Hi -

After years of putting up with a gradually-dying twelve year old Aiwa midi
system, I'm thinking about picking up my first basic seperates system.
I've been reading around, and I plan to buy from Richer, because most of
the HiFi shops in Bristol tend to start rather significantly further up
the foodchain. I've also looked in a second-hand shop, but the only thing
that stood out as a possible bargain was a late Arcam Alpha for 100GBP;
everything else was ~50GBP per component and seemed to be in poor
condition and/or fairly unremarkable. :-]

My budget is somewhat flexible, but I don't want to spend more just for
the sake of it; I'd want fairly tangible increase in performance,
reliability/longevity or features (or all three!). My music tastes are
fairly diverse. I'd be lying if I didn't admit that a lot of it is
downtuned Metal of various sub-genres, but I also listen to some prog,
some jazz, some folk/acoustic/female vocals, and some classical. I
generally prefer a slight boost to low bass (300Hz), and a higher boost
to high treble (4kHz) so I can hear percussion clearly.

I'd welcome the group's collective input on the following systems. On all
systems, I plan to use a basic Teac V377 or W600 tape deck (for ad-hoc
recordings and access to my remaining few old tapes), a Cambridge M1+
learning remote control, and the turntable from my old midi (which has a
built-in phono preamp). Most of my music is on CD, but some will doubtless
come from my iRiver H3xx MP3 player (192-256Kbps VBR encoded using LAME),
and possibly a MythTV HTPC I'm thinking of building.

System 1
Teac AG790 Amp/Receiver
Cambridge CD36 CD Player
Gale Mini Monitor MkII Speakers
(I bought these a few years ago as an upgrade)

System 2
Cambridge 540A Amp
Cambridge 540Cv2 CD Player
Mordaunt-Short MS902i Speakers
(the above is a bundle deal Richer are running right now, for the price
of the amp and CD player alone)

System 3
NAD C352CT Amp
Cambridge CD36
KEF Qcompact or Wharfedale Diamond 9.1 Speakers

System 4
NAD 320BEE Amp
Cambridge CD36
KEF Qcompact or Wharfedale Diamond 9.1

My thinking is that whilst CD mechanisms wear out and get superseded,
amps and speakers essentially last forever if treated reasonably, and
therefore I probably won't regret investment in either of those two
components. Also, from playing electric guitar, I remember that the most
significant improvement in my sound came from an upgrade to my amp and
speaker, rather than the guitar or any effects units.

Thanks in advance,
Alex.
--
Alex Butcher Brainbench MVP for Internet Security: www.brainbench.com
Bristol, UK Need reliable and secure network systems?
PGP/GnuPG ID:0x5010dbff http://www.assursys.com/