computer speakers question

[Mr1der]

hell..right not the 2.1 CA pc speakers I have suit me fine...

they sound good...

I'll get some 5.1 eventually though...

[Rex]

Sherwood RA-1140, never had a remote, and the only thing wrong with it is the digital dsiplay looks like it's always "dimmed".

[HashiriyaS14]

I have a friend who works in a high-end stereo store (which shall go unnamed), and he can get most Pioneer Elite products (at least audio) for like 30% of retail (so 70% off) until the end of December. I only have a few more days to decide if I want to go buy a reciever....

[Looneybomber]

Very Nice! http://www.pioneer.co.uk/uk/pr...62-98120W RMS x 7 ! Holy crap. That's alot .

But of course, mine is bigger then yours . 150W RMS from an old Sony A/V receiver .

What speakers are you going to hook up to the receiver? Please don't tell me that you are going to use one of those Home Stereo in a box Cube things .

If you do, I will have to beat your a$$ for buying that nice receiver, and then hooking it up to crapping speakers. BTW, even Bose and Klipsch cubes arn't any good.

If you'd like help with speakers, I can help you out . Do you prefer 18in or 21in sub in your speakers

Oh I'm replacing an old/cheap sony pro-logic 60x4, or so it says. I noticed a HUGE difference with my new receiver! Much more powerful, the amp has a LOT higher dampening. It controls my speakers much better for tighter, less muddy bass Did I mention the 7.1 surround?

What's horrible is that my speaker selection isn't the greatest. I have a pair of cerwin vega LS-12's and an LS-6c as my center. For my surrounds I'm using some old sony 1-way bookshelfs I really should have jumped on the deal with the Infinity Alpha's being sold for half price in Crutchfield but I wanted to use my 1k on a carpayment instead

For a sub selection a 12 is all the bigger I will go (this is for home theater, not concert). Even a 15 in a sealed just isn't fast/tight enough for my tastes. My fiend had a JL 18" in a, relatively speaking, small sealed box. It would boom like mad with rap, but was waay behind on most rock music, mainly Limp Bizkit - Conterfeit.

[HashiriyaS14]

Don't buy speakers from Crutchfield. (Or Best Buy, Circuit City, Good Guys, etc...)

Recievers or whatever, and video stuff, DVD players, you can buy there.

For speakers, use the vendors from http://www.audioreview.com

Even better, find a dedicated stereo store in your area and consult them.

The only good speakers that Crutchfield sells are Polk and (sometimes) Infinity, but they are overpriced for what you get. For what they're charging for some Infinity Entras, you could have B&W DM602s.

http://www.axiomaudio.com <---this is my choice for affordable HT speakers. They're titanium dome, so a tad bright, like MB Quarts, but that's ideal for most recorded material (cept like Jazz & Classical). Wonderful movie speakers.

[Rex]

I wouldn't say never buy from these locations, just never pay their "normal" price.

I picked up a great pair of JBL's for dirt cheap, and that's the only way I'd buy anything ... cheap .

[HashiriyaS14]

For speakers on the SUPER cheap, try this site.

http://www.fluance.com

I might grab a set of these for my computer/gaming room.

They are SUPER cheap, even cheaper on ebay. I have actually heard pretty decent things about them. A good source for reliable feedback is http://www.audioreview.com

On ebay, there is another brand of cheapo speakers called "Theater Research" or something like that, used to be "Dogg Digital". Do NOT buy these, they are unshielded, and will screw up your TV/monitor, etc... They are a scam.

[Rex]

Here's the JBL (Studio Series 312) that I got for $135 for the pair. One cracked grille, one scuffed corner.

Click on image for specs.

[Looneybomber]

Here's the JBL (Studio Series 312) that I got for $135 for the pair. One cracked grille, one scuffed corner.

Click on image for specs.

Aww you rat bastid! I've been keeping my eye out for some S412's and S312's. Also some acoustic research AR1's. I've been wanting some for 5-6 years. Probably the best towers ever made, for the money.

[Rex]

Scratch and dent sales are your best friend, you just have to have the money and haggle with them a little. It's worth the effort to save $100's.

I have more time than money.

