Thinking about Amp/Speakers to gradually build up home theatre. What are my alternatives. Also, stan

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I've recently moved house and am looking to upgrade the various bits of hifi I've had for the last 12 years or so to something 5.1'ish.

However, I don't have the money to do this all at once, so am doing it gradually. I've already got the TV I want, a Panasonic TXP46G20B, which is awesome. Next on my thinking is an amp/front speakers combo, getting the amp first and then the speakers to follow in a few months.

For amp choices, I'm pretty much looking at the Onkyo TXSR608. It's got good reviews and is at a price and feature level that I want. However, if anyone's got any alternatives, it'd be good to hear them.

For speakers, I was originally set on getting some floorstanders but then for the price point I'm looking at (£300-400), someone suggested that I might be better off getting a better pair of bookshelf speakers rather than floorstanders. The room I'm putting it in isn't huge (probably about 12-15' square) so I don't need masses of volume. With this in mind, the B&W 685's looked good, as I can then get a pair of 686s as rears and there's a center I can match as well later on.

Finally, if I did get bookshelf speakers, what stands should I get?
 
I think bookshelf speakers are best at that price range, and if you don't feel you're getting enough bass etc you can always add a sub and if you're still not happy add the speakers as rears and get some floorstanders when you can afford decent ones.

Not sure about AV amps so can't really help on that front
 
IMO the B&W are OTT for a £400 AV amp front end. They deserve a better amp. Something in the £800-£1000 region really. If you've set your heart on them then that's what you'll buy; but I know that I could beat the overall effect using a more suitable choice of speaker package and spending a little extra time getting the positioning right. That's not the point of this post though.

If your room is small to medium sized I'd really consider your rear speaker choice first, then build your system around a range that gives you the right options.

Rear speakers.... It's easy to overlook just how important they are in creating a convincing and enjoyable surround sound effect.

The whole point of surround sound is to feel like you are immersed in the action, right? So the rear sound field should be enveloping without you being aware of the location of those speakers. That's very different from what the front speakers are doing. Here you want excellent imagery and pinpoint accuracy.

So, if we use direct firing speakers for the front because they give excellent imaging....why use them in the rear where that's exactly what we don't want?

The correct speakers for rear effects use are bi-pole speakers that produce a diffuse surround effect. Who says so? Well Dolby Labs, DTS, THX, all of the worlds theatre dubbing and sound mixing studios and pretty much everyone in the business of making movie soundtracks.

There are times when direct firing speaker are correct for rear use; but it's not for movie surround work. Multichannel SACD- and DVD-Audio music disc should be listened to with direct firing rear speakers. But that's it.

Something else is special about rear speakers. It's how close they are to the seating position.

The front speakers need space to focus the stereo image because that's how they work. Sit too close, or way off to one side or the other and the effect is ruined. Now think about where the rear speakers should be - which is either side of the main seating area and about a foot higher than seated head height. How close are you to those speakers? Are you closer to one than the other? Are you sitting much closer than you'd consider correct if these were front speakers?

Of course, not every room will allow for big boxy direct firing rear speakers to be put in the best position; so what's the alternative? The corners a ceiling height of course!! Now guess what's the worst place you can put a speaker ;)

High corners are bad for various reasons. The first is speaker design. They just aren't tuned for somewhere that messes up the bass as bad as a corner. The second is imaging. We hear direct and reflected sound. The best imaging is where we hear very little reflected sound. Reflections come from hard surfaces; walls, the ceiling and the floor mostly. The further away those surfaces then the less reflected sound to spoil the imaging. A corner puts three hard surfaces right next to the speaker.

Dipole speakers have a slim profile. They protrude very little from the wall. The speakers fire sound along the axis of the wall forwards and backwards. This creates the even and diffuse sound field which is exactly what's needed for rear surround effects.

If you haven't nodded off yet then you might be asking why all rear surround speakers aren't di-poles. The answer in most cases is cost. B&W's di-pole rears (DS3) cost £550 compared to £299 for the 686 direct firing speakers. That would push the budget for a B&W 5.1 system to over £1500, but result would be so much better.

Some alternative brands that do dipole rear surround - Monitor Audio, Focal, Kef, Teufel.
 
I have the B&W 685 Theatre package and think it's awesome...... Start with the 685 fronts as you've mentioned then get the sub, rears and centre later
 
I'm a big fan of B&W, I have some older 601's for sale if you want to save money.

