Fed up with my Mission 752s

[Neo4]

Built these myself many years ago and have served me well but after 7 years i feel its time to replace them. Not been in the speaker market for quite sometime so could use some pointers.Thought about a complete package but i dont want to lose my Meridian Sub and Surrounds.

What should i be listening to for say a £600 budget? Strictly front ends and must be floor standers for the party nights

 

[tom_nieto]

What don't you like about the 752's? It might be worth really thinking what you want out of an upgrade before splashing the cash. Your Missions aren't half bad by all accounts, so even £600 might not get you a substantial gain. What sort of amplification are you using?

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Couple of questions:
- How do you build a pair of Mission speakers? Do you mean you sourced drivers, cabinets and crossovers that are exactly the same?
- What kind of kit are you running them with?

 

[kidloco]

as the others have mentioned, bit puzzled by how you have said you have built a set of 752 yourself.

I know one thing, you wont get a much better speaker then the 752 freedom's for £600 new. The Monitor Audio RS6 are quite simular but look nicer, but I dont think they have as good imaging as the 752.

what have you got them hooked up to, the 752 are very capable speakers and just get better and better as you upgrade your system.

 

[Neo4]

Couple of questions:
- How do you build a pair of Mission speakers? Do you mean you sourced drivers, cabinets and crossovers that are exactly the same?
- What kind of kit are you running them with?

I used to work there and added a few extras into the cabinets to tune them to a sound i preferred over the standard units.

I have a Kef Centre,Meridian m1500 Sub plus a choice of Mission speakers for rears [780,761i etc]

Amplification i have a Cyrus Amp which i use for CD listening etc and i use a old Sony DBR940 to use for multi channel sources.

 

[9designs2]

Still not said what you think is wrong with the sound.

As others have said the speakers were a respected model, and if you have tweaked them further, without the cost restraints Mission had in the production model, then you could well have a nice set of speakers there.

Seems to me as a classic case of always blaming the speakers for the sound of a system !!.....

Take them along to a dealer, and hook them up to a decent CDP and Amp.... you might be very surprised !

To my mind once you have a speaker in the £600-800 bracket, you need to have spent a couple of grand on the CD and Amp, before you need to start worrying about them again...

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

I'll go along with 9s suggestion. As you've not mentioned your CDP, I'm going to assume that it's not a Meridian or Linn unit.
Go have a listen to a really good CDP and see how you get on. You'll be surprised at how good speakers will do an excellent job of showing just how bad a cheapy CDP is.

 

[gt_junkie]

I agree.

I bought a sony SACD player when it first came out along with a highly regarded sony amp and a set of floorstanding wharfedales.

Imaging and timing was ok but bass was either confused or lacking depending on the source music.

I thought the speakers might have been the problem but luckily tried a friends arcam kit to see if there was any change. The improvement was massive so i saved and ended up getting a Cyrus aca 7.5 pre, smartpower and CD7Q which solved all my audio needs.

It was fast, accurate and incredibly powerful - the old sony hardware (which was still fairly expensive) wasn't a patch on the new kit.

The CDP is probably the weak point as Cyrus make quality amps (i even use the classic Cyrus 1 amp with my PC and it's ace!) and 752f's are very fine speakers indeed!

gt

 

[Corasik]

Did you base your custom 752 on the Original 752, or the upgraded 'Freedom' model? The 752, and 753 freedoms were highly rated speakers (I have 753 Freedoms myself). I believe both the crossovers, and tweeters were reworked in the freedom models, plus additional cabinet changes in the 753's.

If your mods improved the stock sounds, I very much doubt that a £600 new speaker will improve it much. Hifi diminishing returns apply, and I would have thought you would be looking at a grand, to get a real improvement on a speaker that even in 'stock form' would have been around £600 new.

Of course, speakers often have a 'family' sound. If your simply 'bored' with the mission sound, then the best advice I can suggest is visit a small 'professional' hifi shop, and ask for some demo's.

Personally, I find that my 753's only really sing, with a powerfull amp driving them. Cyrus One amps, are good, but only 30WPC, with later Cyrus amps being rated at 50WPC.

Sure new speakers may be the thing for you, but I would certainly check out some different electronics before splashing out on new speakers.

