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If you had $12k / £10k to upgrade your analogue front-end...

Hi all,

I am upgrading my system in my listening room bit-by-bit. This room is for focused listening of music only. No movies. In the future I will be looking looking to upgrade my analogue front-end and am thinking of a budget of around $12k / £10k for a turntable, tonearm, cart and phono stage/pre-amp. I listen to all sorts of music from electronic, bass-heavy vinyl, jazz, hip-hop, rock (new and old), ambient (Cinematic Orchestra, Nils Frahm etc...) and lots of soul/funk type tracks. So quite varied.

If you had $12k/£10k to spend, what combination of turntable, tonearm, cart and phone stage/pre-amp would you go for? I'm looking for suggestions to help with my research. I'm unsure what the balance should be between them. For example, should I go for a Rega Planar 10 with Aphelion 2 cart (£6,840) and give myself just over £3k to spend on a phono stage. Or spend less on the cart (Rega Planar 10 with Apheta 3 is £4,950) and get a more expensive phono stage.

Turntable brands I've been thinking of are Rega, Clearaudio, Technics, VPI, AVID, Thorens, Michell Engineering, VPI, SME etc... but don't really know where to start.

Any help would be much appreciated.

 

cainullah
dekay's avatar
dekay
5,564 posts
 

Just read a Stereophile review of the 1200G (prompted by dctom's post) and saw mention of an aftermarket mat that I was not aware of.

Changing the mat would be a good place to start with the OP's current setup.

I have (Thorens TD125 MkII/SME 3009 II non-improved) an OEM rubber mat, a 100% wool mat and a DIY cork spot-mat all of which change the sound in my system.

I generally prefer the spot-mat, but the wool mat works well with brighter sounding LP's.

The one mentioned in the review is a spot-mat design.

 

DeKay

plinko
256 posts
 

I think you would do quite well with a P8 or P10 and a phono stage in your stated price range (perhaps consider used for the phono stage for even more value). I listened to several tables costing much more (high mass) than my P10/Aphelion 2.  I was left unimpressed and so I didn’t “upgrade”.

mambacfa
75 posts
 

Start by buying on resale, not retail. Your $12K USD or 10K GBP can get you a world-class vinyl setup. I have a Garrard 401 with a Dynavector XV-1s MC cartridge, a Fidelity Research 64 tonearm and an Einstein dual-mono balanced phono preamp and I paid $7K USD (less than 6K GBP.) I couldn't get the phono preamp at retail for that much, although I might get the tonearm and cartridge for that much at retail.

dekay's avatar
dekay
5,564 posts
 

The OP is looking for more of a "jump/exciting" sound, though with a sizable budget.

My course of action would be to optimize what he is currently using (he has a nice system which could be improved towards his goal with 10%-15% investment  of the budget towards a suitable cartridge perhaps with a step up TF if he is he truly wishes to experiment with a lower output MC cartridge).

In regard to step-up TF's,  which I mentioned before, there are more than decent used Denon's in the $300 range that would work with a variety of cartridges.

 

DeKay

grislybutter
2,997 posts
 

buying a speaker or amp or DAC used seems to be pretty safe. But I would not buy a used (more than 6-8 months old) turntable or CD player.

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