2. amps-preamps
  3. 1037965017

Adcom or Creek?

Hello,

I have recently re-started aquiring a budget hifi system...
The last one was in the UK, circa 1997: Pioneer A400 - a Giant killer:

http://www.audioreview.com/Amplifiers/Pioneer+400X/PRD_116076_1583crx.aspx

B&W P4, Pioneer stable platter transport and Cambridge DAC - The A400 sounded very neutral and magically delicate and powerful :)

Now if the Pioneer were available in 120v I would be happy with that, but that's another story...

I now have a Creek 4330R integrated and an as yet untried Adcom GFA 5200 Power Amp (watts are less important that the quality of them).

My question is would an complete Adcom system including say the GFA 450 Pre/Tuner sound better than the Creek on it's own?

I like a neutral and not artificialy "warm" sound which is what I am finding with a lot of gear I've tried.

Any comments will be much appreciated.

Thx,
Josh
San Francisco
joshcloud9
lou_3rd
74 posts
 
Hi Joe,

If you want the most bang for the buck, Adcom is a great place to start. Until recently, their unmoded gear has been a bit less than impressive, items like the GCD-750, GFP-750, and the 5802 amp have changed that. These too need mods to really smoke, but they are pretty good out of the box, which older gear was not. The thing is that Adcom generally uses a solid design, though I hear they have had issues with manufactures not following those designs, etc. Anyway, even most of the ones they had issues with, because of their sound design in general, can be moded to sound pretty fantastic. For more specific information I would contact Stan Warren, co-founder of PS Audio, later he founded Superphon, and now he has SuperMods.

Stan Warren
Supermods
2375 W. 21ST Ave.
Eugene, OR 97405

(541) 344-3696

He has no answering machine, and ususally is available in the evenings. I have worked with him and he is fast, reliable, and a great guy. He does Adcom mods all the time and can adivse you more properly as far as what gear to buy, so you can mod it to rival some of the super gear out there.

Best Regards,

Lou
joshcloud9 OP
46 posts
 
To put my system in perspective, here's my cost so far:
(I'm a cheapskate)

Creek 4330R - $300 (after selling the phono stage :)
Adcom 5200 - $125
Marantz CD-67SE - $140
Minipods (Temporary solution) - $250
Homemade Cat-5 speaker cables
Various interconnects, awaiting a pair of these
http://signalcable.com/analogone.html
arriving from Signal Cable...

I was thinking of perhaps the Musical fidelity X-Pre (tube) any comments on that one?

Thx,
Josh
cdc
1,773 posts
 
I agree with Philjet - Adcom is grainy. Dealer switched from Adcom to Classe CAP 101 on B&W Nautilus 804 and big improvement in clarity and sound quality.
If you use Epos or other speaker with very easy load the 4330 should be okay. Otherwise could bi-amp 4330 with 2nd Creek power amp.
bday0000
266 posts
 
Creek.
lou_3rd
74 posts
 
Hi Josh,

It all depends upon funds. If funds are tight, I would never recommend tubes. You can get a nice old Perreaux SM-2 preamp for a few dollars, replace the 2 modular bridge rectifiers with Freds, the other diodes in the power supply with low noise UF4007 diodes, and all the caps, other than the 12 big PS caps, with Black Gate caps, I guarantee you a killer preamp with a great little phono stage. You can use Nichicon's audiophile grade caps in the power supply to save a couple more bucks. It will not be as great as the best, but it certainly will be better than a lot of highly touted gear.

If you want to spend a little more and get a remote, the GFP-750 with Black Gate caps, and soft recovery low noise diodes would be the way to go. As for Adcom being grainy, I have hated Adcom gear most of my life, nevertheless, Stan Warren can make it sound pretty awesome.
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