Please do suggest if there are others that would meet my requirements for the price or choose which is the best on my list. I am planning to buy it by the end of this month. Thank you.
What exactly are you trying to accomplish? ie. Are you trying to flesh out your current system? Are you building your first real sound system from scratch?
The problem here is that everything you are talking about is junk. I am not saying it will sound good or bad, I am saying almost all of this stuff is made from the cheapest plastic known to man kind and some of these companies will burn in hell for trying to pawn this crap off on unsuspecting people.
If you want a good quality system, either get something like the audio engine A2+ which is an all in one system (so you will not need and amp/dac)
Or save up some more money and get an entry level marantz, harman kardon, or denon receiver with what ever cheap bookshelf speakers you like out of a magnolia room at best buy.
Upgrading from my T20. Me and my friends are playing around music, so I thought it's time to upgrade.
CR4, XD4 both have wooden cabinets.
I would rather get Kanto YU5 (currently $239 on Massdrop) instead of A2+ they almost have the same price but YU5 is better imo, a friend of mine had A5+, sold it for the YU5 and Added Sub8. I have a crappy On-Board Sound Card, used to have Xonar but it broke 3 months ago. I can't even here the base on my Custom One Pro (80 Ohms). So it would be a big upgrade both for speakers (sound quality) and Headphones (enough to drive it).
I don't think I would need a reciever for a simple desktop set-up. We have a Harman Kardon Reciever and a Yamaha 5.1 Home theater set-up.
The A2+ was not a solid recommendation. I was using it more as a loose base.
Mmmmmmmmmmm... You should think about the receiver. I know it is big and bulky, but it is probably the single most under rated piece of gear you can own.
Think about it. It has a decent built in speaker and headphone amp as well as a decent dac.
You can hook up what ever you damn well please, and it offers plenty of power for expansion to larger speakers as well as letting you add on gear like CD players and turn tables.
I see, just for it's price I don't think it's worth it, since the YU5 is currently on sale at Massdrop.
The think is, this system is more of a hobby/for fun, nothing serious. ik it has a lot of perks since we also have it on our home theater, using it for different settings )i.e. karaoke, house party, etc..)
Just the sheer size and price is a big turn off for a small desktop set up.
True, but I am not planning to go serious at this set-up just a regular desktop speaker when I am in the mood to do some random mixing or w.e.
the only descent one I could recommend for sub $120 is the S.M.S.L 793-II dac/amp, $75 shipped on ebay, from memory. I actually have 2, they're really wellbuilt quality units, powers my dt-990 250's very well. i have the volume knob at 50-60% for normal listening-youtube vids/music and 75% for loud music, 85% is too loud.
1/4" and volume on the front, with both push power button and a output selection button (green and red led's for power, red is on, the way it should be) on the rear, L&R rca outs (speakers), coax and optical in (optical is better for PC usage over usb since you don't use a usb port and the face there is no interference from poor usb power on some motherboards-also the optical works with consoles, for the peasants out there.)
hope that helps!
note, it's a headphone amp, it's doesn't amp the rca outputs.
I know your budget is $150, but really speakers should almost be a one time purchase, since they don't really go obsolete. That being said, let me give some context to speakers and sound:
Unlike other PC hardware (i.e. video cards) speakers don't go obsolete. A good pair of speakers is an investment that will at least last 10 years, if not 20.
The sound experience is the other side of the coin to the visual experience, yet most gamers neglect it completely. PC's can leverage a good pair of speakers, or even a home theatre setup, better than a TV or Blu Ray player can. AAA games will put a lot of effort into the sound of their games, and a good surround setup would take full advantage of it and give a better experience than any movie would.
That being said, under $1000 for a home theatre setup is on the low end,
Again I am stating all of this simply to put things into context. I spent $500 on a surround setup, and am really glad I did when I am gaming. The ironic thing is: $500 is on the high end for PC speakers, but almost non existent in the home theatre world. It really is kind of sad that sound is neglected that much in the PC world, when PCs can be a superior experience over Blu Ray movies.
Like Angel said above: you may want to try getting an entry level receiver, and some bookshelf speakers. These receivers are in the $250-300 range. They also will power your headphones easily. They don't have the greatest output impedance like Mayflowers $300 headphone amp/dacs, but you do get a lot of features for a surround setup.