Build a system for $1000


One of my sons is moving in with his girlfriend.  He grew up with my audio obsessions and seems to be immune to them.  She apparently grew up in some type of Fundmentalist household where listening to reproduced music, and most other things that make life worthwhile, were discouraged.  She has fortunately rejected all of that and we love discussing food and wine with her as she is a cooking buff.
Anyway, she wants a decent audio system, and my son at least remembered that I might be good for something.  Both of them are used to Apple Ear Bud or TV speakers , but Tina asked me at brunch today for advice.  Their budget is a grand, she says sound is the paramount consideration.  She wants a digital tuner and isn’t interested in powered speakers.  They were including a TV stand in the budget
  My wife, who shares my taste in music but could care less how it is reproduced, wondered if I had any spare stuff that I could contribute.  I just took a perfectly good 9 year old Onkyo AVR out of one of my HT systems that was top of the line at the time so that can be used and it has digital inputs.  I also have a TV mount that I picked up that might suit their TV.  I recently added a Bryston BDP3 streamer to my main system and if Bryston  ever add Qobuz then I can donate a Bluesound Node 2 , but not sure if that will occur.
  Anyway, how would you answer their search?
mahler123

Showing 1 response by knownothing

Take the Onkyo and add an Audio Engine B1 Bluetooth Music Receiver, nice stands for the receiver and speakers (See AudioAdvisor) and spend the rest on the speakers plus some decent cables.  Speaker choices are nearly endless.  If they want to watch Bluerays/DVDs, stream Amazon, Netflix, etc., or listen to the occasional CD, adding a consumer grade Samsung BDP with streaming capability would round it out for not much additional cost.  The mid to higher end Samsungs can be configured to feed raw bitstream audio to the DAC in your receiver and the performance with BDs and CDs is rather good.