First Hi-Fi System

That will be a very fine system. If you find the Thorens 1600 I'd suggest skipping over it and going to Vinyl Nirvana, genuine vintage Thorens tables made truly better than new. As regards the cartridge, Dave at Vinyl Nirvana is very helpful. Of course your selected Technics is pretty darned sweet, too.

 

the cornwalls are awesome and excellent for your room. the turntable is also about as good as it gets.
spending that kind of money but using the Hana EH as the primary signal generator affecting the sound quality of LPs is something that will not get the most out of your other components.
I would consider restructuring the amplifier and / or turntable to work in a top flight Low Output moving coil cartridge. This will improve dynamics, sound quality and refinement, something you will appreciate with the cornwalls.
The yamaha MC section has adequate gain but a poor load option of 50 ohms, which could make mosts MCs sound dull.
consider the 1200GR turntable and spend the savings on a decent phono preamp and cartridge, e.g. lehmann black cube se ii and audio technica ART9XI. The sound will be light years better than the original proposal.
At your kind of budget it would be a crime to go short on the cartridge and phono preamp.

 

I, too, would go tubes with the Cornwalls. I use a Line Magnetic tube integrated (with different speakers), and love it. Highly recommended.

Also, I would rethink not using a phono pre amp and the cartridge choice. Those are the two biggest influencers of the sound of LP playback and should not be overlooked. All the other gear you’re looking at is very nice, it would be a shame to bottle neck it at the source. If you don’t have room to add these to the budget, I would reallocate funds from elsewhere.

 

The Mac with a case is an old school receiver (yes, it has a tuner) with good phono sections and DAC.

 

tubes in such a large room make sense if it is a higher powered amp, e.g. a KT120 based 100 WPC like the rogue cronus magnum iii.

 

I dig Cornwall’s and tubes but I wouldn’t recommend tubes for your first system. With high efficiency speakers the real priority is a low distortion amp. And while low power will work fine, CW’s sound better with 100wpc.

The system you have planned will indeed sound fantastic. The only “problem” is the cart. If you are going that deep with the budget, it would be foolish not to get the LOMC cart. Personally, I wouldn’t get that Yamaha amp. Not that it’s bad at all but it’s way more power than you will ever come close to using. That much power with horns can be a bit hot and hard to live with. Something with a warmer sound (like tubes) would be my choice. A lower powered McIntosh SS amp is what I use with my CW’s, it sounds as good or better than every tube amp I’ve ran with with.

 

Or if you don't listen a very high levels.
I've owned mid efficient speakers coupled with 30w tube amps, the sound was very good until pushed too far.

 

Have you had this amp or spent some time with one? A first gen popped for sale locally at a very reasonable price. I really don’t need it but I’ve never had a tube amp with that much power and I’d be interested in hearing it, especially with my CW’s. My concern is the 120 tube, that hot of a tube and a printed circuit board can’t be a great idea for longevity.

 

My only recommendation is that you choose the Hana MH or SH over the EH. A phono cartridge can and will make a big difference.

 

i had the second gen cronus magnum for about 4 years and it sounded awesome. i had one KT120 go out after 2 1/2 years of solid use, replaced all 4 and kept the three good ones as spares.
no reliability issues. i swapped in seemingly dozens of small signal tubes and combinations giving the tube sockets a challenging workout. the PCB and sockets are well supported, i wailed on them and emailed rogue how impressed i was at their ruggedness.
sound is exceptional, no hum or hiss through the speakers but the preamp tube needs to be low noise.
you do hear some transfomer hum standing over the amp
a spacious open sound stage and lots of bass impact. would be a perfect match with heritage series.

 

If

meters are your thing, I'd check out McIntosh MA5300.

 

It sounds like you have a great plan.

Just a couple of thoughts:

1. Call around to some dealers. Make appointments and go listen to a few different things. Online reviews are great, but they are no replacement for hearing different things in person. If you don't have any higher end dealers near you, take a weekend trip. $1000 spent on a weekend trip is money well spent when you are thinking of spending $15k. Also, bring your own music to the demo.

2. I agree with your assessment of vintage. I did the vintage thing. It has it's moments (I still have the vintage Marantz), but going new was the best thing I ever did in this hobby. The wife and I listen to 25-35 albums a month. Everything just works.

3. Read #2 again. So I actually do have one vintage piece in the setup - a Thorens TD125 with a SME 3009. I got it for $800 on ebay 8 years ago as a 40th birthday present to myself. I freaking love this turntable. I have a Grado gold cartridge. It sounds fantastic. But, and here's the but, it has crapped out on me. I'm very lucky that I only live a 90 minute drive from Dave at Vinyl Nirvana. He got me back up and running in a week and a half. I don't know what I would have done if I was halfway across the country. Huge shout out for Dave - great guy, great products.

