What audio system do you have, or plan on getting?

[The new erato]

I just purchased a used (mint condition) pair of these and now I need to listen to all my discs once again (oh crap):

[steve ridgway]

I just purchased a used (mint condition) pair of these and now I need to listen to all my discs once again (oh crap):

Maybe there's something you didn't quite like that these will improve just enough to make the difference .

[Harry]

I just purchased a used (mint condition) pair of these and now I need to listen to all my discs once again (oh crap):

Which brand is that Erato?

[The new erato]

It's the Sonus Faber Elipsa SE. They were originally brand new in 2015 (and I listened misty eyed to them at the dealer at the time), the previous owner bought them store owned i 2016 and now sold them to me (he has an even heftier and newer Sonus faber set as his prime loudspeakers so they are well taken care of and not much used).

They will replace a 12 year old first generation Vienna Beethoven set as speakers in my living room (and at 5 times the cost of those at original list price). At 550 x 1250 x 420 mm they are rather hefty.

[Harry]

Its not the Starivari but it's slightly downscaled "little" brother. Though in the SE upgraded version with a lot of Stradivari Components.

I know the sound of this speaker. Sonus Faber speakers are high on my list, you did well to buy them. They look and sound fantastic. I envy you. Let me know how they sound in your listening room! Congratulations!

[Wanderer]

Its not the Starivari but it's slightly downscaled "little" brother. Though in the SE upgraded version with a lot of Stradivari Components.

Seeing the picture, I thought it was the Stradivari Homage, they're quite similar. An eventual review will be most welcome! 😎

[The new erato]

Seeing the picture, I thought it was the Stradivari Homage, they're quite similar. An eventual review will be most welcome! 😎

The Stradivari has an additional 10 inch woofer, and a more complex internal structure for the midrange unit, and is deeper and taller, but generally very similar. And even better woodworking and several additional layers of piano laquer. But I cannot imagine how they can look better than these, and I cannot imagine needing an addional 110 mms of height and approximately 100 mm of Depth......

I'll try to write some impressions in due time. In general not the most analytical speakers out there, but fabulous on perspective/soundstage and voices. And as Music is subjective and my preferences are strongly in those directions, sounds most promising to me.

[Irons]

The Stradivari has an additional 10 inch woofer, and a more complex internal structure for the midrange unit, and is deeper and taller, but generally very similar. And even better woodworking and several additional layers of piano laquer. But I cannot imagine how they can look better than these, and I cannot imagine needing an addional 110 mms of height and approximately 100 mm of Depth......

I'll try to write some impressions. In general not the most analytical speakers out there, but fabulous on perspective/soundstage and voices. And as Music is subjective and my preferences are strongly in those directions, sounds most promising to me.

Fine speakers with an enviable reputation. Are they a difficult load for amp?

[The new erato]

They are considered relatively amp friendly and pretty effective.

[SurprisedByBeauty]

I just purchased a used (mint condition) pair of these and now I need to listen to all my discs once again (oh crap):

Note to self: Must find an excuse to come back to Norway, soon. 

[Ratliff]

You've got $20k to drop on a whim for a pair of speakers. The pandemic is treating you well, my friend. 

[The new erato]

Used. Half that. 

They popped up in the neighbourhood and knew it was now or never....

[Harry]

Used. Half that. 

They popped up in the neighbourhood and knew it was now or never....

Its a good deal you made. I have listened to these speakers at a friend of mine, and i was pretty impressed by what I heard.

[DaveF]

I'm hoping for some advice from the experts here.  Last time I bought a hi-fi system, it was made up of a CD player, amp and speakers, and there may even have been a cassette deck in there.  Now I have probably more than half of my music as downloads, and my entire collection, downloads and 2000+ CDs, ripped to a hard drive.  And I'm almost completely ignorant about how to set up a system to play these.  I gather from reading online (which however quickly seems to plunge me deeper than I would like into technology) that I need a DAC plugged into my PC, with possibly another bit of the same DAC plugged into a receiver.  Can I do this wirelessly, with the PC/drive in one room and the receiver 10m away in another?  And all wireless receivers I look at also seem to have streaming capabilities for Spotify, Amazon Music etc, which I'm not too bothered about - really I just want to play the stuff off my hard drive.  And recommendations for specific equipment would be welcome too - possibly with the whole system in the 3-4 figures bracket, rather than 5.  Thanks all in anticipation.

[Todd]

d recommendations for specific equipment would be welcome too - possibly with the whole system in the 3-4 figures bracket, rather than 5.

You may want to consider either a network streamer or an optical disc player that has a USB input. 

For streamers, something like Cocktail Audio (https://www.audioadvisor.com/prodinfo.asp?number=COX14) or Cambridge Audio (https://www.cambridgeaudio.com/usa/en/products/hi-fi/cx-series-2/cxn) might fit the bill.  For an optical player, something like Panasonic might work (https://shop.panasonic.com/audio-and-video/blu-ray-and-dvd-players/blu-ray-disc-players/DP-UB9000.html).

In both cases, if you copy your downloads to an external HDD, you can then connect the HDD to the streamer/player and listen in your main system.  Plus you'll have a backup of your downloads.

I advise against wireless audio if sound quality is a high priority. 

