[Johnny Brown]

My 10 euro computer speakers bought from 'Planet Saturn' appear to have given up the ghost. Given I now do most of my music listening at my desk, I've been thinking of upgrading for a while and this now has some urgency.

I was thinking of a midi amp/ receiver plus a pair of decent small speakers. Any opinions? Are there some decent active speakers out there that I should consider instead? Is it worth getting some kind of DAC? Mostly listening on Spotify premium with a 256kbps stream, or 6 music.

Budget £100-200. It won't need to be particularly loud. I have a proper stereo downstairs with an airport.

[Jim]

just get a decent pair of active speakers, they will be at least 100% better than the planet saturn speakers.
something like these maybe:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Creative-Gigaworks-Series-Multimedia-Speakers/dp/B001IZZ2PO

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

If you can afford a bit more desk 'real estate' then something like these will probably have more bass...
http://www.amazon.co.uk/M-Audio-Studiophile-Speakers-Professional-Creation/dp/B005625CNM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1370436173&sr=8-1&keywords=m-audio+av40

[T_B]

just get a decent pair of active speakers, they will be at least 100% better than the planet saturn speakers.
something like these maybe:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Creative-Gigaworks-Series-Multimedia-Speakers/dp/B001IZZ2PO

We have some of those at work. Quite good.

I have these in the kitchen at home, which I am v pleased with http://www.amazon.co.uk/CAMB-S20-BK-Cambridge-S20-Blk/dp/B002YKFPI6

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

I have these in the kitchen at home, which I am v pleased with http://www.amazon.co.uk/CAMB-S20-BK-Cambridge-S20-Blk/dp/B002YKFPI6

Won't be long before Mini-JB will be thinking 'Oooo, shiney' and jabbing at those cones!

[T_B]

Funnily enough, that's exactly why I now have such small speakers (mini T_Bs are aged 2 and 4 months). The S20s sit on top of the kitchen cabinets  The B & Ws were sold on ebay 

[jmews]

I loved these when I had them. They always seem to be well reviewed.


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Acoustic-Energy-AE26-06B-active-speaker/dp/B000MN96T6

[Johnny Brown]

Cheers folks, found a post with some good info here too. I guess a decent pair of active speakers are the way forward, maybe with a DAC or better sound card at some point later.

[Jaspersharpe]

Good thread, although probably not good for my wallet, as I too spend most of my time listening to music through the pc. Hmm.

[Johnny Brown]

Worth adding these headphones that Obi pointed me at too: http://www.richersounds.com/product/headphones/akg/k450/akg-k450

Product of the year two years back at three times the price, I've been well impressed. Be nice to have a little DAC to plug them into now....

[Falling Down]

Bit out of the price range but I bought a Ruark Vita last year that has an integrated DAC and the difference is stark when playing Spotify premium (256kpbs) and CDs.  DAC definately makes a difference.

[Johnny Brown]

Cheers. I don't own an ipod or iphone so not really looked at docks. Since getting the airport at xmas I've been reminded about the joys of listening on a decent system, so there's always room for the budget to go up...

[Falling Down]

It has a dock but don't use it much.  There's an AUX-in that I have plugged into an Airport Express so can AirPlay from computer/phone/iPad. The CD and DAB is brilliant.  BIG sound from a relatively small unit.

[Jaspersharpe]

found a post with some good info here too.

That guy comes across as a proper cunt though doesn't he. "i-device of choice" "fave baby speaks" etc? Fuck off.

Oh hold on, was it supposed to be ironic? Fuck off some more.

[Johnny Brown]

Jasper's above reservations about him notwithstanding, I went with the advice of the internet's most respected photography journalist and bought a pair of Audioengine A2s - £150 delivered from planetgizmo.co.uk.

They look like proper speakers in miniature (~6" cubed), are reassuringly heavy, come in nice packaging (including felt carry bags) and sound great -  a tad bassy but I suspect that is in contrast to the crap we are used to hearing from computers. They go much louder than I'm likely to need. Power/ amp is built into the left speaker - rotary power/ volume on the back, it'd be easier to access if it was on the front but no biggie. The transformer is bulky and halfway up the power cable like a laptop charger.

All cables included, they are front ported so you can cram them against the wall.  I got the black ones but if you're a hopeless Apple fanboi you can get them in white too. Unlike most computer speakers they don't look like a gaming accessory, and actually look smart and adult. Minor complaint is no covers, so will have to keep little hands away from the . Though they will be the least of the problems if he ever gets on my desk...

Might buy a DAC in a year or two. Starting price seems to be £200 even for the USB sticks, I suspect it's a little test of whether you are hopeless audiophile or not. Going to investigate graphic equaliser software first - windows spotify has a plugin, but a global one would be nice.

[Johnny Brown]

Should have listened to TOP more carefully. NuForce Dac is £105, runs on USb power and doubles as a headphone amp. Sounds good.

Also found my realtek soundcard driver has a graphic equaliser built-in. Presest sound like mud though.

