Have been researching a starterish 2ch+subwoofer system primarily for TV+music with no immediate plans to surround myself with speakers :). My room is about 30 feet by 12 feet with 10-11 foot ceilings. This is a manhattan apartment with thinnish walls so definitely dont need the system to be super loud but then again my ambient noise is probably on the higher end of things with police/ambulance/fire sirens blaring all the time, though i am on a 25+ floor. Have kinda narrowed it down to a few bookshelfs (B&W 685 S2, KEF Q300, Dali Zensor3/1, Monitor Audio BX2, Wharfedale 10.2 Diamonds) that I plan to audition soon. Sub woofer will likely be a (HSU or and SVS sub around $450-500) but haven't decided on whether to buy that now or wait till I test out the speakers at home for a couple of months.
The one thing I would love some inputs on is the choice of an integrated amp with an inbuilt DAC or a combo or a stereo receiver(preferably with optical in and a preamp/sub out) that costs less than $400. I will be using my TV (Samsung Hu 8550) to switch inputs for the most part and since I am going for 2ch sound here don't see that being an issue (as in I dont think I need an AV receiver).
The thing I found in my research is that it getting a good integ amp (like say a Marantz PM 6005 or NAD 356BEE+DAC) would probably cost me more than getting a 5.1/7.2 receiver like say a Denon X1100w($500ish). So while those two are probably not comparable I somewhat arbitrarily set myself a target of spending less than say $400 on the amplifier. Here are the possible candidates I found so far not in any particular order
Yamaha A-S301
Yamaha R-N301
Yamaha A-S501
Onkyo A-9050
Onkyo TX-8050
Harman Kardon HK 3770
NAD D 3020
Please let me know your thoughts/ any other options I may have missed in my research?
Have been researching a starterish 2ch+subwoofer system primarily for TV+music with no immediate plans to surround myself with speakers :). My room is about 30 feet by 12 feet with 10-11 foot ceilings. This is a manhattan apartment with thinnish walls so definitely dont need the system to be super loud but then again my ambient noise is probably on the higher end of things with police/ambulance/fire sirens blaring all the time, though i am on a 25+ floor. Have kinda narrowed it down to a few bookshelfs (B&W 685 S2, KEF Q300, Dali Zensor3/1, Monitor Audio BX2, Wharfedale 10.2 Diamonds) that I plan to audition soon. Sub woofer will likely be a (HSU or and SVS sub around $450-500) but haven't decided on whether to buy that now or wait till I test out the speakers at home for a couple of months.
The one thing I would love some inputs on is the choice of an integrated amp with an inbuilt DAC or a combo or a stereo receiver(preferably with optical in and a preamp/sub out) that costs less than $400. I will be using my TV (Samsung Hu 8550) to switch inputs for the most part and since I am going for 2ch sound here don't see that being an issue (as in I dont think I need an AV receiver).
The thing I found in my research is that it getting a good integ amp (like say a Marantz PM 6005 or NAD 356BEE+DAC) would probably cost me more than getting a 5.1/7.2 receiver like say a Denon X1100w($500ish). So while those two are probably not comparable I somewhat arbitrarily set myself a target of spending less than say $400 on the amplifier. Here are the possible candidates I found so far not in any particular order
Yamaha A-S301
Yamaha R-N301
Yamaha A-S501
Onkyo A-9050
Onkyo TX-8050
Harman Kardon HK 3770
NAD D 3020
Please let me know your thoughts/ any other options I may have missed in my research?