[Dave]

"Mike" wrote in message
...
I plan on buying some B&W CM1's speakers but all that I have for a
receiver is a Yamaha RX-V563 AV that I got for Christmas. The salesman
said that the speakers will not sound exactly the same since he used a
Rotel receiver when I listened to them originally but am I really
going to loose that much clarity or is he just trying to get me to buy
a high end receiver. I would rather put the money into my speakers now
and then save up again to get a better receiver down the road, can I
get some input by someone more experienced?
Thanks,
Mike

Ask if you can bring in your amp and demo the speakers, or a trial period
for the speakers in your listening space. I think many will back me up here
when I say that the amp and speakers (and listening space) work (or don't
work) as a unit, something different than one plus the other. Two amps of
the same power rating may sound very different on the same set of speakers.
An amp and speakers may work in one space but not in another. There's a
particular synergy that some amps/speakers/spaces have which others simply
do not, and the relationship is in no way related to the amount of money
spent. I had a friend in college who lived in a large one-room loft
apartment. He had some cheap Technics speakers hung from the rafters and a
mainstream mid-fi receiver, but I can still remember the sound... you found
yourself unable to NOT tap your foot, it just sounded so much better than my
much-more-expensive system in an unquantifiable way. If ever you do hit
upon a combo that "just sounds right" to your ears, cherish it and do not
succumb to the "audiophile" tendency to define "upgrade" by what reviewers
think.

And, I would wholeheartedly agree that the best bang for the buck in audio
sound improvement is had by upgrading speakers, not electronics, by a factor
of about 10X, closely followed by room treatments and EQ/DSP frequency
response correction. The amp is probably the LAST thing you need to upgrade
unless you need high volume for high-bandwidth dynamic passages of classical
music in a large listening space.

Dave