Looking for amp recommendations under £1000 ($1300)

[AlfieFroud]

Hey everyone
I planned on getting the A90 but due to it having issues with RCA input it’s not going to suitable for me as I’ll be hooking up a DAC to the XLR inputs and a turntable to the RCA inputs.
Has anyone got any recommendations for a dedicated amp under £1000 ($1300)?

 

[3125b]

It doesn't have issues to my knowledge, but with the unbalanced inputs ground loops could occur.
What features are you looking for? What are the other devices in the chain exactly?

 

[AlfieFroud]

It doesn't have issues to my knowledge, but with the unbalanced inputs ground loops could occur.
What features are you looking for? What are the other devices in the chain exactly?

Yeah it’s the ground loops I’m referring to, I should have mentioned that in my original question.
I’m looking for one that has balanced input as well as a RCA in. It’s got to have balanced output as well. They’re the only features I need. It will be connected to either a SMSL SU-9 or D90 DAC. I will also be connecting phono stage which will be connected to a turntable, I won’t be purchasing that until after Christmas though so undecided on model.

 

[AnalogSteph]

As long as the phonopre has a floating power supply as a vast majority of them should, I don't see any problems.

(BTW, when listening to vinyl on headphones you better have a quiet low-rumble turntable, clean vinyl and a well-adjusted cartridge with good channel balance. That's not low standards. I'd generally prefer listening to previously recorded and tweaked vinyl rips if possible. BTW, if you have any mono records, try running them through foo_dsp_centercut - it eliminates surface noise and out-of-phase distortion substantially better than a plain L+R sum in my experience.)

 

[AlfieFroud]

As long as the phonopre has a floating power supply as a vast majority of them should, I don't see any problems.

(BTW, when listening to vinyl on headphones you better have a quiet low-rumble turntable, clean vinyl and a well-adjusted cartridge with good channel balance. That's not low standards. I'd generally prefer listening to previously recorded and tweaked vinyl rips if possible. BTW, if you have any mono records, try running them through foo_dsp_centercut - it eliminates surface noise and out-of-phase distortion substantially better than a plain L+R sum in my experience.)

Is there a specific turntable you recommend? My budget is under £1000 for the turntable and cartridge. I would prefer to purchase a new turntable rather than vintage.

 

[Lero]

Take a look at Flux amps, on paper Flux Fa-10 pro is endgame in my opinion, but unfortunately no measurements.

 

[AnalogSteph]

Is there a specific turntable you recommend? My budget is under £1000 for the turntable and cartridge. I would prefer to purchase a new turntable rather than vintage.

I haven't seriously looked at new turntables in years, but the performance I'd be shooting for would be approximately Dual 617 / 627 or upper midrange Technics level or similar (Denon, whatever)... a quiet, quartz-locked direct drive with a decent arm, subchassis not a priority if you're primarily on headphones (shock isolation is most important for live speaker playback). Unfortunately most of these seem to be either long discontinued or $$$ (though a Technics SL-1500C + an Ortofon 2M Blue stylus upgrade should just about fit your budget). You may want to scour the VinylEngine forums for some more options. For any 'table the needs an external phonopre, make sure you get one with adjustable input capacitance if you're interested in cartridges that aren't at their best with 47 kOhm || ~350 pF (a number of higher-end ATs come to mind).