amp or preamp..what should i keep?

I am familiar with your preamp and Forte. Keep the amp and buy yourself a a nice tube preamp like the Eastern Electric Minimax preamp which is within your price range, you will not be sorry.

the belles designed ocm should be the ticket wth your amp. to know why you want to change anything, tell us what you are looking for

thanks for your response, what im looking for is a little warmer sound,more presence and a better soundstage.

Add a tube pre-amp and tube DAC.

i would experiment with interconnects and speaker cable and placement before throwing anything under the bus. the system on paper sounds good to me.

Your amp and preamp have good reputations, and one poster says they should be a good match. Others who know these electronics well are welcome to correct me, but if you are not satisfied with your sound I would not look to the amp and preamp myself. Instead I would consider either a source or a speaker upgrade, or both. Your Music Hall player, for example, is great at its price, but it's possible to do better still.

A DAC, perhaps but not necessarily a tubed one, would be an option, but you would have to add the price of a good 1.5m digital interconnect. You might find an Apogee Mini-DAC and a VH Audio cryo Pulsar cable within your budget. (I only mention the ones I know in that price range, but there are others of course.)

Otherwise you can find smoother, more 3-D sound going up the Shanling line. The tubed CD-T80 would be one big step up from the 25.2, the JAS Audio Musik 1.2 would be another. These and other one-box players retail around $1200 and might be found used within your budget.

If you could describe what it is about your sound that you don't like, that might help us to suggest alternatives.

im looking for a sound a little more laid back but with a nice quick and fast bass along with crisp clean upper freqs. but would like the vocals to stand out a little more than they are right now. right now they seem to take a back seat to everything else.

mike

I have limited experience with Paradigm speakers. My two sons each have a pair of Titans, and the Titans are balanced the way you describe them. Vocals take a back seat because the midrange is depressed compared with the frequency extremes.

You can compensate somewhat for this kind of thing with careful speaker placement but my suggestion would be to audition some other speakers just to hear what difference that might make. For example, I also have a pair of PSB Alphas, and they favour the mids more than the Titans I mentioned above.

My own main system speakers are Meadowlarks, and they have a nice balance to my ears. If you were patient, you might find a used pair of Meadowlark Kestrels in your price range, but since they are no longer made it might be hard to get an audition.

Don't rule out a source upgrade either, if what you really want to hear is more refinement in vocals.

Happy hunting!

I did some speaker moving tonight and althou it did help for instance i brought the speakers about three feet out from the wall and it seemed to unmuddle the sound so to speak. After more adjustmants it did get better but I think I am probably not going to get much flatter. I am using some nordost flatline interconnects and have tried my kimbers but I think the nordost sound a little better on my setup also running audio art speaker cables. One question is this, My speakers are bi wireable and not sure if this is hurting my sound but I am running a three foot pair of audioquest cables to tie the post together. My next purchase is for a pair of jumpers but for now this will have to do.

You are quite right to want to improve your jumpers.

If you want to know how biwiring would affect your sound, you might look out for a set of Audioquest Type 4 or 4+. This economical cable, as you probably know, is double-run solid-core and you can biwire with it. It's very good-sounding for the money and not hard to resell if it turns out not to your taste.