Also check out Monitor Audio, I have RX6 front floorstanding which are amazing.
 
lucid said:
*snippety
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Interesting, the rear's aren't something I'd put too much thought into but can see where you're coming from. Here's an MSPaint of the room:

unledin.png


Sofa's brown, TV is blue. Living space is about 12-15' square, but as you can see there's another room off to the right (conservatory) and the kitchen is kind-of-open-plan. The green bit is a 4' tall island thing. If I went down the dipole route, would they go directly onto the back wall behind the sofa, or on the small walls to the side of the sofa? I guess there probably isn't enough room here for direct-fire rears...

As for amp, do you think the 608 will be lacking in power/drive, or just finesse /detail/quality for the 685s? I can stretch to the higher budget (maybe), but I just want to make sure that (a) it's worth it and (b) it's value for money. I'd be happy to spend more if I could get a demonstrably better experience from it, but don't know if it'd be more sensible to keep that amp choice and scale back on the speakers.

I guess my only real option is to go and listen to stuff.

Any specific recommendations for amps in the higher range if I did go down that road?


Nick1881 said:
I'm a big fan of B&W, I have some older 601's for sale if you want to save money.

Also check out Monitor Audio, I have RX6 front floorstanding which are amazing.
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Thanks for the offer, but I'm a fan of buying stuff like this new. Will certainly have a look at the RX6 though.
 
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How about the Denon AVR-1911 its about £250 now and is pretty decent indeed, probably better audio quality than the Onkyo just slightly less going for it connectivity wise. I have it and it really is an awesome little piece of kit.
 
Love your artwork :D

Rear speaker positions: If you were installing 7.1 sound you'd have a pair of diffuse speakers on the rear wall as well as the sides, so they will work there. Put them on the rear wall and I think they'll still be more convincing than direct firing speakers in the same position.

Amp: It's finesse. There isn't much power difference between say a 608 and an 808. It's claimed that it's 20W/ch extra but the way the measurements are made should be served with a large dose of salt ;). The other thing is that amps change every year. So there's a fairly steady stream of used amps coming on to the market. You could get up and running with new speakers and a second-hand amp as a stop gap until the right thing comes along.

If it has to be new, and you can get a good deal on the 608, then something like the Monitor Audio Bronze speaker package would be a good balanced system with bi-pole rear surrounds.

I've just been listening to the BX2 stand-mounters and the BX5 floor standers in comparing an Onkyo A-9155 amp & DX-7355 CD player (£350 combined) to a Creek Evolution CD & amp combo at £1500. Both sets of speakers were perfectly at home with this. The budget Onkyo CD & amp would beat the 608 and 609 AV amps for music hands down. The £1000+ AV amps would be closer but still not quite there.

Having a listen is a good plan. Who are your local dealers?
 
Thanks for the advice.

I'll take a look at the Bronze and see if i can demo the BX2 and BX5 anywhere alongside the 608.

I'm based in Hertford, so there's a place just round the corner from me. Will stop by there and see what they've got.
 
Just walked past the hifi shop and they've got some of the MA Radius HD's in the window. The GF immediately stopped and said "Ooooooh, I *like* them, they loook really nice!".

'Looking nice' is an unfortunately high priority for this particular setup.

Anyone got any experience of the Radius HDs? The Sub obviously becomes more important in such a setup, but I'm not immune to the idea of a satellite system. Initial searching reveals some promising reviews, what do others think?
 
Radius HDs are very very good.

Monitor Audio were clever when they designed the Radius series. Rather than simply designing yet another sub-sat system (yawn) they decided to see how small they could make proper Hi-Fi speakers. That's a really important difference. The bass is limited, sure; small boxes don't do deep bass obviously. But HDs work as stand alone speakers in their own right. This is something you could never do with a typical satellite speaker.

edit: I have a customer who is running a pair of the Radius 270 columns as his main hi-fi speakers with a £1500 Creek CD & amp combination. He's chuffed to bits with them.

Think of Radius HDs as miniature Hi-Fi speakers, and accept that the price reflects their bigger-box-performance from a smaller-box-size. They're great.
 
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lucid said:
Radius HDs are very very good.

Monitor Audio were clever when they designed the Radius series. Rather than simply designing yet another sub-sat system (yawn) they decided to see how small they could make proper Hi-Fi speakers. That's a really important difference. The bass is limited, sure; small boxes don't do deep bass obviously. But HDs work as stand alone speakers in their own right. This is something you could never do with a typical satellite speaker.

edit: I have a customer who is running a pair of the Radius 270 columns as his main hi-fi speakers with a £1500 Creek CD & amp combination. He's chuffed to bits with them.

Think of Radius HDs as miniature Hi-Fi speakers, and accept that the price reflects their bigger-box-performance from a smaller-box-size. They're great.
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Ah, so I could in theory get a pair of the floorstanders without the sub first, and then add the rears + sub in later?

Will nip down the road to see when I can get a demo of these with the SR608.
 
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