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Finally stepping into the hobby after 30 years of watching from the sidelines

Ok, so I hope you are all ok with a longwinded post from a first time user of the forum.  I have been obsessed with vinyl and tubes since my dad played records for me as a 5 year old.  My wife and I are finally in a place that we can take the leap into the scene.  We want to grow our system over time and may even create 2-3 systems along the way as we have a bed and breakfast where we want to make analog part of the theme. 

We have made up our mind that our first speakers will be Vandersteen 2CE sigs.  That is about as far as we have gotten.  We definitely want to power them with tubes and have very little idea of where to start.  Obviously the mainstream option would be a Mcintosh mc275 and our local HiFi salesman would LOVE to sell us a pair of those.  However, we know that there are several cheeper/better options out there and would love some input from the board.  We'd like to keep the first amp under $3,000, but we aren't locked into that.  Keep in mind that we are ok starting with a single amp and then adding a second one along the way to mono them.  Also, we would love some help with a table/arm/cartridge!  One with an integrated phono stage is fine to start with and we would again be open to upgrading and adding a stand alone phono stage later on.  

We will be doing some electrical work soon to run a 40 amp fuse to the BnBs espresso machine and would be open to setting up a dedicated line for our main system at that time so that we can have clean power.  Has any one had any experience with this?  Any ideas or recommendations that you may have would be a big help here! 

Thank you all in advance, and we are really excited to finally be part of the scene! 
128x128cottguy
oleschool's avatar
oleschool
722 posts
 
have to chime in and agree with inna ,in my personal experience cables have made a drastic difference.do i need 5k for a pair? no not for my set up .But i can say i have some bucks in cables.From my tt to phono and to pre ,oh yes!.I run an intergrated to help with the cable issues.and the difference is most noticable. but i would not spend your money there anytime soon if it was me.get the vandys you desire then amp then tt (again a hot subject but get the best tt you can afford cart can be added and upgraded at any time  .jmo.
and for goodness sakes treat the room it will help your sound like a component upgrade..
inna ..i should have bought that dam vac lol
inna
7,304 posts
 
Oleschool, one day it will appear again, you can be prepared. And to make it easier for you - I am not going to hunt it down. Whatever I can afford or find, I will almost certainly concentrate on upgrading my pretty good SS phono to a great tube one.
Speaking of cables. I just got a cable to replace my excellent interconnect that runs from phono to the integrated. For the purpose of quicker breaking in process I put it on my Nak tape deck. I should've never done it, even new this cable sounds much better than the one I usually have there which is also pretty good. So now I will refuse to take this new cable from the deck and consequensially will need another same cable to finally put it on the phono stage ! Damn. But it can wait, no rush, I've got patience. In the end I'll have two great cables.
inna
7,304 posts
 
And of course I agree that of the three elements of turntable set-up the table itself is the most important.
Say, entry levels Rega and Pro-Ject have okay tonearms but not so good tables. And though I am personally unfamiliar with it - just read about it - VPI seems to be the other way around. It might, just might, and again I didn't auditioned it, make certain sense to start with new $700 PIoneer direct drive table with perhaps Grado wood $300  cartridge. You would need a good phono cable though. Just a thought.
cottguy's avatar
cottguy OP
56 posts
 
So, I have been watching every youtube video I can find in my spare time in preparation for the RMAF trying to come up with a game plan of which equipment and presentations I want to see.  I have a 3 day pass, so I should have enough time to cover a lot of ground and I'm fortunate that my wife is really into this and will be attending the show with me.  Have any of you attended the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest before?  Any recommendations on brands/models to check out or people I should try to talk to?  

Personally, I have been intrigued by Pure Audio Project's Trio15 Voxativ and Peter Brunniger (sp?) from AV Showrooms seemed to be very impressed by them.  I have no grounds for my interest other than the fact that they are in my price range and they seem to be getting really good reviews.  However, the Vandy 3A sigs or Treo CTs are still at the top of my list.   

I'm also starting to lean towards the Primaluna DiaLogue Premium HP Integrated but with the KT150 tubes.  I'm headed to Golden Sound in Denver today to audition it.  I'm not going to lie, I'm not terribly impressed how Primaluna touts what they do as a company.  I know they have quality gear, but constantly trying to point out other companies flaws to try to stand out is pretty lame.  Let the gear speak for itself.   

I have about 3 weeks till RMAF to try to audition as much gear as possible and once the show is over, we are hoping to finalize our decision on what we want to get.  

@inna  The Nottingham Interspace looks pretty damn nice.  I checked out their site and can't find any US dealers and they won't be attending RMAF, so I probably won't be able to audition one.  How do you feel about buying a table without hearing it? 
inna
7,304 posts
 
Hollywood Sound in Florida, hwdsound.com, is I think the only place. Larry is the distributor and dealer. But there might be some others I haven't heard of. He advertises here too, as I remember.
I am concerned about Primaluna's mug slinging, I do not deal with people like that unless absolutely necessary. 
Cottguy, question is how do you feel about it? I felt just fine when I bought my Nottingham but I knew what I wanted and I knew what I didn't want. I don't know Larry's policy, maybe he lets people audition some turntables, though it would be quite a hassle for him especially if many people want it, so perhaps he is doing alright by simply selling them in his area and by mail to those who are sure that they want them. I had $1500 for table/arm, didn't want VPI, Rega, Sota, better Pro-Ject, Clearaudio, Basis or Linn, all for mostly diffrerent reasons. This quickly led me to the idea of used Nottingham Spacedeck/Spacearm. It took some time for it to appear on Audiogon. These days I see only a few of them for sale a year at best. Usually those who like them keep them for a very long time. My next upgrade if it ever happens would cost me $10k in today's dollars, far beyond what I can afford, and I would not buy anything in between.
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