Spec me a budget hifi system

[FML1990]

When it comes to the world of Audio I have litterally no knowledge at all so I need your help guys.

I'm after a hifi system (With turntable) It will be used mainly for vinyl and on the odd occasion spottily via my phone (ideally wirelessly)

Will also need to drive my headphones (AKG 702) as occasionally I'll be throwing them in. But music will 90% of the time be coming through the speakers.

I have no idea what I'm looking for at the minute, so I'd appreciate if you guys could spec something up.

Ideally, i'm looking around the £300 mark, but could stretch another hundred if the quality is there.

 

[hornetstinger]

I'd look into second hand, you'll get more for your money. I wouldn't buy a second hand turntable though. Speakers and amp though..

You will need source(s), a stereo integrated amplifier, stereo speakers. For your budget I'd buy standmounts. But you'll need stands as well. Plus RCA and speaker cables. And require a phono stage, either built into the stereo amplifier, or external.

You have two types of turntables, moving magnet and moving coil. For your budget it's one of those but I forget which (the other is high end turntables)

The stereo amplifier will need a headphone amplifier as well.

I've got a couple of speakers that I don't need that are in your budget.

 

[FML1990]

Literally the majority of those words you mentioned. I have no idea what they are.

** off to do some more googling**

The main issue I have is not knowing how much I should spend on each particular item, or if something is actually a quality product. I've been looking at richersounds and amazon debating just buying everything together instead of putting one together.

 

[hornetstinger]

You can buy everything together, however for your budget you are really pushing it for the three items, plus cables all for £300.

As for how much to spend that depends, on your finanical situation, and just how far you want to go in build/sound quality.

tbh if it were me I'd increase your budget, because for £300 you'll buy amp and speakers, but you still need the turntable. That's another £100-£200. Plus you may need a phono stage, if the amp lacks one (and another set of RCA cables)

 

[FML1990]

You can buy everything together, however for your budget you are really pushing it for the three items, plus cables all for £300.

As for how much to spend that depends, on your finanical situation, and just how far you want to go in build/sound quality.

tbh if it were me I'd increase your budget, because for £300 you'll buy amp and speakers, but you still need the turntable. That's another £100-£200. Plus you may need a phono stage, if the amp lacks one (and another set of RCA cables)

What is a phonostage? I could probably stretch to 400-500 no worries if required. I just wanted to put everything together on a fairly cheap budget. I've been looking at a few things on ebay but they all seem about 20 years old.

 

[hornetstinger]

phono stage is a pre-amplifier that is needed for turntables. The signal from turntables is a very low signal, which needs to be boosted to typical line level voltages, with eq applied, some also have anti thump filter to protected speakers.

It can be a seperate box, or built into a amplifier. It'll usually say "phono" on your amp, if it has one.

If not then you wire the photo stage in between your record player and amp, using a typical stereo input, say CD, tape, etc.

 

[MouthBoy]

What is a phonostage? I could probably stretch to 400-500 no worries if required. I just wanted to put everything together on a fairly cheap budget. I've been looking at a few things on ebay but they all seem about 20 years old.

I have two setups at the moment. One is a Cambridge Audio amp and speakers setup that I bought new about 1 year ago, around £500 including cables. The other is one that I was bought recently - a whole Technics stack (no turntable) and speakers, for around £200.

The Technics is 20 years old and sounds amazing, but it sounds completely different to my CA setup. Warmer and very good for the music produced around the time that it was made, but modern music sounds off on it - not bad, just not as good as my CA setup.

So you can get a complete 'older' system for your £300 but from experience the sound is very different (maybe you will like it) from a 'modern day' system.

Disclaimer: I am not an expert on audio.

 

[kitfit1]

When it comes to the world of Audio I have litterally no knowledge at all so I need your help guys.

I'm after a hifi system (With turntable) It will be used mainly for vinyl and on the odd occasion spottily via my phone (ideally wirelessly)

Will also need to drive my headphones (AKG 702) as occasionally I'll be throwing them in. But music will 90% of the time be coming through the speakers.

