Sevenoaks and Superfi don't even have stores in Scotland!
Hi-fi dealers in Glasgow:
Loud and Clear
Glasgow Audio
Richer Sounds
The Music Room
I like the Onkyo 9010 amp. It gets the fundamentals of music right.
There are a lot of fans of Q Acoustics. I bought some lower end Qs to go with a Denon DAB37 and those are fine for the money spent.
The typical retail price of the 3010 seems to be around £100. (The 3010i is £200).
TBH, I think these are the weak link in the system.
For £100 speakers they're good, but the system deserves better. In a system below a couple of grand, the speakers are going to have the biggest impact on the sonic signature of the whole package. The change in performance in speakers from £100 to £200 to £300 is marked. So spending extra here will give the biggest impact compared to buying a better amp or TT. Also, as you get used to a system, you'll be looking for more from it, so the speakers would be the first thing to be upgraded. It makes sense then to buy something better now that would stand up to a couple of changes in the front end rather than go cheap on speakers and buy twice.
From a technical.point of view, the limits with all budget speakers are bass driver/cabinet size, efficiency and the Ohms rating.
Bass driver/cabinet size is easy to understand. Bigger boxes with a larger diameter bass driver deliver deeper bass. The 3010 get down to just under 70Hz. Something like a Monitor Audio Bronze are much bigger and have a larger bass driver. They'll get down to around 45Hz. You'll really notice the difference that would make to the richness of instruments and voices.
Efficiency (dB/W) and the Impedance (Ohms) affects how well the speakers turn amp watts in to sound and how responsive the speakers are to changes in dynamics. The 3010s will need more power from the amp to come alive, and that means that at low listening volumes the 6 Ohm 86dB/W 3010s will sound a bit flat. The MA Bronze 2 are 8 Ohm 90dB/W, so they'll sound more engaging at much lower volumes as well as being better able to convey a sense of scale when the music gets more complex.
The Onkyo 9010 will be happier with the MA Bronze 2. 8 Ohms means they're drawing less current from the amp, and 90dB means theyre far better at turning amp watts in to sound.
It would be the same story with the B&W 685s except they're better speakers, so they'd show up the limits of the rest of the system much sooner. If your system was same a £300-£500 Rega or Pro-Ject TT with a £500 Rega Brio amp then the B&Ws would sit in there very happily.
The Monitor Audios, or some Dali Spektor 2 or Zensor 3 are an appropriate choice for where you're at now, and wouldn't be outclassed by the next couple of TT and amp upgrades.
What's missing from your system is speaker stands.
