Have your say & ask the experts

Hello all,

This is my first post. I was interested in peoples opinions about a system I have put together and am very pleased with.

Hi- Fi is as we all know is a very costly buisness and trying to skim those odd pounds away from the wife can be a challenge.I listen to a lot of music and watch a lot of films, and I wanted a system that would be good for both. The problem as always was the budget.

I purchased The Monitor Audio Bronze BR2 as a good allrounders and combined this with BR1's for  surround, Bronze center speaker and Bronze Sub. My Amp isan Onkyo TX -SR507 and a Chordette Gem DAC(half price) which I stream Spotify to via bluetooth.Which allows me to walk around my house with my netbook chossing differnet music.

The result is exceptional for the money spent, The power and clarity present when listening to, for example, Hanz Zimmer's The Dark knight is remarkable for the money spent.

Obviously the Chordette Gem is the real ace up my sleeve and I think its really good bit of kit when streaming from a computer.

I feel like I've cheated.....what a result.......

Matt 

Hello idc,

Thats right I am listening on Spotify, and yes I have after much deliberation gone for the premium package with which you get a higher bit rate. I hummed and harred for ages because its no good spending 9.99 everymonth for rubbish sound quality mp3's. So whilst I loved Spotify  compared to Itunes it needed me to find and have demoed the Chordette Gem DAC before I was convinced. The Gem takes sound quality to a different level. and no I don't work for them..........p.s.  If you like soundtracks try the American Beauty soundtrack to test your system out. It's incredible.

cheers dude

Matt hi, never considered bluetooth as a wireless connection, how does it fair with signal quality and distance? I presume you could stream any music from a laptop so long as you have a bluetooth dongle connected to said laptop? I'm impressed buy the fact you can stream from a portable device e.g iPod touch e.t.c. Do you know any other DACs out there with bluetooth capabilities? I currently have a Squeezebox setup but so far it has been unreliable with wi-fi connection. I may well exchange, bit hasty I know but if connection is more reliable........... 

Thanks, Matt.

Hi Matt,

I have been using this particular DAC for a month or so now and the bluetooth has never dropped out yet, I currently live in a 3 bed mid terraced, and the bluetooth doesn't drop out in any part of the house. As far as I can see you can only be compromised by your internet connection and speed! I have a pretty good internet connection transmitting wirlessly to my tiny netbook it drops out very occasionaly but doesn't any internet site. So currently I can sit on my loo chosing my next tracks. I have also found Spotify very reliable as a music source.

You can indeed stream any music from your laptop as long as your laptop/mobile phone has bluetootth A2DP which most current devices have built in as standard.

As for what else is out there, Chord Electronics do do some other high end DAC's with bluetooth about £3000,,,,,and I think a few companies have built them into receivers, but they are pretty rare as far as I know.

The Gem is £400,,,,,I managed to get mine half price through a private sale as they were buying a Sonos system....so I was made up.

As soon as the info hit the DAC it turns it into beautiful quality sound.

Hope this helps......any more questions...I will try to help..........What hi-fi have done a revie of it if you need to check it out.

matt

Hey  idc,

no probs I shall try and get round to it.

cheers