[PoorManQ45]

What's horrible is that my speaker selection isn't the greatest. I have a pair of cerwin vega LS-12's and an LS-6c as my center. For my surrounds I'm using some old sony 1-way bookshelfs I really should have jumped on the deal with the Infinity Alpha's being sold for half price in Crutchfield but I wanted to use my 1k on a carpayment instead

I say get replace all of those speakers that you mentioned except the CV LS-12s.

For new speakers, I would recommend going towers all around. I absolutely despise those little "cube" things that all these companies are selling now. They really, really, really suck. All they are is a small mid-range with a tiny tweeter. For the bass frequencies you have to get powered subwoofer. That sucks major a$$. I prefer towers all around. Right now sitting in my living room, there's a pair of Technic 12in 3-ways, a pair of Sony 12in with PR 3-ways, and a pair of Jensen 15in 3-ways. So, that's a total of six powered subwoofers, and 2 passive radiators! And they are being fed 120w RMS from an Ol' School Pioneer A/V amp.

Do you want any recommendations for speakers? Ask and you shall receive

[HashiriyaS14]

Remember though, particularly for home theater, that the ideal is to have five IDENTICAL speakers.

This generally isn't possible due to placement/size issues, but having 5 speakers that are sonically matched, or at least sonically similar, makes an enormous difference.

You only need so much bass, one really really good 15" HT sub is as much as anyone's going to need, unless you're filling a gigantic room with sound.

Dipole surrounds in the rear are worth something too, in my opinion (I happen to like the axiom ones on that site I gave, so long as they are also paired with axiom fronts/center).

Oh, and don't ever, ever, ever, EVER have more speakers than you have channels of sound (subs excluded)....

[Chingon]

I wouldn't say that 5 towers or 5 identically sized speakers is the best option for surround sound either. By the way dts and 5.1/7.1 are encoded, using similar sized rears would overshadow the fronts in a crappy way w/o a way to control voltage and wattage output. If you are just into stereo this is perfectly fine however.

[PoorManQ45]

Oh, and don't ever, ever, ever, EVER have more speakers than you have channels of sound (subs excluded)....

What do you mean by this?

I wouldn't say that 5 towers or 5 identically sized speakers is the best option for surround sound either. By the way dts and 5.1/7.1 are encoded, using similar sized rears would overshadow the fronts in a crappy way w/o a way to control voltage and wattage output. If you are just into stereo this is perfectly fine however.

Tisc... Tisc... You under estimate the Intellegence(note incorrect spelling) of PMQ once again. Ya'll should be ashamed . There is a way to adjust the Voltage and/or wattage going to the rear speakers. On the Pioneer A/V receiver it has a feature to either "boost" or "Cut" the power a little going to the surrounds.

P.S. I also think that surround sound sucks major A$$ unless you have a really, really big TV or Projector, or are in a Movie Theater. I mean, what's the point of having surround sound if your TV is "only" 27~36in? Oh wow man, you can tell that the guy that is talking is standing on the left side of the screen! Wow. Who cares, I mean, the TV screen is small enough that you can obviously see where the person talking is standing.

P.S.S. The speakers in my living room are partially acoustically matched. They are all rated, and tested, to have a sensitivity of 91~95Db. The low frequency range of each is within 1/2 Octave. High frequency range is almost identical. Entire frequency band is +-3 Db. And if I need to "tune" the speakers to match a little better, I'll bust out the ol' skool EQ .

P.S.S.S. All speakers in my house are wired in stereo mode. I have wired them in Surround sound mode and have found it to be crappy.

[PoorManQ45]

You only need so much bass, one really really good 15" HT sub is as much as anyone's going to need, unless you're filling a gigantic room with sound.

Well then, we need alot of bass. The living room is "huge". 36ft x 26ft 14ft vaulted ceilings, and an open floor plan. So the volume of the room is actually much larger then 36x26.

[Looneybomber]

For loud stereo reproduction I will keep the LS-12's but for HT use I will have to go with a whole system. For good quality sound you want all of your speakers to be timbre matched, meaning identical tweeters, mids too if possible, in all of your speakers. Now if every driver was identical that would be great! In order to do that though, most people won't opt for the tower route because having 6 towers is just plain superfulous. Going the bookshelf/sub route is the way to go for the cost and space savings. I don't really have the room for the towers I have now, let alone 4 more!