[Fëanor]

I'm hoping for some advice from the experts here.  Last time I bought a hi-fi system, it was made up of a CD player, amp and speakers, and there may even have been a cassette deck in there.  Now I have probably more than half of my music as downloads, and my entire collection, downloads and 2000+ CDs, ripped to a hard drive.  And I'm almost completely ignorant about how to set up a system to play these.  I gather from reading online (which however quickly seems to plunge me deeper than I would like into technology) that I need a DAC plugged into my PC, with possibly another bit of the same DAC plugged into a receiver.  Can I do this wirelessly, with the PC/drive in one room and the receiver 10m away in another?  And all wireless receivers I look at also seem to have streaming capabilities for Spotify, Amazon Music etc, which I'm not too bothered about - really I just want to play the stuff off my hard drive.  And recommendations for specific equipment would be welcome too - possibly with the whole system in the 3-4 figures bracket, rather than 5.  Thanks all in anticipation.

There are many options ...

For my part I prefer a dedicated Windows PC, (rather than streamer), to play my ripped music files because I like to use the Foobar2000 music player.  The PC is a "mini" PC that resides in the same room as the rest of my system and I can add to my playlist on the fly.  All you need to play music files is a cheap mini-PC or cheap laptop -- I'm not persuaded that streamers are good value in general though lots of people like them.

My dedicated PC in connected to the Internet so I can access Internet radio and any Internet-based streaming service that I might prefer.

In turn the PC feeds a DAC the feeds my amplifier.  I have a CD player, (which I rarely use), that is connected to the DAC, (since the standalone DAC is superior to the CD player's). I also have old AM/FM tuner that is also connected directly to my amplifier.

See the diagram of my arrangement ...

[steve ridgway]

I copy my music files via USB to an AK Jr music player which plays all sorts of formats through headphones or line output cable into the input of an external amplifier. So it's portable, doesn't need a computer to be running and the sound won't be interrupted by whatever else the computer might do. There are a number of different players available and you'd need to look at storage capacity (some will take micro SD cards), formats supported, line output and quality of the inbuilt DAC.

[Daverz]

I'm hoping for some advice from the experts here.  Last time I bought a hi-fi system, it was made up of a CD player, amp and speakers, and there may even have been a cassette deck in there.  Now I have probably more than half of my music as downloads, and my entire collection, downloads and 2000+ CDs, ripped to a hard drive.  And I'm almost completely ignorant about how to set up a system to play these.  I gather from reading online (which however quickly seems to plunge me deeper than I would like into technology) that I need a DAC plugged into my PC, with possibly another bit of the same DAC plugged into a receiver.  Can I do this wirelessly, with the PC/drive in one room and the receiver 10m away in another?  And all wireless receivers I look at also seem to have streaming capabilities for Spotify, Amazon Music etc, which I'm not too bothered about - really I just want to play the stuff off my hard drive.  And recommendations for specific equipment would be welcome too - possibly with the whole system in the 3-4 figures bracket, rather than 5.  Thanks all in anticipation.

There are many ways to do this and many different software approaches, but my preferred one for the last 12 years has been the "squeezebox" system.  This consists of a server (Logitech Media Server or LMS) that streams the music on the hard drive to to a client that feeds the DAC.  Small devices like the Raspberry Pi (RPi) are popular for running the client.  This is all pretty much plug-and-play.

An example of how this would work:

- Install LMS on your PC.  It will ask you for the location of your music files and scan them.
- "Burn" the client software to a miniSD card (I prefer piCorePlayer for this, but there are several other choices) and insert it into the RPi.
- Plug the RPi ethernet into your wireless router.  Power it up, find it on the network, and navigate to the piCorePlayer config website to set the wireless password.  You can now use it wirelessly.
- Plug the RPi into a USB DAC connected to your receiver and power it up.
- For a nice modern music playback interface that can be used on mobile phones, tablets, and laptops, install the Material Skin plugin in LMS.

For a high quality USB DAC, I suggest the Topping E30 ($130).

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/topping-e30-dac-review.12119/

Total cost should only be a little over $200 with shipping.

Links:

LMS package: http://downloads.slimdevices.com/nightly/?ver=7.9
piCorePlayer: https://www.picoreplayer.org/
Raspberry Pi starter kit: https://www.pishop.us/product/raspberry-pi-4b-starter-kit/ (I recommend the 2G version)
Topping E30 USB DAC: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0865GJLB5

[Mandryka]

I advise against wireless audio if sound quality is a high priority.

That's interesting. I've heard that said for Bluetooth but never for WiFi.

I have three systems, two connected to a media server with Ethernet and one wirelessly with WiFi. I may play around some time and see if I can hear any differences.

[Mandryka]

I'm hoping for some advice from the experts here.  Last time I bought a hi-fi system, it was made up of a CD player, amp and speakers, and there may even have been a cassette deck in there.  Now I have probably more than half of my music as downloads, and my entire collection, downloads and 2000+ CDs, ripped to a hard drive.  And I'm almost completely ignorant about how to set up a system to play these.  I gather from reading online (which however quickly seems to plunge me deeper than I would like into technology) that I need a DAC plugged into my PC, with possibly another bit of the same DAC plugged into a receiver.  Can I do this wirelessly, with the PC/drive in one room and the receiver 10m away in another?  And all wireless receivers I look at also seem to have streaming capabilities for Spotify, Amazon Music etc, which I'm not too bothered about - really I just want to play the stuff off my hard drive.  And recommendations for specific equipment would be welcome too - possibly with the whole system in the 3-4 figures bracket, rather than 5.  Thanks all in anticipation.

What Daverz said is what I think, but note that you won't get amazon music with it. I'm sure there is a way, but I don't know it.