Mainly due to space my basic separates set up resides in my old bedroom at my folks house – untouched for years 🙄

Apart from a couple of DAB radios around the house the main source of music is via my iMac.

I WFH and usually use my headphones but a small speaker set up would be useful.

I had looked at these:

But i am drawn to a small amp set up with conventional speakers This would allow me to reuse my bookshelf Mission speakers ….. not that they are anything fancy.

The limiting factor …. I guess is that my only output is a headphone socket rather than dedicated audio out.

What are folks thoughts, suggestions?

It’ll be fine.

wouldn’t even occur to me that you couldn’t plug an amp into a headphone socket. Is this an audiophile thing?

@nick ….. its the double amplification “thing” that actually mayn’t be a thing.

With the above I had just thought about setting the volume on the speakers themselves and then control the volume from my keyboard.

These at a third of the price of the Quarks have also caught my eye:

Linky

I’m not 100% sure what you’re trying to achieve.
Just to clarify…
Your source will be the headphone out of your Mac.
Your speakers will be existing Mission speakers…?
Your amp will be existing one or ‘small’ new one?

You can just run a lead from the headphone out to the phono inputs on any amp & it’ll work. That’s what I do when I wanna play Spotify through my separates; I just have a lead permanently plugged into an input, so I just need to plug the tablet/phone in & choose the correct input on the amp.

A lead like this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01GR5B9OW?psc=1

letmetalktomark – Member

@nick ….. its the double amplification “thing” that actually mayn’t be a thing.

Yeah, you’ll be able to increase the volume via the Mac or the amp.
I just leave the phone/tablet volume alone (unless they’re set really low) and use the main amp volume to adjust.

Those Edifier speakers look like a neat solution though!!

@ stumpy ….

To clarify I know I could just connect existing amp and speaker set up but I don’t really have room.

So I would be looking for eiither;

Small amp to use existing speakers or buy some new active speakers.

use the missions, get a small amp, get a bluetooth receiver for the input of the amp..

mac can send audio via bluetooth, so can most phones etc.

“get a small amp, get a bluetooth receiver for the input of the amp“

Get a small amp with built-in bluetooth ?

Get a small amp with built-in airplay ?

Get an Apple TV to stream into the amp ?

As I understand it (and I’m no expert), double amplification wouldn’t an issue here, since what comes out of your Mac’s headphone socket is a line level signal. Powered speakers (that you plug into your Mac’s 3.5mm headphone out) contain an amp to drive the speakers.

If you were using high-end headphones you might find that they need more amplification than the line-out signal from the mac, and you’d consider a headphone amp to drive those.

I’m having similar/related quandary at the moment. I have a decent set of powered speakers (Harmon Kardon Soundsticks) that I had plugged into my Mac’s line-out. Pretty good sound, but I just bought a turntable which I keep on my desk. With the turntable I needed a pre-amp to bring the signal up to line-level, and then from there I plugged in my Soundsticks (as the amp/speaker part of the setup).

Now I have no speakers plugged into my mac, nor do I have a headphone option for my turntable, so I’m now looking at getting a proper integrated amp/receiver, so I can plug in both the mac and the turntable and output to some proper speakers. And then I’ll have some Soundsticks to sell :-).

Another thing worth considering is that before you get an audio signal out of the mac, it goes through a pretty mediocre DAC. Getting an external DAC (or an amp with an integrated DAC) and plugging that into the mac via USB would give you better sound, even if you just go from the DAC to your existing headphones or a set of powered speakers.

Disclaimer: I’m not an expert. I’ve just been doing a bit of reading about this recently.

just a small normal amp with an AUX in and one of these or something similar

https://www.logitech.com/en-gb/product/bluetooth-audio-adapter

i use one at home (but i do also use a small mixing desk…)

letmetalktomark – Member

@ stumpy ….

Small amp to use existing speakers or buy some new active speakers.

Cool, that’s what I thought you wanted….

There’s cheap little amps on Amazon that get decent reviews….

Like these:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/LEPY-2024A-Plus-Amplifier/dp/B00SATAEEA/ref=pd_lpo_vtph_23_bs_img_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=X46C27620RJEW9KMP8PN

And there’s this Amptastic one that seems to get good write-ups

https://www.amptastic.com/

but confusingly, what I assume would be the normal ‘add to basket’ button says ‘unavailable’, but there’s highlighted text that says:
“Mini-1 stock available, contact sales@amptastic.com to purchase”

Might be worth dropping them a mail though….?

I’ve just found these active speakers for £90, that have a headphone in, but also work with Bluetooth….quite fancy a bright red pair of these in the garage (the wood option are about £50 more):

https://www.audio-shop.co.uk/product-page/steljes-audio-ns1-active-powered-bluetooth-speakers-uk-pair.html?gclid=COqwy96og9QCFW4A0wodJcoN4A

How about this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Q5-Coaxial-Optical-Digital-Amplifier-x/dp/B015ZHZG1K/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1495475302&sr=1-2&keywords=amplifier+with+optical+input
What you don’t seem to realise is that your Mac has more than just a headphone socket, that socket doubles up as an optical out, so all you need is a little amp like the one above with optical in and a TOSLINK to connect the two.
It’s how my Mac Mini is connected to my old Yamaha A/V amp, and I can control playback via the Remote app on my phone and pad.

Yep, digital out from mac would be better. Headphone out is not the same as line level output. There is a gain stage involved, which means adding more distortion. You can obviously use it for the same purpose though.

This is about £60 on Amazon and you could use your Missons. Something similar without bluetooth would probably be about £45.

Yep, digital out from mac would be better. Headphone out is not the same as line level output. There is a gain stage involved, which means adding more distortion. You can obviously use it for the same purpose though.

Hence the optical out built into the 3.5mm headphone socket. AFAIK, all Macs have the optical out built into the headphone socket, it’s just few people know it’s there.
And not many really have a use for it anyway, but it’s handy when you do.

^ using it with kodi from a mac mini (late 2014) you’re right, its not a well known piece of info.

my first port of call was to try a (turtle beach) usb to optical cable that even works with a raspberry pi.. which isnt fully supported on the mac (2.0 only, no ac3/dts). then tried a hdmi->optical breakout (about 15 quid).. which had intermittent choppiness before discovering online that the convertor in the usb device i’d tried first would work in the mac mini 🙂