4. If you love Meters - go demo some McIntosh. I wasn't sure about the black and blue vibe, but the sound swayed me, and I gotta admit the aesthetics have really grown on me over the years.

5. Tubes vs Solid State - I have a McIntosh C2600 Pre and a McIntosh MC302 Amp. That is a tube front end with a SS back end. I was convinced I wanted the MC275 (tube amp) but when I actually demoed it, it became crystal clear that I really preferred the sound of solid state amplification. Not saying it's better - just the sound we preferred.

6. If your wife likes music, bring her along when you go demo the stuff. I got my wife hooked on the "Hi-Fi" sound during this whole process - still paying dividends to this day. She loves to talk gear now!

Good luck and let us know how it all turns out!!

 

That does sound pretty exciting

 

I think we have similar taste in music. I like Rock and Roll; The Who, Alice Cooper, Neil Young. And, my system is similar to what u are considering.

I have a Yamaha A S501 integrated amp 85 Watts, and Klipsch RP 160m speakers. As far as I can tell it’s a great combo. The Klipsch are very efficient speakers, and they sound great when pushed by my Yamaha amp which functions like a dream.

Considering the speakers:

The bass is clear and defined. On some of my vinyl albums it can come across as a little booming, but it’s controllable. In fact, I would guise many would consider that bass sound, intense. The high end is also well presented. Seldom splashy it’s always clear. At times, I have pushed those speakers pretty hard, but the music is never ruined by distortion, even at high volume.


As for the amp:

Most of the time I use the “Pure Direct” option which permits the signal to take the shortest route through the amp. It bypasses the tone, balance, and loudness controls.

At times, I’ll use the “Loudness” control. This is a nice feature that one should engage at the start of a listening session. The manual instructs you to turn on the amp, set the volume to the highest level you plan to use, then turn down the “Loudness” control. You set it per your taste. That control only liwets the midrange, the high and low ends of the frequency range are not effected. Per the manual, this is done because our hearing is more sensitive to the midrange. It does make an audio difference.

Finally, I love the “look”. Both the amp and speakers have a nice high quality look and feel to them. You have two choices of color for the amp; black or silver. The Klipsch speakers are obviously well made. And that metallic orange color of the woofer is cool. There are several wood stains from which to choose.

I’m not an expert, but I am more than satisfied with this combo.

 

Thanks for the advice. I looked more into tubes based on the posts here and I’m also not thinking it is a good place for me to start... with things like warmup time.and maintenance being things I prefer to avoid right now.

I was hoping to avoid a phono preamp but I’m starting to research those now to open up the LOMC possibility.

 

Like I said. Just try a boatload of stuff.

only you know what you like.

And that ain’t the booze talkin on a Friday night.
Lol

 

Fancy cartridges come and go, while a fancy turntable lasts a lifetime.
For maximum sound performance right here right now, you should get a simpler table and a more fancy cartridge.
But if you intend to develop your system over the long run, getting a good foundation for your cartridge - a turntable that is - comes first instead.

 

Well....you know you don’t have to get everything all at once. You are kind of missing out on the fun of getting to know how something sounds and then making a change. It’s that incremental upgrading that makes this hobby what it is to some extent. So, while I would tell you a phono stage is one of the most rewarding spots you can invest money in your system, it would be even more so if you use the internal on that Yamaha for a good period of time. I think the Yamaha has an MC setting, that should cover you for most LOMC carts. And....since you are just getting going I’ll explain the difference in MM and LOMC is the output voltage (electronic signal) the cart makes. A MM is going to be about .5mv and LOMC .05mv. If you are in that range, the internal in the yammy will be fine and give you something to upgrade later on. An external phonostage is a great spot to get your first piece of tube equipment. Much lower hassle, those tubes can last for 10,000 hours as compared to power tubes that are a fraction of that.

 

A decent low output MC cart and quality standalone phono stage are absolutely essential in this level system. Enjoy!

 

More like 5mV for a MM (like an Ortofon 2M Black) and 0.5mV for a LOMC (like a Sumiko Songbird Low Output).

 

Right, decimals are rough this early

 

I certainly agree with that idea. With respect to the Technics G or GR to me the GR is more than good enough for the long haul journey. Reinforced every time I lower the cueing lever into the groove with any of the three excellent cartridges I use.

 

All except the Yamaha A3000 is great. Replace the Yamaha A3000 with a Pass Labs at that price range. Per others Pass Labs is much better sounding. Here is one opinion from Stevehuff Reviews.

UPDATE 2021: I much prefer the Pass Labs INT-25 or Luxman 590 AXII over this amp, even for harder to drive speakers. I no longer recommend the Yamaha as I have heard much better in 2020-2021 for less or the same. I also do not recommend Yamaha with Klipsch speakers as they can sound dry, a little sharp and not as sweet as with some tube or class A options. This review is now quite a few years old.

 

Early? It's afternoon already!
Ah yes, different timezones...