There’s one on ebay for £4995 2026. Buy it! It’s a good price.
XPSDR 2022 with NO Burndy £1800, would be £200] with Burndy.
1 Like
I think that may be the first time I’ve seen hifi gear kept in a cage so it can’t escape!
1 Like
Huh?
Well, the rack under the TV looks to me like a cage! (Though maybe itd TV not hifi gesr.)
Oh yes it’s an IKEA TV bench. I keep the router, NAS, switch, modem and cable TV box in there along with an AudioQuest Power Quest 707 power distribution unit to plug those items into.
Nice system!
Thanks Dan. My only concern is that I might be over gunning the front end and create a bottleneck at the Nait 50 Dali Menuet SE end.
1 Like
IME this is really impossible to do. A better source will always give you better performance from your system. The ‘bottleneck’ phenomenon is really only of concern if your downstream components just aren’t good enough to justify improving the source. No such concerns with your system. That doesn’t mean that you won’t get better performance from a better amp and speakers - that will always be the case (assuming good enough source), but they will be more than capable of letting you hear what a better source will do.
3 Likes
A lot depends whether you expect to upgrade, or stop where you are indefinitely. If you stop where you are what is most important is a sound that you like, with the best balance of contribution from each component. Also, in my experience speakers make the biggest single contribution to the overall sound character of a system, and can make an awful lot of difference especially if hearing the full bottom end of the sound is important to you. Personally I would not be satisfied with a system that curtailed the bass, and unfortunately speakers that do full bass well are inherently expensive, and often demanding of amp capability. If bass is not important to you, or simply not a part of the music you like, then you can get away with much less expensive speakers, whence maximising source might be more beneficial.
2 Likes
I almost exclusively listen to acoustic music and love detail and separation so bass is not really an issue although for their size the Menuets are no slouch in that department. My current system is great and I could quite happily live with it as it is but there is this desire to fully unlock the Ndac as it’s something I’m definitely keeping hold of.
What they won’t do is to restore musical information that the source didn’t recover. Big speakers will theoretically give you more bass and scale, but this does IME also depend on the source recovering the necessary information in the first place. Otherwise what you end up with is a big overblown sound with lots of bass - none of which is musical in the sense that it contributes cohesively to the musical message.But musical coherence has to come primarily from the source. Timing, rhythm, all that kind of stuff. Unless your source does it then you can forget it - speakers can’t give you that.
3 Likes
1 Like
Great looking system
1 Like
That is the age old fallacious application of computer data GiGo principle! No speakers won’t let information out if it hasn’t gone in, but anything that blocks or muddled information, including speakers, will limit watch you here. Simply a case of weakest link. That is why if not upgrading in the future I feel it is critical to get the best balance rather than following the source first mantra.
By lots of bass in that statement , I am assuming you mean out of balance with the rest of the sound. That is absolutely not inevitable! If you have speakers to do full spectrum with a neutral frequency response, with an amp adequate to control them, also with a neutral frequency response, and ensure the room set up doesn’t have significant resident frequencies or excessive decay time, then bass would just be what is in the music. On the other hand, if you reduce or cut off the bass by using speakers that are not capable of reproducing it.
Musical coherence and the musical message require all parts of the music to be heard, at least it does for me, and with some music the bass is a very important part. Of course different if the music to which you listen doesn’t have bass.
Some people like their music played through highly coloured speakers, or with something in the system exaggerating the rhythmic elements of the , saying that makes the music more exciting. To me that is complete anathema: it is up to the music to be exciting, not up to the system to try and make an exciting music exciting (and of course not all music is exciting!)
2 Likes
I agree the speakers are the single most influential component in the audio chain, but that’s just half the equation IMV, even the best speakers will fall short if not positioned properly in the room. It is speaker/room interaction that is king, no amount of upgrades, regardless of their position in the audio chain, can compensate for poor speaker/room interaction.
1 Like
By the picture it looks like those ATC Loudspeakers are placed out from wall into room, don’t they work closer to rear wall ?
Can I suggest a bit of cable management, and can the speakers not go a bit closer to the wall?
Like that Ikea cabinet a lot.
They sound better with them placed into the room
1 Like
Indeed, and other aspects of room , e.g. Minimising early reflections that muddle/smear the sound.
1 Like
I’m looking at some GIK treatment for my snug, to really dial in the performance
1 Like