Need to downgrade any advice??


Hello everyone.

Well I am in the process of moving into my first place. Although it is good to move out of my folks place, I never realized how much money I would spend. The above, along with the space available at my current place, and my girlfriend nagging has lead me to the conclusion that I need to downgrade until my funds replenish.

Currently I own Green Mountain Audio Europas, a fully modded Bolder Squeezebox 2 with separate ac power unit, and a Onix sp3. One option is to sell my speakers and the sp3 and simply buy self powered 2.1 speakers. The second option is to sell everything and simply get a self powered 2.1 speaker and use airport and my mac.

Here my question. Based on what I have said what is the best option for me? I know I can get the most out of my squeezebox and I honestly haven't used it as much as I should have over the years. Yet I don't really want to get rid of it. Overall, I need a system that is more flexible, in terms of inputs, takes less space, and eliminates a lot of the cables. It also has to be user friendly considering my girlfriend is computer illiterate. Can I still get a good sounding system by downgrading and getting powered speakers?

Any recommendation on self-powered speakers and so forth are greatly welcomed.
daimbert
Man, that's a bummer and a tough one, but I've been in this kind of situation before. I guess let's get some numbers in here: how much are you looking to end up with in your pocket out of this, and that will give a better idea of what can be accomplished. My first thought is that the squeezebox should go as you have airport and a mac. There's not a lot of compromise there and then you can address what to do about your speaker/amp situation.
I'm using the Quad 12L Active speakers and really couldn't be happier.

Enjoy,

TIC
I'd keep the Onix and monitors. Sell the squeezebox and use the Mac/Airport express and buy a DAC when the time comes.

Self powered speakers are still going to cost you at least $300, and you wouldn't be happy.

The only experience with downgrading I did was when I decided to sell my tecnodec and keep my Rega Planar 2. $1600 vs $300. I should have gotten a second job.

Don't know if your current set-up is head and shoulders above powered speaker set-up. It probably is, and once you've heard something better, it's going to stick in your head every time you listen.
keep your europas and get a good used amp to power them. my mac mini is connected to a pass labs clone from the headphone out jack and powering a pair of Spica TC-50s. I've also used cheap adcoms that work very well as well.