Musical Fidelity’s M2si and M2SCD are distributed in the UK by Henley Audio and cost £699 each. Ian Ringstead tries them out.

A minimal and good looking pairing

Formed in 1982, Musical Fidelity has been around for nearly forty years and was the brainchild of Anthony Michaelson, a talented clarinet player and audiophile. The first product he released was The Preamp (My first real HiFi product – ed) a refreshing and reasonably priced simple design that really surprised the market at the time. It was a sleek black Perspex fronted unit that, despite its minimal in facilities, was a musical gem. This was closely followed by the Dr Thomas power amplifier that was also sleek in design in the mk1 version and had the same black Perspex fascia and a very smart looking oblong case. In my early days of retailing HiFi I lusted after both items and hoped my boss would let us sell this range, but alas this never transpired. Instead, I and my wife ended up travelling to London to audition a Dr Thomas amp in Camden. We had gone to London initially to see Arthur Khoubersarian of Pink Triangle fame to collect one of his turntables but the chance to hear the Dr Thomas in London was too good a chance to miss. Battling through early rush hour traffic in central London to audition the amp was a saga, let me tell you. We travelled in our first car as a married couple – an early 1970’s Vauxhall Viva that had more rust than solid metal in its bodywork and the front wings were like paper doilies. The traffic was horrendous, and it took over two hours to travel a few miles, but we got to the shop and ended up buying the amp. The sales assistant was fantastic and said that, although the amps were in short supply, we could take one he had sold earlier rather than wait for a new delivery. I hope the customer expecting his amp forgave us jumping the queue.

The long intro just shows the lengths we audiophiles will go to hear and buy equipment in pursuit of our dreams. Thirty-odd years on and once again I renew my acquaintance with the brand. Anthony Michaelson sold the company a couple of years ago to Pro-Ject company owner Heinz Lichtenegger who wanted a new electronics brand to compliment his own range, and what better brand than an established British favourite. Musical Fidelity has never stood still and has produced numerous models and ranges over the decades and I’m sure that Heinz and his team wanted to continue this trend.

The models I am reviewing here are the cheapest full-size items in the current Musical Fidelity range. Around for about a year now, these budget models (relatively speaking) follow the rest of the pricier models’  style and build quality.

CONSTRUCTION

Simple clean lines define this amp

The M2si is an integrated amplifier rated at 72 W per channel into 8 ohms and so there is plenty of power on tap for normal listening levels. There are six line-level only inputs so the user will have to add an external phono-stage if vinyl is their thing. Of course, Musical Fidelity has a choice of options on the phono-stage front, as do Pro- Ject.

Plenty of inputs on the rear of the amp

The smart solid aluminium fascia and simple controls give the unit an air of minimalist sophistication and the internal build is impressive too. The pre-amp stage is Class A and has its own independent power supply and the power amps are discrete which results in a real value for money, no-nonsense integrated amplifier. For Home Cinema installations, the AUX1 input can also be manually switched to a Home Theatre (HT) through-put. A plastic remote control is included that controls both the amp and CD player.

The simple and elegant lines continue in the CD player

The matching M2SCD compliments the amplifier perfectly in its looks and quality. The CD player features a mains choke filter and a high-tech digital stream noise filter which Musical Fidelity say allows the player to perform like much more expensive models and it does have excellent specifications. Trickle-down tech’ from the pricier models includes a 24bit Delta-Sigma DAC with 8x oversampling to ensure excellent data recovery from your discs. The slot-loading mechanism worked well and without a hitch, I am pleased to report. In the past, I went to a retailer for a demonstration of some speakers and I took along a favourite CD of mine by Michael Ruff an American artist on MFSL CD. The salesman loaded the disc into the slot-loading mechanism and the disc jammed inside refusing to play or eject. Embarrassed by this he apologised and took the machine into the back for a colleague to try and dismantle the unit and retrieve my treasured CD. Unfortunately, they couldn’t access the mechanism, so the unit had to go back to the manufacturer. Happily, I got my disc back a week later. This made me somewhat wary of this method of loading when it was newly introduced, but since then I have used other machines that use this mechanism with no problems – and there were absolutely no problems at all with the M2SCD.

Around the back of the CD player

Aimed at newcomers on a reasonable budget, and perhaps dipping their toes into HiFi for the first time, the Musical Fidelity amp and CD player offer a no-nonsense look but allied with great quality. The units I received had obviously been out for previous reviews or used at shows which is actually a bit of a bonus for a reviewer as they will have had some use and be suitably ‘run in’. I was provided with a silver amp and black CD player and so I could judge each finish in the flesh – both looked very smart and well presented.

SOUND QUALITY

Heinz Lichtenegger, best know for the Pro-ject brand and who took over the intellectual property of Musical Fidelity in 2018, wanted to rejuvenate the Musical Fidelity brand, build on its reputation and introduce the well-loved brand to a new generation of consumers. I have seen the brand grow from its infancy in 1982 (when it was of an exciting newcomer) to a mature and varied series of world-class electronics to suit all pockets. The newest models here have certainly benefitted from trickle-down technology and offer a lot of its more expensive siblings’ qualities for the budget-conscious music lover. T

he amp and cd are certainly a good match with each other (of course), but, if used separately, they will still deliver in a well put together and synergistic system.

AT A GLANCE

Build Quality: Solid and well-turned-out functional products

Sound Quality: Clear and bold sound that says “Here I am”

Value for Money: Good value for money at £699 a box

Pros:

Clean and good-looking kit that should give many years’ service when matched with smooth sounding speakers

Cons:

The amp produces a well-lit sound stage that some may want to tone down if your room or speakers are on the brighter side of tonality

Price: £699 each.

Ian Ringstead

Review Equipment: Luxman PD151 and Benz Micro Ace low output moving coil, Temple Audio Harmony moving coil phono stage, Luxman L-505UX11 amp, Luxman D-05 SACD player, Jern 12WS speakers, Chord, Tellurium Q, Missing Link and Way cables.