I have no idea what I'm looking for at the minute, so I'd appreciate if you guys could spec something up.

Ideally, i'm looking around the £300 mark, but could stretch another hundred if the quality is there.

The first question i would ask is, how much Vinyl do you actually own at the moment ?
It's important because if it's a few albums that you have been given then you would be wasting your money on a vinyl dominated set up.
I know that it's fashionable at the moment to have a vinyl system, but there is a reason it faded out very quickly. It's because to play vinyl and get the best from it you need to have a very very good source (turntable, arm, cartridge, stylus and phonostage). People were never prepared to spend the sort of money needed to make Vinyl "sing" even when it was the only decent source, that's why CD took off the way it did.
If you are serious about Vinyl then just have a think about this, just about the best low end phonostage is a Rega Phono and it will set you back about £200 new. Notice i said low end, high end would be £2500 to £4500+.
If you have 100's or even 1000's of LP's, then don't be tempted to play them on a cheap record deck because it will destroy them in time. Just do a lot of research, and i don't mean Ebay, there are plenty of vinyl sites. You might then change your mind as to your budget, or even if it's worth your while in the first place.

 

[TALON1973]

If you are determined to buy a vinyl system and on that budget your beat/ only option imo is to get an amplifier with a built in phono stage 2nd hand. I'm talking marantz or rega.

Ebay has a few marantz 6005 amps at at about £150 . Some new speakers at about £130 . That leaves about £250 for a project debut turntable.

 

[TALON1973]

That's my turntable setup .

Rega rp6 turntable - £1200
Tom Evans microgroove X mk2 phone stage - £600
Graham Slee srg11 headphone amp - £450
Sennheiser hd650 headphones - £250

And that's still not classed high end

 

[LazyManc]

The first question i would ask is, how much Vinyl do you actually own at the moment ?
It's important because if it's a few albums that you have been given then you would be wasting your money on a vinyl dominated set up.
I know that it's fashionable at the moment to have a vinyl system, but there is a reason it faded out very quickly. It's because to play vinyl and get the best from it you need to have a very very good source (turntable, arm, cartridge, stylus and phonostage). People were never prepared to spend the sort of money needed to make Vinyl "sing" even when it was the only decent source, that's why CD took off the way it did.
If you are serious about Vinyl then just have a think about this, just about the best low end phonostage is a Rega Phono and it will set you back about £200 new. Notice i said low end, high end would be £2500 to £4500+.
If you have 100's or even 1000's of LP's, then don't be tempted to play them on a cheap record deck because it will destroy them in time. Just do a lot of research, and i don't mean Ebay, there are plenty of vinyl sites. You might then change your mind as to your budget, or even if it's worth your while in the first place.

The OP wants a "budget" hifi system - telling them they need to spend £200 minimum on a phono stage is BS.

There are plenty of decent stereo amps you can buy 2nd hand for £50-100, some of which will include a phono stage. If not, you can pick up a Project Phono Box E for £50.

If you want new, there's the Onkyo A-9010 (which includes a phono stage) for £200, which is decent.

For record decks, if you want to buy new look to be spending £150+ for a Project Essential or Elemental, or expect to be spending a lot of time researching good second hand decks and an equal amount of time waiting for them to show up on ebay. Avoid any of the Crosley style all-in-one units as the sound rubbish and can allegedly wear your records prematurely.

You can get a decent set of bookshelf speakers for £150-200 new (Dali, Q Acoustic), or £100ish 2nd hand.

£300 is pretty tight unless you're willing to go 2nd hand for everything, but you don't have to spend thousands either. You'll end up with a great starter hifi that will let you enjoy your records, and blow any similarly priced "lifestyle" system out of the water.

 

[hornetstinger]

yup you don't need to spend thousands. £50 on phono stage, or a amp with it built in.

turntable like this
http://www.project-audio.com/main.php?prod=essential2&cat=turntables&lang=en
http://www.rega.co.uk/planar-1.html