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Starting out - KEF R3 or Integrated Amps?

Sputnik

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Bowers and Wilkins doesn’t make a lot of money by selling amps and sources, yet they recommend investing only one third of your total investment in speakers.
They do own Rotel and Classé.

Now if you are talking about a full systeem, pre amp, power amp, cd player, dac, streamer, turntable, phono pre, ... The speakers shouldn't be over 1/3rd, but that's not really the case here.

So get the R3 if those are the speakers you like, get a 2nd hand amp on the cheap, or an Aiyiama/Topping/..., and enjoy the R3's. It will already sound so much better than the soundbar.
 

AnalogSteph

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Beyond a certain level, price is a relatively poor metric of device performance, besides it also depends on some unrelated factors like economy of scale (the more of something you can make, the more cost-effective it becomes). An amplifier has to get the job done, i.e. approximate a "wire with gain" at the SPLs required. If the frequency response is sufficiently flat, you can't hear any noise or distortion and you never hit its power limits at your listening levels, that's good enough. You can spend more for better parts quality or improvements in other parameters just for the feelgood factor, but is it going to sound any better? Nope.

For many folks with typical bookshelves in a near to midfield setup and without extreme level needs, the point of diminishing return may be a Yamaha A-S301 or a Topping PA5 (ca. $350 - you can get away substantially cheaper still on the used market). Amplifiers are at a high enough level that a half-decent one will generally perform fine. The spread among speakers is way, way greater. Finding two amplifiers that sound the same under normal circumstances is not a truly major challenge, but try the same with speakers and it's a much different story.
 

regan

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Hello All,

First of all thank you for Amir and rest of the ASR crew and contributors on here. I have found this forum to be extremely useful as I begin the journey.

Bit of a dilemma and I wanted to seek some feedback from you.

Current Setup:
Sonos Arc and my usage is about 60:40 on music to movies.
No vinyl - mostly streaming audio.

Future Plan: my end goal is to build a solid 2.1 setup

Since I can't find all the funding needed for the whole system right now, I want to build this out within a year. And here's what I am thinking so far for this:

Option 1: Buy KEF R3 on sale now and buy the amp later. Speakers will sit in the box until I get the amp. Trying to take advantage of the sale that's going on now essentially.

Option 2: Buy amp now (Max: $1500) and a cheap Sony SSCS5 ($89 pair) and then upgrade to the KEF R3 later (if still on sale). If not, I am thinking of the KEF LS50 Meta instead.

What do you all think I should do? I am trying to stick to the budget for the entire system and distribute the expense over a year and buy quality pieces and be done with this.

Anything I am missing? Thanks all!
What amp did you buy in the end?
 
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mmi

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I’d recommend you think about getting the Sonos amp. It has plenty of power, proper bass management (impossible to find at its price bracket), and loudness control which is very beneficial for low level listening. Plus then you extend your existing Sonos config and can add a sub down the track relatively easily if you want (the Kef R3 are a bit bass shy IMO).
 

regan

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I’d recommend you think about getting the Sonos amp. It has plenty of power, proper bass management (impossible to find at its price bracket), and loudness control which is very beneficial for low level listening. Plus then you extend your existing Sonos config and can add a sub down the track relatively easily if you want (the Kef R3 are a bit bass shy IMO).
Wouldnt a Ncore 252/502 be better?
 

mmi

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Wouldnt a Ncore 252/502 be better?
Not sure… the Amp has the same power as a 252 roughly, a transparent DAC, Airplay 2, proper dsp bass management, plus all the bells and whistles of the Sonos ecosystem and app (voice control, multi room + grouping) which OP is already part of. The only downside is unavoidable latency.
 
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