I thought I would post my experiences from today. I have been trying to work out which amps will stay in my main system, for now anyway. I am lucky and have the attic to myself, which means I can always run a second system up there.
As my wife and youngest sons were going to be out for most of the day I decided to run a little test swapping a variety of boxes around.
Components to stay in the system:
Uniti
Staigeline
Sondek
SBLs
Components to experiment with:
BD 250 serviced
BD 250 unserviced
BD 160 unserviced
32.5 unserviced
62 unserviced (CB)
HiCap unserviced
Nait 1
Nait 2 (CB)
This was my experience:
Music - Lambchop, Vampire Weekend, Massive Attack, Flaming Lips, Laura Marling (A bit random I know)
32.5/HC/250 unserviced- Music sounded a little far away, a little harsh with some tracks. Not bad but not great.
62/HC/250 unserviced. - much the same as above, maybe a little closer to the music.
32.5/HC/160 - wow, what a difference, the music is smooth and relaxing, tighter bass, maybe a little less in the mids but the highs were better.
62/HC/160 - maybe not quite as detailed but I was really hard pushed to hear the difference to the above.
62/HC/250 serviced - much like the 160 but with more detail in the midrange, slightly brighter but not enough to be wearing, it just felt like a good balance.
32.5/HC/250 serviced - not unlike the above but possibly tighter bass.
Just for fun I brought in the:
Nait 1 - lovely, smooth, relaxing, tight bass and very musical. Detail is lost a little but still, for 1 box, amazing. Lost control and got muddled with higher volume.
Nait 2 (CB) - as above, I could not hear any real difference, I swapped back to check. Maybe the Nait 2 was a little more controlled at higher volume but I could be wrong. I wouldn’t put any money on a blind test between the 1 and 2.
Conclusion.
I have kept the 32.5/HC/250 serviced as my main system. I think it just, and I mean just, edges the 160 in this combination. On a different day, I may have gone for the 160 over the 250. The fact that I can run the 62/160 in my attic without the investment of another HC helped too.
But what also struck me was that the Nait 1 could easily replace the 32.5/HC/250 without me feeling like I was missing a lot. Also, an unserviced BD250 can definitely sound worse than an unserviced Nait 1.
Sorry about the waffle but lockdown has allowed a little more time than I would normally have.