2.1 setup with desktop amp.

OverDrive · 17 May 2016 at 11:18

Hi all,

I want to replace my current (very old) 5.1 system which now has a blown speaker with a good quality 2.1 setup as I never use the 5.1.

I love listening to music and I like a bit of bass too - so good stereo speakers and a subwoofer that are run through a dedicated desktop amp would be ideal.

I've been reading up a bit on desktop amps and speakers, but the components that I have been reading about are made by a company called 'Dayton' and don't seem to be available here in the UK.

My budget is about £250.

Any ideas/suggestions would be very welcome.

Thanks

OverDrive · 17 May 2016 at 11:39

Thanks for the reply - I can increase the budget. It's a worthwhile investment that I'll no doubt have for a good number of years. What can you suggest?

Cheers.

OverDrive · 17 May 2016 at 13:56

Thanks for the replies guys, the A100 amp looks fab and has won some top awards!

I'm happy with the SW150 sub too.

Any recommendations on better speakers?

OverDrive · 17 May 2016 at 21:51

Thank you guys for your input

I'm in the process of doing a little research - I will up the budget as I listen to lot's of music, so it's money I don't mind spending.

Sorry if these are silly questions:

1. What is high level input?
2. Can I use the optical out on my mobo to connect to the amp for better sound?

Hopefully after a little more reading, there will be less silly questions

Thank you so much again.

PS, Marine - that's a fantastic setup you have there!

OverDrive · 18 May 2016 at 23:36

Thank you, that's really helpful. Does the optical from the motherboard bypass the on-board soundcard?

I'll post up on here once I've selected the components

OverDrive · 22 May 2016 at 15:05

Hi guys,

I've been reading up more on the A100 amp:

This thread was really useful:
https://www.avforums.com/threads/monitor-audio-a100-owner-experience.1910441/

Definitely going to get this amp - the AirPlay functionality would be great too as I have an iPhone and iPad.

I'm now thinking I might invest in some floor standing speakers, as I do pretty much all my listening from my PC it might be worth it with this amp.

If I went for some floor standers, would that reduce the need of a subwoofer, or would I be best going for 2 bookshelf speakers and a subwoofer?

I've seen pairs of used B&W 603 S2s for around £250, or Monitor Audio Bronze BX5 for a little more.

Thanks.

OverDrive · 22 May 2016 at 23:09

Thanks for the replies guys

I was in town today and popped into Richer Sounds in Holborn (I was actually walking to the shop when I posted my last message). To my delight, they had an A100 in the front window display. A really helpful chap set it up in the demo room for me...it sounded absolutely fantastic with the speakers we tried! There was so much detail and depth to the sound...and that was with source audio from my iPhone/Apple Music. We also tried it with some lossless files he had on his phone.

The A100 was very impressive in person and was much heavier and more solidly built than it appears in photos.

We tried the A100 with the following pairs of speakers:

1. Dali ZENSOR 3 (bookshelf - mounted on stands) - £310
2. Dali ZENSOR 5 (floor standing) - £549
3. Atacama MOSECO 6 (larger floor standing) - £729

The ZENSOR 3s sounded really good and they could actually push some good bass, however I think I preferred the overall depth of sound from the larger floor standing speakers. So I'm now thinking that I may go for these without a subwoofer.

I think I will buy some used speakers online so that my money goes a little further. However, I will buy the A100 from Richer Sounds as they were fantastic today and I would like to give them my trade.

How do these four used pairs of speakers compare and do they seem well priced?

1. B&W 603 S2 - £250
2. Monitor Audio Bronze BX5 - £300
3. Dali Zensor 5 - £320 (quite a saving over the new price I saw today)
4. Monitor Audio Silver RX6 Speakers - £550

It seems that the parameters of my original idea have changed somewhat. I spend lots of time listening to music in this room, so I think this will be a great investment.

Regarding the listening environment:

My desk is positioned against one of the walls in my dining room/study, the room is just over 4x4m with a wooden floor. If I went for floor standing speakers I was thinking of positioning the speakers on the back wall in each corner of the room.

If floor standing speakers seem overkill for this environment/for primary use with a computer please say.

Thank you so much for your advice. I have so much to learn in this area.

