90's/00's Mini/Micro/Separates Hifi - Worth a buy?

90's/00's Mini/Micro/Separates Hifi - Worth a buy?

Author
Discussion

Mont Blanc

Original Poster:

1,994 posts

58 months

Yesterday (18:58)
quotequote all
I have Bose and Sonos AirPlay speakers all round my house, and they work fine for whole house audio, streamed from my phone or iPad.

But there are a couple of rooms where I spend a lot of time, such as my home office (8 hours a day) and I would appreciate an upgrade in sound quality and some actual stereo separation.

What are your thoughts on the old mini-separates or mini-hifi systems as made in the 90's and 00's from the likes of Technics, Panasonic, Denon, Sony, etc.

I'm considering buying a couple of these as they can be bought in good condition, with speakers, for next to nothing: £50-150 ish. I'll need to add a bluetooth receiver of reasonable quality.

Are these mini systems actually any good or were they a compromise? Any brands to that are considered to be better than the others? Am I just better off buying a full size 80's/90's separates amp?

Thanks

tonyg58

407 posts

214 months

Yesterday (19:08)
quotequote all
The only one (series) that I am familiar with are the Denon DM series - they sounded pretty good and were also really reliable (sold a heap of them over the years and I'm pretty sure none of them failed).
DM41 had Bluetooth built in.

Mont Blanc

Original Poster:

1,994 posts

58 months

Yesterday (19:26)
quotequote all
Or, if all I really want is to stream bluetooth audio from my phone, to some passive bookshelf speakers, would I be better off with something like this:

https://www.richersounds.com/fosi-audio-mc351-blac...


LR90

316 posts

18 months

In your shoes I think I’d be looking at a pair of active speakers, especially if you’re just going to be streaming. Nice and simple.

Deranged Rover

4,058 posts

89 months

Most of them weren't all that great.

They'd be an improvement on Bose, though, obviously... wink