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
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.
Sorry for the delay in answering your question.  At times, yes I wished for more power, but the lushness of sound, provided I didn't play at too high a volume, was wonderful and for the size of my room, it was sufficient.
So the audition of the Primaluna was pretty disappointing due to the speaker options.  Nothing against the shop I was at or Focal lovers, but the only real option for the audition was the Aria 948.  For a $5,000 speaker I was extremely surprised at the lack of balance it had.  It was so bright that my ears fatigued after 3 songs.  3 hours later, my ears still feel like I was at a 4 hour long heavy metal concert and the most extreme thing I listened to was Steely Dan.  High piano and guitar notes were downright metallic and piercing.  It seemed as if some one turned the volume up several notches every time there was a high note.  Trying to find a decent place to audition gear is turning out to be a challenge.  One thing I can take away, is that the Primaluna didn't seem to have a hard time powering the Arias.     
Well, if you are going with Vandersteen 3a sigs. I would suggest getting a McCormack amp. Steve McCormack uses Vandys and I can attest, they sound great.- And also in your price range.
If you want tubes, then Atma-Sphere would be my first choice.