The great £500 system thread

OK,
I know Chris said no modded bits however I've given this a it of thought

1 Used pair of Kef Coda 7's Used £45-55
Better Caps/resistors for the above £38
T-amp £40 (new) uprated built psu (not fancy but far better than Stock) £50 including Box
Mods to amp £32
Used Arcam cd72 £140
internal mod cost (basic) £ 44
4m of CY mains cable from RS 79p@m £2.36
2 Tuff plugs £5
2 silver plated otto heil IEC's £14
2m of Van damme pro cable £9.50 (ic)
1 pack Eichmann Bullet plugs £25
1 pair of used (cheapo) attacama's stands used £35-£50
will make a pretty reasonable sound, and take about a week to contructed.
Sorry for cheating, the t-amp maybe only about 12ish watts, with a decent psu & a few internal tweaks can really sing and surpise a lot of equipment. Wm

 

Marantz CD63ki sig £150
Marantz Pm66ki sig £150
Mordaunt Short MS30i Classic £75 (I have ebay proof )
2nd hand Atacama SE24 £20
5m QED Original speaker wire £10
2nd hand Sonic Link Violet £25
2nd hand Sound Organisation rack £70

 

Hi Garyi,

A Linn LP12 into a NAD 3020 was a popular route choice in the early 80s. The Nad 3020 was an amp that influenced a lot of budget amps. An the upgrade path was from a Nad to either a A&R A60 or a Naim Nait or naim pre power. It was a huge seller It is good enough to show the differences between front ends. It was capable of driving a wide range of speakers. It produced good sounds.

Most of them are still going now.

SCIDB

 

Marantz CD52SE CD player – circa £50 S/H
Solid early nineties bitstream player with excellent component quality.

Rotel RC970BX Pre Amp – circa £50 S/H

Tannoy Active Reveal Monitors - £270 New
Active crossover Bi-amplified monitors.

0.5 metre interconnect CDP to Pre Amp - £20

3 metre interconnect (two single runs) - £30

Leaving £50 for stands and £30 for music!

 

Brings back memories! The Linn/NAD 3020 combo was often used to drive a pair of Videotone Minimaxes, a ridiculously cheap speaker made in Hungary.

 

Some interesting suggestions, keep em coming!

The mods now have a selection of prizes the winner can pick from too. Some of them actually aren't bad!

 

Upto little over a year ago I was happily running a system within this budget and it comprised of..........

• Garrard 401 inc. postage.....£122
• New Rega RB300.....£188
• Materials for plinth inc. squash balls.....£58
• Ortofon OM5.....£22
• Pioneer A225 amplifier.
• Kef Coda 2's.....£20

As the Garrard came as a motor unit for mounting in your own plinth anyway I will not count that as "tinkering" in this case! I have had a quick look around Ebay and the system I will submit will be......

• Garrard 401, RB300 and plinth as above, total.....£368
• I will swap the cartridge and use a Denon DL160 instead.....£70
• Some great budget amps on Ebay. A couple of Pioneer A300's at less than £15 with a day to go and a Rotel RA840BX at £7.50 with 2 days to to go. I will go with the Rotel, say £25.
• Speakers, easy. There's a pair of origional Tannoy Mercury Mk2's at £15 with a day to go. again guess at £25.

Mmmm, a quick tot up brings that out to £488 without stands or cables, so in that case go for a secondhand RB300 at say £100-120 and that will leave plenty for stands, cables and a few records to spin. Easy!
The Rotel pumps out 50 WPC and the Tannoys will give a nice big sound that you can listen to all day long. If your very lucky you may be able to find some M20 Golds, and if your toast always lands butter side up a pair of Tannoy Venus, the later a larger wood veneered cabinet with time aligned x-over, a very highly rated speaker in its day.


Paul.

 

Assuming you already have a PC....

+ EMU 0404 soundcard (£70)
+ Creek 4040/4140 amp (£70) - secondhand
+ Rega Kyte (£75) - secondhand
+ MJ Acoustics Pro 50 (< £200) - secondhand

That little lot would be about £400, enough for some decent speaker stands, slabs, and cables.

That would sound really nice IMO.

 

Again assuming you have a computer:

Squeezebox2 - £200 - new
Rega Ela - £150 - second hand
Mission Cyrus 2 - £100 - ebay
Leaves £50 for some cabling

Or a conventional system:

Naim Nait 2 - £230 - ebay
Rega Planet - £100 - ebay
Rega Ela - £150 - second hand
That leaves £20 for some Van Damme cabling or something second hand

 

thought I'd have a go myself - even though my entry is void and I cant win. Its just for fun.

