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How cheap can you go and still be happy with the sound?

I would think many guys on this forum are spoilt by the gear they have and never listen anymore on cheap rigs.

I was listening recently on my younger daughter’s PC audio rig and got reminded again of how good it sounds. There is a fairly high level of clarity, detail, tonal balance and great bass in this rig.

 

- Yamaha HS8 powered monitors: $700 to $800

- Yamaha WXC-50 MusicCast streamer+dac+preamp: $450, often found on A4L for around $300

- Audioquest Powerquest PQ3 (was around $200 or so)

 

IMO, this would qualify as a high quality (sonically) charity price hifi rig for any younger or older person w.r.t small room nearfield or midfield listening.

 

What is the cheapest rig that has brought you happiness these days?

 

deep_333
limomangus's avatar
limomangus
1,418 posts
 

Now that I'm retired  and I'm 72 ,my system that would add up to about $5,000.Will be my last system I think it sounds great. But I guess as far as audiogon guys think it not good at all.I think it sounds great and that's all that matters to me.

doni
347 posts
 

Wiim Amp and Klipsch Rp600M speakers work very well in the garage.

 

tubeguy76
150 posts
 

It's really hard to say, there are some great affordable pieces of gear out there and they're getting better and better as time goes on.  I would be happy with a $5000 integrated and a $3000 - $5000 set of speakers.  I'd get a decent streaming DAC and call it a day.  Maybe another $1000 - $2000 for that.

What I've woken up to is that I have accumulated a number of mid-tier gear that had I just saved my money, I could have bought a higher-end piece.  Then again, it's hard to know what you like or don't like unless you try a lot of things.  Thank God for used gear - at least I can sell this stuff without much loss.

 

secretguy
1,686 posts
 

You can get pretty great sound for not a lot of $ these days. Maybe THIS is the Golden Age.

bassdude
488 posts
 

The price of your equipment bears little relationship to the sound it may produce. While it may be a "general principal" that the more the equipment cost the better it will sound... it... does not mean there are no exceptions - there are many!

I bought a $700 Class D. Audio amp a few years ago (SDS-470C Class D Audio Power Amplifier - 300 watts / channel at 8 ohms), and it drives my $1000 Maggie LRS+ speakers to "audio Nirvana."

That’s about as "cheap" as you can get for great sound! Though, I am using a Bryston BDP & BDA as the source.

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