New Av Amp needed
Posted by: DarkWhisper on 06 September 2014
After years of listen and not missing a beat my amp has a intermittent fault. so its time to look for a replacement.
At what price bracket should i be looking at to replace a ARCAM Alpha av50 With thanks Drew
I currently have a NAD AV and I am especially happy with it because of the good quality sound. I pass my front and sub to my Naim based system. The advantage is that they offer exchangeable modules to upgrade to new encoding standards etc. I'm currently have it gone to take care of an upgrade.
Bert,
do you also use Verity speakers for surround duties?
It took me a long time to find anything as good as my trusty AV2, but I reckon the Anthem 700 is pretty special. The ARC room correction software works very well too.
Hi Drew,
If you don't need all the bells and whistles of newer amps such as HDMI pass through, extra channels and happy with sound quality etc......
I found Arcam's customer service excellent and cost effective. My old Alpha 7 cd player (also amp and power amp), still returns a sterling service at my father-in-law's, repaired, fully 2 years out of guarantee for free by Arcam, because it was a known fault. I kept my equipment powered up, so this fault, which happened to be with the power supply didn't manifest itself beforehand. Give them a call, you never know!
Regards
Guy
I traded down from an AVR400 to a Marantz NR1604 slimline receiver on moving to Naim XS series separates for stereo duty. It has pre-out for the front pair, so that I can use the Naim XS2 as power amp for, and I still use a subwoofer for LFE. The Marantz provides the decoding and rear channels ( I no longer have a centre speaker, the stereo pair produce a sufficiently good image, and I don't have space for it any more anyway). I have to say, I'm very pleased with how this works. The Marantz has recently been upgraded to include wireless connectivity, but I use mine with a mains network and I can stream to it over the network, or use airplay. I can get internet or FM radio too although it has no DAB tuner. It was nicely discounted because of the NR1605 model release.
Actually just one other point, my system is the same as yours, Drew, except I have Motive SX 2 speakers, but also a FlatCap XS power supply for the CD5XS and my equipment is on an early Quadraspire AV table. I am going to change to the current AV table from Quadraspire, which will give me room to add the matching Marantz bluray/universal player, and put another shelf in to take the amplifier out of the Naim stack its currently in.
Dark Whisper,
My advice - park getting any AV amp. Buy an Oppo 105D, hook this into your main hifi for the fronts and buy some decent power amps for the other channels.
In my case I am using 250s for centre and rears.
Loved my AV2, but this is better.
M
Isn't the issue with Oppo pre-out into power amps type option is that whilst that is good for Bluray or DVD, it won't work for Sky HD+ for example. Oppo may have some streaming function for Netflix or similar, but I haven't checked its spec.
Anyway, what did you decide?
Isn't the issue with Oppo pre-out into power amps type option is that whilst that is good for Bluray or DVD, it won't work for Sky HD+ for example. Oppo may have some streaming function for Netflix or similar, but I haven't checked its spec.
Anyway, what did you decide?
That was indeed an issue with many Oppos but the latest models, 103D and 105D, have HMDI inputs that enable them to take a signal from a Sky HD box. A little while ago I tried a 103D at home when I was deciding whether or not to get my n-Vi repaired. The 103D worked fine with my Sky HD box.
Isn't the issue with Oppo pre-out into power amps type option is that whilst that is good for Bluray or DVD, it won't work for Sky HD+ for example. Oppo may have some streaming function for Netflix or similar, but I haven't checked its spec.
Anyway, what did you decide?
That was indeed an issue with many Oppos but the latest models, 103D and 105D, have HMDI inputs that enable them to take a signal from a Sky HD box. A little while ago I tried a 103D at home when I was deciding whether or not to get my n-Vi repaired. The 103D worked fine with my Sky HD box.
How do you find the Darby processing?
I have an Arcam AV600 in my home cinema system that I am pleased with.
Isn't the issue with Oppo pre-out into power amps type option is that whilst that is good for Bluray or DVD, it won't work for Sky HD+ for example. Oppo may have some streaming function for Netflix or similar, but I haven't checked its spec.
Anyway, what did you decide?
That was indeed an issue with many Oppos but the latest models, 103D and 105D, have HMDI inputs that enable them to take a signal from a Sky HD box. A little while ago I tried a 103D at home when I was deciding whether or not to get my n-Vi repaired. The 103D worked fine with my Sky HD box.
That's interesting, I shall take another look.
Isn't the issue with Oppo pre-out into power amps type option is that whilst that is good for Bluray or DVD, it won't work for Sky HD+ for example. Oppo may have some streaming function for Netflix or similar, but I haven't checked its spec.
Anyway, what did you decide?
That was indeed an issue with many Oppos but the latest models, 103D and 105D, have HMDI inputs that enable them to take a signal from a Sky HD box. A little while ago I tried a 103D at home when I was deciding whether or not to get my n-Vi repaired. The 103D worked fine with my Sky HD box.
How do you find the Darby processing?
I have an Arcam AV600 in my home cinema system that I am pleased with.
To be honest, on picture quality I couldn't say I noticed a difference from my 93U Oppo but then I didn't do an A/B comparison and I was more interested in sound quality. There the 103D into 3 x NAP100s had the edge over my n-Vi (and Oppo 93 into it), though I think was down to the NAP100s. What the 103 had over my 93 was the HMDI input.
I did find the 103D/NAP100 combo had a couple of fiobles, though. First, unless the system was left powered up, the NAP100s would emit a low hum when firing up. On the other hand, when left on constantly the Oppo103 would eventually lock-up on some functionality, necessitating a power-down anyway. I suspect these will be sorted by firmware updates in due course, and as the n-Vi itself locks up from time-to-time too it wouldn't have been a showstopper for me. If I wanted glitch-free AV I would have looked at the Arcams so I'm not surprised to learn you're pleased with yours.
I've just integrated an Anthem MRX510 into my Naim system for AV use. It's brilliant. The room correction software is excellent, I've never heard dialogue as good. I highy recommend it. Spud
Have been running an system HT system comprised of Anthem MX700, NAC282/2xHiCap DR/NAP250.2 for some time. Sonic bliss when 2 channel for serious listening and an absolutely dynamite setup for home theater, the MX700 supplying the power for the center and rear channels.