Marantz Hifi System MCR612N1SG

Perfect little kitchen media player - compact but powerful, and when paired with decent speakers, sounds great. This is my second machine, which is much improved from the previous generation where streamed music was a bit cronky. This new one with Spotify is a huge improvement.

Bought my Marantz a month ago and am delighted with its operation and sound quality. It has combined with my existing speakers so well to produce a full, balanced sound and I am hugely enjoying listening to new streaming services as well as going through my old CD collection.

This was a replacement for an older version of the same compact Marantz all-in-one. In many aspects, it's the same as the older version: sound quality is good for the price (but don't expect hi-fi levels), connectivity is very good - the reasons for me to stick to this model were (1) being able to connect two pairs of speakers (and control them separately), and (2) have fixed-volume output to a separate amp. This gives me possibility of having the music in three separate rooms, all speakers wired (which I prefer as it gives me better sound quality at fixed cost), all pairs of speakers independently controlled.

I bought this a few weeks ago on the advice of the guys at Richer Sounds Leeds and it's turned out to be very sound advice. I had gone in to ask about a couple of separate units. When I described the size of my room and requirements, they pointed me to the Marantz Melody X M-CR612 and I'm really glad they did. It does everything I need, such as streaming Tidal, Internet radio, cd, DAB etc and takes up much less space than separates. Great sound too. More detail, clarity and more open soundstage than my previous Denon. Its also quite happy to punch out as much bass as I need, to my Argon subwoofer, which I had bought from Richer Sounds a few months ago. Great system and top quality advice as always from the Leeds team.

Nice well built unit and sounds as it should. Streaming connectivity can be pointless if you don't subscribe to the vast majority of apps, so I've just stuck with the free version of Spotify. It's just as easy to connect a laptop or tablet to your existing set up, but other than that it's fine. No operating instruction booklet in the box , so it's a matter of searching for one, but it is easy to install and set up. Can't imagine I will ever use the buttons on the actual unit though as you can do it all with the remote or HEOS app on your phone. Other than that it's fine.