Whatever you decide, try before you buy!

 

[gt_junkie]

Personally, I find that my 753's only really sing, with a powerfull amp driving them. Cyrus One amps, are good, but only 30WPC, with later Cyrus amps being rated at 50WPC.

Good point!

My smartpower is designed to push 60 watts at 8 ohms and 80 watts at 4 ohms as standard. After i added a PSX-R power supply the visceral performance of the speakers has definately improved. That supply retains the amps 60 watts into 8 ohms performance but pushes it's 4 ohm performance to 100 watts which really adds some power to bass lines when driven hard.

Let us know which CDP you're using and also the model of the Cyrus amp you have.

gt

 

[Neo4]

My CDP is quite old Marantz CD63 and barely gets used. Its not so much the sound i am bored with its more the look. I guess its just one of those "ahh what the hell lets buy some new speakers" moments,if that makes any sense.The Amp is a old but loved Cyrus 2.



The 752s have drive units Mission wanted to use originally in the production models but were to expensive so Farad sourced something else.I managed to get a set of these units thanks to Farad and used them in the speakers i built.

After taking onboard some of the wonderful advice given here i have decided to have a look at a updated CDP and keep the 752's .

 

[gt_junkie]

After taking onboard some of the wonderful advice given here i have decided to have a look at a updated CDP and keep the 752's .

gt

 

[jellybeard999]

Surprised no-one has mentioned modding the CDP, since he already has a CD63.

 

[Mr_Sukebe]

Surprised no-one has mentioned modding the CDP, since he already has a CD63.

As the OP does sound like he knows his way around a circuit board, I'd agree.
Would definitely be worth looking at at least uprating the onboard clock. I added a Tentlabs "flea" clock to an old transport I had and that made a good improvement, certainly for the £50 it cost.
Personally I'd shy away from spending a lot of dosh on the unit as something like a Quad CD99 can now be had for around £500 s/h, and they're a seriously good piece of kit.

I'd certainly suggest you concentrate on the CDP first, then come back and ask about the Cyrus 2 (I used to own one, so can comment from a little experience).

 

[kidloco]

I recently added a superclock 3 to my CD63 MkII Ki Sig and it made a world of differance, cost me £60 for the board and £20 to fit it.

As Mr_Sukebe said, I really wouldnt through any more money then this at it is a fairly old unit now.

I dont know about the Cyrus II amp but I did own a Cyrus III for a while, paired with a set of Mission 751's. Great little amp, just found it a little lacking in UMPH! department when I upgraded to bigger speakers (Monitor Audio GS10s).

With your budget you could pick up some really nice second hand gear that will make them speakers sing. I picked up Roksan Kandy Mk III amp for around £170 if I rememeber off fleebay. and I love it. you could also pick up some nice arcam pre/power combos for under £300 which would still leave you with a great budget for a decent 2nd hand CDP. £300 should bag you a arcam aplha 9 or maybe even a FMJ CD33 (pretty much same as the 9 but looks nicer)

Sure others will give you other reccomendations, I can only comment on what iv listened to.

Oh, dont forget to save a little for some decent cables if you arnt using some already, I swaer by Mark Grant interconnects (£24) and Chord Rumour 2 speaker cable (£10 a metre)

 

[Neo4]

I thought about just using the CD63 as a transport but was talked out of it.I could refit the PCB in the CDP but as its 13 years old it also looks very dated.

 

[gt_junkie]

If i were you i'd match the amp and speakers with a cyrus cdp.

The CD7 will be within budget and the CD7Q (a good improvement) might fit as well. Mine cost me just over £600 a few years ago and is an exceptional player.

Obviously it's worth auditioning before you buy but should be a fairly safe bet as many cyrus components are tuned to work well with one another and as you know are paired with mission speakers for obvious reasons.

gt

 

[9designs2]

At this price point I would say look also at the Rega CDP, and matching amps if you like. Roksan maybe, hesitate to say Naim, as they are not everyone's cup of tea, not mine anyway.... but many like them...

Linn are not really at this price point anymore, so I would guess over budget... Used would be a Genki, around 400-500 notes, though the ideal would be an Ikemi, but they fetch about a grand used.