Hi-Fi - Roon Labs
A well set-up hi-fi system can sound incredible and dramatically improve your enjoyment of music. We specialise in proper hi-fi separates and matching these to suitable hi-fi speakers and pride ourselves on offering expert advice by phone or e-mail and in our showroom. Our carefully selected range of hi-fi equipment includes many industry award winners and spans between great value products, exclusive Audio Affair hi-fi offers and some of the finest music systems available.
You can browse our range of Hi-fi Separates, which includes hi-fi amplifiers and music "source" components, like hi-fi streamers (for enjoying music over the internet and stored on your home network), DACs (for the best sound from your Mac or PC), media servers (for storing music including high res files) and CD players. We also sell a range of one-box hi-fi systems like the Naim Uniti range - just add speakers!
You can also browse our range of Turntables & Cartridges to view our range of turntables, phono cartridges and turntable phono stages (pre-amps) or select Vinyl & Accessories to browse our range of music LPs and turntable essentials and upgrades.
We pride ourselves on good service. If you need any further advice on a new hi-fi system or upgrade for your existing system, please call or e-mail us.
Roon Nucleus music servers are a central hub for your music, allowing you to stream your music to Roon network players (Sonos, Devialet, KEF LS50 Wireless, Meridian etc) to fully enjoy stored music, and control it from the Roon app.
Roon Labs was founded by the team responsible for the award-winning Sooloos system, Roon Lab’s aims to provide the listener with the richest and most engaging interaction with your music. Using a Roon Labs server opens up the composition, performance and recording of your music.
The start of these innovative products was in the late 1990’s, when an A&R representative, a record-label owner and a software developer got together with the problem of easily accessing their large music collections. The trio proposed a computer-based platform to that would be able to store and organise a music library giving music lovers the ability to explore their collections in a simple manner.
Nine years after the trio proposed a central database solution to music collections, they conceptualised a music server called Sooloos which was launched in 2008. Sooloos demonstrated the power of computers for accessing music. Meridian Audio subsequently bought Sooloos and two of its original founders remain to continue with product development.
In 2015, the companies agreed that the software developer behind the Sooloos needed to be spun off into a separate company which became known as Roon Labs, with the aim to bring to market software for managing and accessing a music library on any Mac or Windows PC.
The Roon software, expands the Sooloos experience, making it universally available to anyone with a computer. Roon software works by recognising devices and ports them audio which is enhanced for their individual capabilities. The central devices from Roon are the servers from their partners, including a Roon Server pre-installed or available as an option that is installable. With these products, you will be able to enjoy Roon without a PC or Mac.
Traditional hi-fi speakers (either bookshelf speakers or floorstanding speakers) are passive and require a separate hi-fi amplifier. The most popular type of amplifier is an integrated amplifier (a single box designed to be the heart of your hi-fi system, connecting to all of your music "source" components like hi-fi streamer, CD player etc and to your speakers).
Generally however, the most desireable and best sounding type of amplification though is to have a separate power amplifier (which connect to your speakers) and pre amplifier (which connects to your music "sources" and the power amplifier). By having these two boxes rather than one combined box (hence the word "integrated"), each box is designed specifically to perform that part of the amplification and by splitting these duties up, each section benefits from this dedicated design, separate power supplies, and sometimes better components, resulting in better sound quality through your speakers.
Whatever your choice and budget for amplifier and speakers, we have a range of equipment to suit. We also sell a range of valve amplifiers, which offer a warm, rich sound and a heritage of hi-fi listening that is as endearing to look at as it is to listen to. This valve amplifier range also includes in itself both "integrated" and "pre" / "power" valve amp models.
As mentioned, our range of music "sources" is also comprehensive. Hi-fi streaming has gradually taken over CD players (although we still offer CD players and dedicated CD transports which can be connected directly to a DAC). Streaming music didn't used to be taken very seriously in the hi-fi community back in the days of mp3s and highly compressed audio viles, but with the advent of better content available online, using a hi-fi streamer is now a serious option as a music source and can even sound better than a CD player if you play and collect high res audio files.
The popularity of turntables for playing vinyl has also massively increased in past years (beyond that of CD players) but please note that your hi-fi amplifier must have a "Turntable" (or sometimes labelled as a "Phono") input to be able to play vinyl on your turntable, as the output level from most turntables is lower than that of other music "sources". If your amplifier doesn't have this input (or even if it does), we recommend using a high quality turntable pre-amp, referred to in hi-fi circles as a phono stage. We also sell a full range of replacement phono cartridges and other turntable essentials to get the best sound from your vinyl.
If you would like further advice, please call or e-mail us or visit our Birmingham showroom and one of our hi-fi experts can assist you. Don't forget to browse our full range of speakers and our Audio Affair exclusive offers as well.