QUAD 33/303 good condition £150
MAGNEPLANAR SMGa pair with oatmeal grille cloth , boxed £250
MARANTZ CD63 £30 http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=3272&item=7518193152&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW
Speaker cable – Canare £30
Interconnect – Belden Mic cable interconnect £15
£25 for music

 

In which case there are lots of good mods to be done to the CD63..

 

well I did have £25 left !

 

I'm thinking that if you're looking to keep your spending to £500 then your system mightn't be going in a 500 sq m country manor ballroom . So with that in mind and working round the small room acoustics / consideration to neighbours limitations:

Rotel RCD-1070 £300 (Hififorsale.com advert no. 51466)
Creek OBH-11 £50 (Hififorsale.com advert no. 4xxxx, though it's gone because I bought it )
Sennheiser HD600 £140 (brand new from Ask)
Bit of posh wet string from Maplins £10

Total £500, though by the time you've haggled over the CD player you could probably do a bit better than that

 

Can I have another go?

Just seen this on ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=4787&item=5778391285&rd=1

Good system for £500!

 

Sh*t! Wish I'd spotted that.

 

source 1 revox A77 £ 116
source 2 crystal set, tunning capacitor £1 ferite rod arieal £1.50, diode 20P £2.70
pre amp 50k pot £1, 6 way switch £1.50 ,1 6 way and 1 8 way phono socket £2.50 ,4 resitors 20p case £2 total £7.20
power amps 2 x bk electronics mf 100's plus case and connectors £120
speakers 2 audax ht210m's, 2 tweeters,2 8x4 sheets of mdf,roll 20 quage wire, 4 capacitors , screws and glue £150
cables 10 meters 1.5mm flex £3.00,10 meters musicflex £6, 6 phono plugs £1 , 2 1/4 jacks 50p
total £455.90

 

At the moment being the key word!

Tony.

(who will happily buy any number of good condition working A77s at a unit price of 26 quid - no quantity too great!).

 

Marantz CD62 - (Philips CD850 MKII with few cap upgrades, much underrated machine the CD62 and most important to this system has a surprisingly good variable output. Also has a nice CDM4 mech and will perform well for dac upgrade in the future)

£32 inc delivery it cost me.

Exposure power amp 2010 £249.99 inc del - not a bad price for a nice amp.
http://www.hifibitz.co.uk/product.asp?id=2274

Tannoy 611s: Great speakers these.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14993&item=5776755295&rd=1

50+25 delivery: £75

Van den hul cs122 1.7m pair (bit short but will do to get started)
£ 5.99

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=295&item=5776620672&rd=1

Inner tube and Argos/Asda granite chopping board for cd player isolation (makes a big difference)

£13+4: £17

Van den hul Thunderline IC

£35 inc delivery

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=295&item=5775132222&rd=1

£414.98 - spend the rest on some decent music or mains cabling if so desired. Or put it towards future dac/pre upgrade. Or another power amp. Alternatively could buy 2 Rotel RB971 power amps and place them close to the speakers. Could probably get 2 for £200 (saw one go for 92+del) and spend a bit more on the source.

 

That's actually a TV STAND, not a TV...

Rega Planar 3/RB300 £150
Ortofon 520 £110
Rega Ela £50 (that's what I paid for mine )
NAD 4225 FM tuner £12 (what I paid)
NAD 3020/Rotel 920AX £40-ish)
Rotel 965BX CD £30ish?
Pioneer CT339 tape £15
Target 5 tier shelf £20 from record fair (as ILockyer found out a few weeks back!)
Cheapo Cambridge Audio cables for tuner/CD/tape, twin&earth for speakers.

Job done, and 4 sources

 

OK, here's the first SACD compatible system to be listed!

Source: Pioneer 656 - £125 - eBay (used)
Amp: Audio Insititute VR-70 - £200 - eBay (used)
Speakers: B&W DM602 S2 - £125 - eBay (used)

Interconnects - Ixos 1002 - 0.5m - £15 - eBay
Cable - Gale XL315 - 4 metres - £10
Stands - Target - £25

The 656 is the best SACD source I can think of under £350 (where the Denon 2900 comes in). Its also very good with DVDA.

The Audio Institute is a 20wpc EL34 integrated with a 12AX7 pre-amp stage. Very nice, sweet sound that should calm the 656's digital glare/brightness down a tad, whilst preserving the timbre & tone and "air" that SACD delivers.

The 602's are 90dB 8Ohm sensitivity so will go loud with the VR-70's paltry 20wpc. They are excellent all-round speakers noted for their seamless driver integration and competency throughout the frequency range. Well built they are too!

DT