[rodeodude]

The title says it all. All of my current equipment is listed in my sig, except for my soundcard, which is an X-fi extreme gamer. I'm completely ignorant when it comes to this, all I want is the most for my money. Here's some information that should help:

~I'm focusing on upgrading the speaker side of my setup, but if whatever it is that I buy has a nice headphone out, that's a plus

~I'd rather keep the speakers themselves since my dad gave them to me, and my mom would probably pull the "those speakers are really nice, why do you need new ones? blah blah blah..." (although i could get away with replacing the drivers)

~It would be nice if i could still use my vinyl, but it's not a deal breaker (after all, I'll still have all my old stuff)

~I have ~400USD, but I want to get stuff that will last, and will give me the most sonic bliss for the money, so if that means spending more, I'll just mow some lawns

 

[psyllium]

What is the impedance and how many watts for those speakers?

 

[psyllium]

I like my NAD C372 amp, but they have a more budget oriented line too, with the C315BEE:
SoundStage! Equipment Review - NAD C315BEE Integrated Amplifier (6/2008)

Can be gotten for ~US$350 apparently? I'm not up on the market for amps though, this is just an option.

As a bonus, NAD headphone outputs are usually pretty damn fine.

 

[No Smoking]

. Delete please

 

[rodeodude]

Quote:

Originally Posted by psyllium /img/forum/go_quote.gif What is the impedance and how many watts for those speakers?

From what I was able to dig up, the impeadence is 6-8ohms, and the sensitivity is 86-88dbW. I forgot to include that in the first post.

If I were to get an amp, what else would I need to get it to work? Would I need a DAC and/Or a sound card with different outputs?

 

[mrarroyo]

Since you already have a set of speakers I would start w/ getting an upgraded Zero DAC w/ a built in headphone amp (upgraded op-amps to the 627) which you can get from eBay for $183 including S&H. This will provide you w/ a DAC a headphone amp, and a line out to feed the receiver/amp. See: ZERO 24/192 DAC DA CONVERTOR, HEAD AMP(Upgrade Version) - eBay (item 110275759233 end time Aug-10-08 14:00:00 PDT)

Then I would buy a vintage receiver like a Marantz, Pioneer, Yamaha, etc also from eBay. I just did a quick search and there are quite a few available that you can purchase for under $125 including S&H. The sound of the vintage units (70's through early 80's) is superb and were well made.

As you can see in this scenario you would be out $300 and you can spend the remaining $100 on IC's, music, etc. Good luck.

 

[rodeodude]

awesome, thanks for the help