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March 23, 2015 - 4:18am
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Marantz PM8005 or PM-14S1
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I would recommend the Arcam A19, which goes for $999 from Audio Advisor and others.
I am sure it has all the power you need for your speakers (90w at 4 ohms) and I think it will sound better than either of the Marantz amplifiers (which are OK, but the Arcam sounds better IMO).
Another really excellent one is the Musical Fidelity M3i, which goes for $1499.
Thanks for the suggestion.
I've demoed many amps and speakers.
I personally do not like Arcam, good amps but not for me. Not tried Musical Fidelity though.
I like Marantz but not sure what one to go for. £650 or £1700.
I like your question. When I was shopping for integrated amps, my question was "how much should I spend on amplification relative to how much I spent on my speakers?" I asked the question at a local dealer and the response was interesting. Better amplification is going to make a good speaker sound better but there is a point of diminishing returns.
Those Quads are nice speakers. Everyone who has them seems to love them and you will hear a difference in clarity between the PM8005 and the PM-14si. Is going to be 2.6x clearer to justify the upspend....probably not. It will sound better, but you won't be getting the most out of the PM-14si.
The differentiating factor for me is how long you plan to keep those speakers. I personally would get the PM8005 if I was planning on keeping the Quads for a long time.
If you are planning on upgrading the speakers in the near future, I would get the nicest amp I could and the PM-14si is a very nice amp. In the latter case, I would probably reverse the process and buy the speakers first and then choose the amp so that I was certain my amp would be adequate to drive my speakers but that is not always possible. Incidentally, I didn't follow my own advice and bought my integrated prior to upgrading speakers and it has worked out extremely well.
One other thought, you might want to look at the Rega Elex R. 90w of power into 6 ohms which is the nominal impedance on those quads should provide plenty of power unless you are in a huge room. According to WhatHiFi it should be about 900 pounds.
Check out the review here as it is the award winner for best stereo amp in its price range.
http://www.whathifi.com/rega/elex-r/review
I recommend this unit because I am a huge fan of Marantz and Rega is one of the few brands I like even better. I have 4 systems in my house, 2 are powered by Marantz, 1 by Denon and the final has a Rega Brio R in it. The Brio R is probably light on power for your speakers unless you are in a small room, but the sound profile is extremely similar. Rega makes super detailed and very neutral amps.
One other fact, all three Rega Integrated Amps - Brio R, Elex R and Elicit R have won awards for best in price class since 2012.
Thanks bierfeldt.
There are better speakers than my Quad 21L2's but after lot's of demoing over the years, nothing really stands out to me as being worth the cost of an upgrade. I've demoed up to around £5000.00 speakers, and they are good, but all have pro's and con's.
Examples: ProAc, Harbeth, Monitor Audio, Dali, PMC, Sonus Faber, and others that I can't remember. I've owned Spendor, Mission, Castle, Von Schweikert and B&W. I've had various amps too – Denon, Cyrus, vintage Quad – and I don't think any of them have got the best from any of my speakers. I've also demoed many makes of amplifier.
I'm planning on keeping my Quad 21L2's for a long time so want to get the best from them without spending silly money.
I'll try to get a home demo of the PM8005 and if it does what I want then that will be that.
Let us what you decide ultimately. Good luck,
Update.
I've tried using digital coaxial from 751BD to Denon to allow the Denon to do the decoding.
This has made a noticeable improvement.
Music sounds similar but the bass is a bit better and the mid/high frequency compression/brightness is gone. I can now listen without fatigue and there is more realism to instruments and voices. I have not level matched so it could be to do with volume. I have to turn the amp up a bit more to get the same perceived volume, but without a meter I cannot be sure.
I still might home demo the Marantz amps but I now think the Denon is much better than I thought and might be more than adequate for my needs.
I can get the following for under £1500. CA Streammagic 6 v2, balanced connectors, CA Azur 651W Power Amp, QED silver An XT biwire and Tannoy Precision 6.2 speakers. Is it worth going for or can someone suggest something better for the budget
Finally moved a few weeks ago.
New room is about 11×13 feet but the acoustics are great.
No or very little echo, bass is fine when volume turned up.
Something I noticed when demoing amplifiers was the upper midrange was different between low powered and higher powered amps.
Lower powered amps sounded flat but higher power amps has a 'soaring' but smooth quality to them (difficult to explain). Noticed particularly with vocals and panpipes. Turning the lower powered amps up did not not change this so I don't think it was a volume issue. Possibly the lower powered amps lacked control?
I get this quality with my current room and system, so my amp must be controlling my speakers properly so why 'upgrade'?
An amplifier upgrade might help with the bass a little but I'm not sure I can justify the outlay now as it sounds really good as it is.
After a few weeks of enjoying my system in my new place I've begun to notice a distortion in what I think is the midrange. It is a graininess mainly with vocals.
I hear it with all souces and at all volumes with both analogue RCA and digital using the Denon DAC.
It seems worse via the 751BD analogue outputs.
Could it be the Denon not controlling my speakers properly, or an inherant issue with the speakers?
I demoed Cambridge Audio Azur 851a amplifier.
Without going into too much detail, it does a very good job.
I am tempted to get this amp instead of either the Marantz or Icon Audio amps I have been considering.
Bought an amp.
Abrahamsen V2.0 UP