About adjusting the rear voltage as someone mentioned. Every 5.1,6.1,7.1 reciever that I know of has atleast surrounds and center channel adjustments. Mine in particular has +/- 10db in 0.5db increments for every channel (excluding the sub becuase I have yet to see what it's adjustments are. I dont have one so I dont use it) Plus it has 5band EQs on every channel (40,125,250,4k,13k). One step beyond just a bass and treble adjuster, though I have that too.

[HashiriyaS14]

Ok, then you most definitely qualify (that's why I put that in there, I know some people are filling bigarse rooms).

As for the speakers per channel of sound thing:

Some people do DUMB stuff, like have 4 front channels. i.e. A/B speakers on a reciever, and 2 speakers are playing the same channel for no good reason. This should never be done, if someone thinks their front channels are lacking, they should buy better ones, not just add more speakers. Even if they are 4 of the exact same speakers, it STILL shouldn't be done, as while it won't conflict, it will throw off the imaging.

I had a guy in my fraternity that had 3 pairs of speakers, all playing the same 2 channels of sound. He thought it was cool because it looked like a stereo store. He's a retard, it sounded terrible. It was all mis-matched, the imaging was thrown off, etc... Stuff that is recorded in 2 channels (stereo) should be reproduced in 2 channels, not some half-assed quadrophonic mistake. In turn, if something is recorded in 5 channels, you only need 5 channels to play it back. You can have a sixth or seventh speaker hooked up, but nothing should be coming out of it.

I'm seriously not ranting towards anyone on here in particular, I've just witnessed people doing highly irrational stuff with audio gear before....

And when I said "subs excluded", I meant exactly that. Sometimes people just need more than one sub.

[PoorManQ45]

As for the speakers per channel of sound thing:

Some people do DUMB stuff, like have 4 front channels. i.e. A/B speakers on a reciever, and 2 speakers are playing the same channel for no good reason. This should never be done, if someone thinks their front channels are lacking, they should buy better ones, not just add more speakers. Even if they are 4 of the exact same speakers, it STILL shouldn't be done, as while it won't conflict, it will throw off the imaging.

I had a guy in my fraternity that had 3 pairs of speakers, all playing the same 2 channels of sound. He thought it was cool because it looked like a stereo store. He's a retard, it sounded terrible. It was all mis-matched, the imaging was thrown off, etc... Stuff that is recorded in 2 channels (stereo) should be reproduced in 2 channels, not some half-assed quadrophonic mistake. In turn, if something is recorded in 5 channels, you only need 5 channels to play it back. You can have a sixth or seventh speaker hooked up, but nothing should be coming out of it.

Well, to correct the imaging problem, you have to make sure that all the speakers are equally distant from the location in which you will be listening to it most. As long as all left channel spekers are within 3ft, and all right channel speakers within 3ft, then imaging will not be a problem.

There isn't anything wrong with hooking up more then 2 speakers to just play stereo sound. Right now in my room, I have 4 speakers, hooked up to 2 seperate receivers(1 pair per receiver), and they usually only play Radio. Remember, radio is only broadcast in stereo and/or mono mode . And I can honestly say that those 4 speakers match PERFECTLY with each other. Oh, and sometimes I play DVD-Audio through the stereos too. I'll post some pictures in a few minutes
Modified by PoorManQ45 at 6:08 PM 12/29/2004

[PoorManQ45]

The Sony amp is used to power the Cerwin Vega speakers, and the JVC is used to power the pioneers. I have found that the Sony amp has a mid/high frequency bias, and that the JVC has a mid/low frequency bias

*edit* the black thing with the Sony label on it underneath the Sony Amp is the tuner. It has a signal-to-noise rating over 105Db. Which is greater then the tuner in the JVC. But I really like the old anolog style tuner in the JVC amp. If you zoom in on the JVC, you will see that it has a signal strength and signal focus meter on it, I really like that. The sony tuner initially goes to the Sony amp, and then it psses trough via an output to the JVC receiver

[PoorManQ45]

Left speakers

[PoorManQ45]

Right Cerwin Vega

[PoorManQ45]

Right Pioneer 16in 3-way