New Member - please help me build a rig

Thanks again for the responses. I finally have a few minutes to get online this morning, which is a welcome change from drying out a house submerged in flood water for the last 5 days. It looks as though the metro area(New Orleans) will rebuild a little faster than all of the doomsday reporters have been reporting. I may be purchasing some equipment within the next 2 to 3 months! I have learned a great deal from reading the posts on this forum and enjoy the hospitality. I look foreward to everyone's advice as I finally begin to build my first true hi-fi rig.
Thanks in advance to all who help with input--it is greatly appreciated. I will post more detailed questions in the weeks to come as I get closer to choosing amps, preamps, cd, dvd, analog tables, etc.

Pepe Lafourcade
New Orleans, LA

take it slow,reeeeeeeel slow,do not be in a rush to put a rig together,research what gear you want then research the average sale prices of said gear & dont pay anything above market value for anything,what you may think is going to be a peice of gear thats a keeper for life may very well be the peice you cant stand so buy smart & sell even smarter.

another thing is the reviews in magazines,totally worthless,stay away from them at all costs,they word these reviews in some form of martian language that only the most experienced double talker could even begin to fathom,try to audition as much gear as possible before buying anything.

mike.

yeah, i'm really sorry, hang in there, it can only get better !!!

Best wishes to you!

Pepe, my heart goes out to you and all those who have been affected by this terrible storm and its aftermath. I hope you are soon able to think again about an audio system.

Thanks for the responses. I will address this topic again in about 6 months as my life has just been turned upside down by Katrina--I live in New Orleans.

Thanks again,
Pepe Lafourcade

That rotel pre/pro is the weak link in that setup, i would have to agree. BTW, if you're looking for an excellent match up with the scoutmaster, take a serious look at the dynavector p-75, especially if you're going to use a dynavector cartridge.

Cajunpepe, this is a little hard to respond to since your question is so huge and unspecific. You have already made up your mind about a lot of your gear, too. If you wanted suggestions for a phono stage, for example, you could just post on that subject and you might get more responses.

I personally have never done what you seem to be proposing to do, that is, buy all the gear and then play it all together and see if you like it. Perhaps I have the wrong impression. Maybe you have heard your speakers with the Cary V12s--that's a nice amp, and should be able to drive almost anything. Maybe you have heard your source and preamp together...

( It has been very rare that I bought more than one component at a time. Whenever I did buy a component, I always had the sound of my current system in mind and a notion of how I wanted it improved. Each new piece was a step towards a goal, and luckily I had the sound of much better systems to refer to along the way. )

It looks as though you're sitting there with some very nice speakers and a Rotel pre/pro and you don't know how they sound together, let alone with the other gear you have planned. Maybe I have that wrong. Please correct me if so. Anyway, to answer as well as I can given my small understanding of the situation, none of the gear on your list looks bad, and it should work together OK. I wonder if the pre/pro is at the same level of quality as the rest, but you're keeping it, you say, so I didn't say anything.

Maybe someone else can do better...