[Jaspersharpe]

Nice. I still say he sounds like a cunt though.

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

If you got the money these are pretty damn sexy.

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/reviews/speakers/380788/kef-x300a

http://www.kef.com/html/gb/showroom/digital_music_solutions/x300a/overview/?utm_source=KT-Consumer&utm_medium=Spotlight1&utm_content=X300A&utm_campaign=DataCleanse0613

[Obi-Wan is lost...]

Was chatting to my bro about this over the weekend. He uses a Fiio DAC with a decent pair of headphones. Highly rates it. Sounds like they are one to consider. The portable E7 is around £70, the desktop E10 is around £60. What HiFi rates them...
http://www.whathifi.com/review/fiio-e7/specs

[chris j]

Slight thread hijack - It's occurred to me now all my music is digital and sitting on an external drive attached to my laptop the only thing my nice but 10 year old Denon mini stereo gets used for is sound for the TV. I'm looking at putting in a NAS drive and moving all my media to that. Then it's finding a way of distributing the music to the stereo in the living room while still being able to put the TV sound through it (there's one twin socket input that the TV is using and an aux in 3.5mm socket). I've seen the Sonos Connect which looks like it could do the job, does anyone know if the sound quality through these is any good? I guess it would be much easier to ditch the stereo and start fresh but I'm loath to do that as it works fine and the sound quality is pretty good.

Or alternatively I suppose it will be some kind of media centre type thing that would be able to send films and music from the NAS to the TV and hence through to the stereo? (I know nothing about these things - is there a luddite smilie?)

[chris j]

No one has any ideas / experience with home network storage / media server / music distribution over wifi round the house type stuff that can drop a few pearls of wisdom? 

[butters]

No one has any ideas / experience with home network storage / media server / music distribution over wifi round the house type stuff that can drop a few pearls of wisdom? 

What you have outlined above is gradually moving up my somewhat extensive list of things to do. In theory it will be a NAS drive with DLNA software running on it connected to one of the little Onkyo mini systems via ethernet cable but it has yet to become a reality yet

[Johnny Brown]

I think there are some fairly in depth threads on NASs elsewhere on the forum, try a search?

[tomtom]

Slackers 'll be back from holiday soon..

[underground]

What you have outlined above is gradually moving up my somewhat extensive list of things to do. In theory it will be a NAS drive with DLNA software running on it connected to one of the little Onkyo mini systems via ethernet cable but it has yet to become a reality yet
[/quote]
This is exactly what I've done (how's the Readynas butters?)

I got a HP Proliant Microserver (just looked at ebuyer and they seem quite expensive now or even discontinued but mine was <£200 and came with a £100 cashback voucher), running Windows home server, with 2 1TB drives in it, (came out of the Readynas which has a proprietary OS) and I used a linux tool to read them and copy everything into the spare space having neglected to do it before flogging the box) one of which is backing up the other, and for the family photos etc. they are then automatically backed up to Crashplan, which costs bugger all (in UKB currency under 2 fuckalls a month). This connects by wire to an airport extreme (broadband comes from a super cheap router as I found they were all equally shit and failure prone)

I then have a couple of airport expresses connected (but any wifi extender would do the job) (so they all boost the wifi strength although the office one is right next to the outside wall and almost next to the main access point), one to the kitchen hifi (via optical cable) and one to the 'office' (2x2m spare bedroom) computer speakers (Creative T10s which are about £20 and sound amazing for the money especially at work or nighttime listening volumes, and are shielded, apparently), and the telly/blu ray etc. is connected by wire to an old airport extreme that I got for £20 and upgraded the firmware on to make it current and acts as a wireless repeater.

The DLNA software is Serviio, which is a free WHS plugin, and it does what I want (never really looked at it other than to point it at the right media folders) and I can browse it from the TV and importantly it and the hardware play all video formats (inc. HD) over wireless instantly with no latency or buffering.

Music wise I can browse all my folders through the TV via DLNA but otherwise haven't bothered trying anywhere else because Spotify is so handy and I just make stuff available offline if I want it when there's no signal etc, like on the train or in the motor car. I just use airplay in the kitchen or office and use the iplayer app to listen to the radio, and generally listen to Gilles Peterson's 6music show most of the week and then get stuff I liked from it on Spotify.

TBH with the airport I was happy enough using a pair of decent computer speakers in the kitchen before (Creative T20s) but I was tired of the flack I go from my lovely wife because she couldn't get radio 4 (i.e. hadn't tried to use iplayer app on her phone) and I missed playing CDs at times, so it was a perfect excuse to treat myself. I only use a little pair of Gale 3010s speakers because the party wall amplifies sound massively (I know this because the horrible c*nt of a neighbour had a chiming clock that led me to sleep in earplugs - that's not the reason he's a horrible c*nt, he absolutely is one - we had the police round because my lad kicked a ball over the fence when he was 3 to name one thing) but it does sound ace. Better than the computer speakers but mainly as they're very neutral, no bass which is ideal for keeping the noise down when the bin lids are in bed.

Hope that helps