Rather than suggestions, general advice
Priority of gear, in my experience.
- Speakers are by far the most important thing (along with where you place them)
- Amp is next, with speaker-amp matching being a very big deal indeed
- Source is last - theres enough variation in them that you can have a source good enough that the rest of the setup doesnt do it justice, its probably most important to just not spend so much that you overshoot this point (and its kinda hard to judge that point).
As far as amps go, my NAD C352 is great, but recently discontinued. I think the new one, whatever its called, is just a tiny bit different and rather a lot more expensive. I just got hold of an OLD (20yrs +) rotel and its really crisp, but warm, organic and lush (but a bit slow and flabby, which may be its age, either in component drift or older design); I dread to think how good the stuff they're making now is.
CD player wise I use an arcamCD73, and its quite fantastic, but I only get the full goodness of it through my Adam A7s & sub 8; nothing else I have can represent the detail its capable of (B&WDM602 S2s, Eltax Liberty 5+, JBL controls and KEF C40s are all insufficient to various degrees). My other setup has an Awia XC005, which works just as well through the same stuff (but shows its inferiority through the adams). Speaker wise, I just listed the ones I have, and its really a matter of taste; they all have strengths and weaknesses and different characters, but getting ones that can produce what you want to hear is a must, and your choice of speaker will make the single biggest difference to your sound (imo).
I have no clue whatsoever about turntables.
