What £20k system would you chose against this criteria?

Dominic,

I think you are going in the right direction. Find a good patient dealer and use them. SoM are ideal and they have a buy back facility. They have one of the widest selections of hifi and with 8 listening rooms more than enough variations. John will ensure that you get what YOU want.

About 10 years ago (during to some very boring cirumstances) I went out to buy £20K of hifi. The 2 local dealers were very keen to sell but could not put together a system. They let me hear a £10K set up and then said the £20K must be better And you will have to go to the manufacturers to hear it

Basically they were operating at the other end of the market (but were bespoke hifi dealers).

I also doubt there are many people here who have heard a decent £20K set up in a domestic environment. You have every right to demand an excellent system that looks really good and will blend in with your domestic requirements.

That therefore excludes the Cambridge CDPs and Squeeze-box SB3s. They are OK (and not much more) but easily outclassed. Some of what has been recommended is a little down-market for what you can expect to get (especially if second-hand).

I suggest you continue with SoM and maybe take some of the better recommendations to John. He is a pretty straight guy (but obviously interested in your wallet .)

Do keep us up to date with how your lucky venture is going and don't agonise it, it should be fun.

 

Be careful though, the expense isn't always justified. As Peter Daniel said "I will show you a better example of BS."

£150 Pioneer DVD Player:



£6000 Goldmund Eidos 18:

 

haha thats brilliant... have they actually changed anything to justify the £6000?

i remember a chap took apart a cyrus dad1 and found inside, the innards of a cheap panasonic portable cd player.

 

That is pretty special,

 

Hahaha...the biggest joke ever...

An award should be issued here. Regretfully there are other examples.

Gerner

 

There doesn't seem to be a power transformer in the Pioneer It must be more eco friendly!

Beautiful example Shin

 

Quite.

Tenson - the brown Panasonic board is an SMPS. Looks like Goldmund just add a small isolation transformer - sorry, 'Goldmund 'Sweeter' circuitry' before it. Bizarre.

 

I see, said the blind man...

 

Great spot. I hope there arent any ZGers who upgraded from a Pioneer to a Goldmund If I had Id be sick!

Armed with this new info I have a perfect solution those with £20K to spare and want to approach studio standards

rebadged of course


Andy

 

Wow, thats a cool product! Check yo self before yo wreck yoself, word!

 

Can we make the Goldmund / Pioneer a sticky? Call it 'High end uncovered' or something?

 

What 20k setup? Mine...

 

i'm presuming you've got the house / space to put this so...
i'd go for active funktion 1 p2's, these are purple monstrosities however if aesthetics are all i'd pay a competent fabricator to make me some custom enclosures to hide the 'nastiness', personally i think they look rather funky.
source would be the network transport of your choice (squeezebox, eva, whatever) some hooning great storage server (a cheap pc or nas box with a few terrabytes in it)
dac would be audio synthesis dax discrete variable.
if there's any spare cash left over i'd look into modding the net transport to use a/s's custom clock / data link. i'm sure david at a/s could sort you out.
wires would be whatever.
a decent power block would top it off - there are some good ones from china.

that's pretty much my dream system.

 

I was with you there right up until you mentioned the B&W 802's.

 

Amazing things these new fandangled computers eh? Don't worry you'll get the hang of it.

 

Me too!!!

Still I agree with you absolutely about ignoring the mags and listening for yourself.

 

I third that.

The 801s are worse and the 800sszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

 

shure but do you have space for a set of sig 800 in your home
801's are not far behind in sound and so easy to live with

as you can see my computer skills out with crestron and lutron programing is prity bad hence the bad pic links
life is a learning curve lol

 

ok let me go over my mess up
the 800's are in abbey road
801's are big and nead alot of power
802's are the best of the 800's in a more friendly size
in the original post true clarity and repoduction is what hes after the 802's do this with the bonnec set up at least abby road think so with the 800's

 

I suggest he listens to them, his experience may be different to mine..

I do agree with Abbey Studios on the amps though Classe do make a nice solid amp that sounds really sweet. Haven't hear (or heard of) Bonnec.