Advice please on up to $10k to upgrade pre amp, dac, phono, and power amp


I'm looking for advice on where to start looking for upgrading my system.

Planning to keep my sources & speakers.
  • Source 1: Roon from a media PC
  • Source 2: Turntable from Vinyl Nirvana (link) w/ Denon 103r LOMC cart
  • Speakers: Monitor Audio Gold 300
  • S/W: Monitor Audio Good W15
Up for discussion on upgrading:
  • Phono Stage: SimAudio LP3.5
  • Pre Amp: Parasound Halo P5
  • Amp: Emotiva XPA-200
Other Notes: I currently use the DAC built into the P5.  I also us MiniDsp ddrc-22a for room correction & to integrate the subwoofer.

I'm willing to put around 10k to this upgrade (give or take).  Some brands I have been eyeing are: Pass Labs, Simaudio, Mytek.  But I have not auditioned any of them (frankly don't find auditioning in store very helpful).

Happy to take some suggestions!


otherones

Showing 1 response by jond

I went ahead and read a bit about your speakers, they sound like they are not especially hard to drive. In the Absolute Sound review they mention driving your speakers with an Air Tight ATM-1S a really nice tube amp from Japan. I owned the prior model the ATM-1 for about a year and quite liked it. Not sure your comfort level with tubes but I  browsing the listings and saw this:

https://www.audiogon.com/listings/tube-a-reference-tube-amplifier-2018-01-06-amplifiers

That is the Air Tight ATM-2 the big brother of the amp mentioned in the review putting out 80 wpc more than enough to drive your speakers effortlessly. It also has two inputs, one of them with a volume control. Looks like a very reputable seller, I have no affiliation of any kind, and he's selling the amp for $5350, it's $15K new. You could use the amp with your P5 at least temporarily and you have $4650 of your budget It also gives you some flexibility with the volume control if you need to be without a preamp for any reason. Just one suggestion I thought might work as always YMMV. Good luck!