember to take some music of your own to listen to on their stuff. A couple of CD's that you really like the music and how it sounds and a couple of vinyl albums for them to play on their turntables. Back in the 70's and early 80's the album I took with me for listening tests was Aqualung. It demands a whole lot out an audio system and turntables / carts with especially tricky bass sections.
My thing about direct drive TT's is partly because they are the only kind I've ever had that I used on a regular basis over the years (I have a Dual belt drive as my third spare but never really ever used it) and the other is for my recording needs. There is nothing wrong with belt drive TT's. The majority of all TT's are belt driven. For me, the Technics is always going to either work or it isn't. The speed accuracy is the industry standard. It is what everybody else makes and tries to say theirs is just as good as. And they will hold their value over time. That is proven. I can sell mine for what I paid for it 3 years ago in a heart beat. I would predict that the used value of those two new Technics models would only be $200 less than new.
The advice I took to heart when I got my first stereo was to put the most money in the source reproduction end. It will make everything that follows sound better. It's the old garbage in garbage out thing. It is still my guiding principle. That said, I'm all in to vinyl. You are listening to CD's and vinyl so you need to find a balance and decide just how big a part vinyl is going to be in the rest of your life. If it's going to get bigger, then spend the money for it now. You'll never regret it.
Good point. Never thought of it that way. I am more of a CD person. But i already have a Bose CD player, so maybe if i skip the CD player for the system, i can afford a decent TT. I can always add the CD player later.
