Recommend me a good mini hi-fi shelf unit.

  • Thread starter Thread starter chessrock
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chessrock

Banned
:D My girlfriend's birthday is coming up this weekend. Her CD player is busted, and it's time I get her new system.

Her place isn't very big, and she's not the type to get in to super-loud music . . . nor is she an audiophile or anything, so I was thinking of just picking up a decent all-in-one compact type unit. No cassette needed. And up to 3 CD changer would do just fine.

$250 tops.
 
Look for the Tivoli Model Two at about $160. Add a fifty dollar CD player, or a standalone CD changer, and you're there. TIVOLI AUDIO

Image is at: http://www.tivoliaudio.com/images/pm2tpebig.jpg

This stuff was designed by Henry Kloss. A quote from Tivoli's home page follows:


Henry Kloss,
Legendary
Audio Designer
1929 - 2002

Henry Kloss' refusal to be constrained by budgets, deadlines, and trends has resulted in some of the best sounding audio products ever made. His long love affair with audio began back in the early 1950's when, as a student at M.I.T., he began building speaker enclosures for fellow students who wanted to exploit the sound of live FM broadcasts of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. After co-founding Acoustic Research in 1952, he helped develop the first acoustic suspension loudspeaker, which forever changed the way audio was reproduced. Next came KLH and the Model Eight, the first highly sensitive FM table radio, now a highly sought-after collectible. Ten years after at Advent, Henry brought to market one of the first projection televisions (which later earned him an Emmy), and one of the first consumer cassette decks with Dolby B noise reduction*. Kloss Video entered the picture in 1977. In 1988, Henry co-founded Cambridge SoundWorks* with long-time associate Tom DeVesto, offering factory direct savings in hi-fi and multimedia speakers. In 2000, at the age of 70, Henry emerged from retirement to once again team-up with DeVesto to produce the critically acclaimed Model One table radio. His classic Tivoli Audio designs stand as a permanent testament to his passion for fine audio, simplicity, and value. Henry passed away in January, 2002. Read more about Henry in the Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame.
 
Treeline said:
Look for the Tivoli Model Two at about $160. Add a fifty dollar CD player, or a standalone CD changer, and you're there. TIVOLI AUDIO
Click to expand...

. . . and a womping 10 Watts per channel ? ? ?

:D I realize I did say her place was small . . . but not like it's a closet or anything.

That does look pretty good, though. I'd bet it would sound nice. How loud do you suppose that thing could get? Mind you, she's not looking to rock the house down or anything, but enough to hear it well in a small apartment would be sufficient. :D

Maybe if I added the subwoofer . . .
 
Well, I've heard AIWA's pretty good. :D

The Tivoli is more for background music use - it's advertised as a table radio. I think it's much more than that (you can tell I'm a fan of Henry Kloss - I still have a set of Advent 1s in my living room), but it is not going to compete with a 300 watt sonic superhero.

You could try THIS for a little more boom, but it's $190 over budget.

The old KLH radios were wooden boxes with a very good receiver, a small amp and a big speaker. They took up the space of a toaster and ended up on thousands of kitchen counters, doing service for thirty or forty years. They became a bit of a cult item and are now prized as collectibles - not because they were loud or really high fidelity, but because people came to love them.

The Tivoli was designed to take the best characteristics of those units and make them available in a modern form. It's ten watts and not a hundred. It's about as loud as a decent computer speaker system but sounds better.

You can buy much more boom for the buck with an AIWA system (they may look like hell but they do sound good for the money!) but the Tivoli is something she'll come to love.
 
He said $250, not $2500 ... :D

How about CAMBRIDGE SOUNDWORKS? Kloss and the Tivoli guy started that company, too. Nice engineering in little packages.

50 watts, CD player, subwoofer, $250.

The EQ presets are not for the audio engineer in any of us, but what the heck; it's a decent little system.

Or you could go OVER BUDGET and get a really nice small system.:cool:
 
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Hey Treeline,

Thanks for the tips. So I got a chance to listen to the Tivoli Model two this afternoon while hunting around.

And you're right. That thing sounds outstanding.

Damn thing looks like a toy, :D but it sounds really sweet. I can see where the sound of these could really grow on you. What a cool invention.

Unfortunately, I don't think it's right for the lady, though. Just not quite enough juice for the whole apartment. Neither does she even have the discerning ear to really appreciate something like this. But I'm definitely going to get me one of those things for the bedroom, or for the kitchen. I am a little concerned, though. They seem like they could be gateway drugs to a whole different kind of expensive audio addiction.

Maybe I could use them for the studio. They could come in handy as final playback for my clients.

Chessrock (to his clients) : "Now the final test for any mix is to see how well it translates to very small, crappy speakers. . . . Like these right here, for example." :D Yup, if they sound good on those, they'll sound good on anything, guys!
 
chessrock said:
...I am a little concerned, though. They seem like they could be gateway drugs to a whole different kind of expensive audio addiction....
Click to expand...

LOL :D

Yep.


D o n o t r e s i s t .


Y o u w i l l b e a s s i m i l a t e d .


:cool:
 
I would look into Sony cheap mini stereos.

They have em for less than $200.00, with built in 50, or 60 cd changers.

As far as I know Sony is the only one with this much cd changer, in a cheap stereo.

Also a nice way to store discs, saves clutter!!

GT
 
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