EDIT: Just noticed that the used Dali Zensor 5s are in pretty poor cosmetic condition - hence price (it did seem too good to be true) - I will avoid that particular pair.

OverDrive · 23 May 2016 at 09:31

Hi again,

Just another quick update. I've had a read about these 4 pairs of used speakers on What-HiFi and a few other sites and they all seem pretty good, so don't worry about feedback on those. The RX6s being the best and the B&W 603s being the most entry level out of these.

However...I did also have a read about the Q Acoustics 3020 bookshelf speakers and 3070S subwoofer mentioned above. They appear to be very highly regarded, so I'm now giving these serious thought.

There is a large part of me that would love to get some floor standing speakers, but i'm thinking that the Q Acoustics setup may be better for my PC and the dining room/study - they would also fit nicely on my desk with the subwoofer on the floor next to it.

OverDrive · 30 May 2016 at 23:12

Hi all,

Sorry I’ve not replied for a few days. I listened to a few speakers at my local hi-fi store last week including the Q3020 and Q3050 floor standers, however in the end I fell in love with the sound of the B&W 685 S2 – which allowed me to hear my music in detail that I hadn’t heard before. I managed to have the speakers reduced from £500 to £460, so I’m very happy. I then purchased the A100 and speaker cables from Richer Sounds who were fantastic and even made the cables up for me. The 685 S2s sounds fantastic with the A100 and I feel that the sound has improved as I’ve run the speakers in over this last week.

I’m really happy with the A100. I was able to set it up with no issues and also perform the firmware update to the latest version (639). It was a little jumpy with the AirPlay playback to start off with, but it now seems to have settled down and is working beautifully. I also have the A100 hooked up to my computer via the optical cable and this works beautifully too. The next step for me will be to setup a DLNA server on my NAS and gradually encode my CDs into FLAC.

I have a few more questions though and I really hope you guys will be able to help. This is my first step into the world of hi-fi and I would like to get the best sound out of the A100 and my speakers. Please bear with me on these – this is all new to me.

1. I’ve set my motherboard’s optical out as the default audio device. However, when digging deeper in the Windows audio settings I noticed that you can select sample rate and bit depth when running in shared mode. I’ve set this as high as I could hear the test sounds which was ‘24 bit, 96000 Hz (Studio Quality)’, any higher and I could not hear the test sound, so I assume that’s the upper limit of the A100’s DAC. Have I done the right thing by setting this as high as it goes? Also What exactly is ‘shared mode’ in Windows?

2. The A100 is rated at 50w per channel, the speakers are rated at 25-100w. Everything seems fine, however I’ve read that the speakers can get damaged when driven by amps that are not powerful enough. Is the A100 amp ok for the speakers? I plan on keeping these speakers long term and using them with other amps further down the line as I get more into hi-fi, so want to look after them.

3. If the A100’s DAC limit is 24 bit/96000 Hz, what does that mean in practical terms? Am I likely to ever need to play files that are actually of this quality (or higher)? As I understand it CDs are 16 bit/44100 Hz.

4. I have an Apple Music subscription so I often listen to that from my computer. Would I get the best quality by listening to that using the optical out or AirPlay? iTunes in Windows allows me to select either for playback. I assume AirPlay (and DLNA) use the same DAC in the A100 that the optical input uses? I’m not sure what quality Apple Music uses or if there is a way I can set it to use high quality?

5. What’s the best application for me to use to start to encode my CDs into FLAC? Any advice on this would be appreciated.

Again, thank you for all of your help and advice so far and I’m sorry for all these questions, even if you can answer a couple I would be grateful.

OverDrive · 1 Jun 2016 at 23:19

Thanks for the reply and for answering all my questions. I'm so happy with my new speakers and the A100 - I've been listening to some of my old CDs over the last week and it's like hearing them again for the first time - with so much detail and depth.

I installed Exact Audio Copy this evening and I've already started to rip some of my CDs to FLAC. It works really well.

I've also installed foolbar2000 - with the WASAPI add on set as the output to ensure 'bit perfect playback' of the FLACS. I'm not really sure if that was necessary as I can't really hear any difference though!

Thank you so much again!