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Home / News / Marantz muscles in on Arcam Solo

Marantz muscles in on Arcam Solo

Marantz, purveyor of all things high-end in the land of hi-fi, has cooked up a shamelessly populist micro.Looking like it ate one too many power suppl

Marantz, purveyor of all things high-end in the land of hi-fi, has cooked up a shamelessly populist micro.

Looking like it ate one too many power supply units at the factory, the £350 CR601 makes for an obvious rival to the £1K Arcam Solo and the £235 Denon D-M35.

In addition to the CD player at its heart, Marantz’s mainstream machine touts digital and analogue radio plus 60 watts of stereo amplification. The only missing part of the puzzle is a pair of bookshelf speakers.

Make no mistake, Marantz has finally caught up the 2005 Britain of IKEA and LLB. Flogging its new component sans speakers may be a cunning marketing trick to achieve the cheapish £350 price tag but it’s also fairly practical. If you’re ditching your old micro to get the DAB radio on this one, you can bring your old speakers along with you.

Better still, use the opportunity to treat yourself to a new pair of speakers from the likes of B&W, Monitor Audio or Mission. Since surround sound took off, good quality stereo speakers have become laughably affordable (we’re working on the assumption that industry pricing trends make you giggle).

Other specs of note on the CR601 include a headphone socket, socket for a sub, 99 radio presets and some fancy new technology called MP3 CDs.

It’s on sale now, though it’s not yet on the Marantz website.

Profile image of Dan Grabham Dan Grabham Editor-in-Chief

About

Dan is Editor-in-chief of Stuff, working across the magazine and the Stuff.tv website.  Our Editor-in-Chief is a regular at tech shows such as CES in Las Vegas, IFA in Berlin and Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as well as at other launches and events. He has been a CES Innovation Awards judge. Dan is completely platform agnostic and very at home using and writing about Windows, macOS, Android and iOS/iPadOS plus lots and lots of gadgets including audio and smart home gear, laptops and smartphones. He's also been interviewed and quoted in a wide variety of places including The Sun, BBC World Service, BBC News Online, BBC Radio 5Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News Radio and BBC Local Radio.

Areas of expertise

Computing, mobile, audio, smart home