I am looking to upgrade - looking for advice


So I am the guy who recently asked if a Rotel 1572 preamp would work with a Parasound A21+ amp. So I was asking because I was thinking of upgrading my current amp which is a Rotel 1552. The rest of my system is Yamaha CD player and project turntable (both approx $400 each), Bluesound Node, and B&W 705 S2 speakers. Right now I primarily stream my music through the node. So I was interested in the next step to improvement and I thought it would be what the amplifier. After reading some of the posts on my original question (would the A21 work well with my Rotel preamp I am now thinking that I need to look at both the preamp and amp. Of course that is you agree with my assessment. Here are a few of the amps I was looking at: A21, Vincent  SP-332, and Bryson 3b3. The preamps that were suggested all look outstanding: Benchmark LA4, Backert Labs Rhumba 1.3 and the Audionet Pre 1 G3. It looks like with these I would need to also get a DAC, not sure about the phono stage. Any advice is appreciated. I am knee to this.

tjraubacher

@tjraubacher

Congratulations. It is likely you will enjoy the upgrade with your choice of the Hegel. Not sure the streamer is an upgrade… fingers crossed.

Tell us what you think when it is all assembled.

 

Typically cabling is chosen after you have had many hours of listening and know what you want from a cable. For instance, most of my interconnects, cables and power cords are $3K ($3 - 5K). I purchased them six months or a year after upgrading my components. I have had a some Nordost Odin 2 in my system for several weeks… they were unbelievable… I had a hard time giving them back. 

 

 

 

Cables aside, my humble prediction is that you will quickly come to the conclusion that the Hegel far outclasses the B&W Speakers and you find THAT is your new priority.