How much does a decent surround sound system cost?

Dark Light

Dark Light

Dark Light

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Looking to get a decent sound system, ie not one of those rubbish ones from Currys etc, but one with maybe a separate A\V unit and\or amp. And I was just wondering how much a decent one will cost.
 
Dark Light said:
Looking to get a decent sound system, ie not one of those rubbish ones from Currys etc, but one with maybe a separate A\V unit and\or amp. And I was just wondering how much a decent one will cost.
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heh bought my current technics setup from currys about 11 years ago mind. cost me £450 with staff discount but came with a eltax sub and some solid surround speakers. still going strong though and is nice and loud. :D
 
GAC said:
heh bought my current technics setup from currys about 11 years ago mind. cost me £450 with staff discount but came with a eltax sub and some solid surround speakers. still going strong though and is nice and loud. :D
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Don't want anything loud, all I am interested in is sound quality, and being able to change the volume without getting up.
 
What I did was look at Whathifi best buy winners and go demo the kit in my budget. Seems to have worked so far. Just about to refresh my kit, I have a 106 inch projectror screen being installed next week:)
 
Dark Light said:
That's the thing, I am not sure what you can get for £x.
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Surround sound systems start for a little under £250. There is no upper limit in price. Several of us here have surround and Hi-Fi systems that would equal the price of a nice 4-door family saloon car. That means that the word "decent" is rather subjective, as is budget.

If your point of comparison is a typical all-in-one system from Currys then I'd suggest £300 as a starting budget is where you should be aiming. At that level you'll outperform an all-in-one kit both sonically and in useful features such as the range of inputs. You'll also sidestep the cheaper receiver +sub/sat kits where the speakers are the real Achilles heel.

Rough ball park figures are...

£300-£400 for a receiver with a sub/sat speaker package that ticks all the boxes in terms of compatibility with the various file formats you're likely to encounter from DVD, Blu-ray, TV and media streaming. Compared to the Comet-type all-in-one kits the performance will have better fidelity: Bass will be reasonably articulate, treble sweeter and there'll be a good stab at midrange so that voices sound realistic.

£400-£600 you'll start to get better speakers and marginally more power but the main advances are in extra features such as 'net streaming, app control, Audio Return Channel (ARC) and possibly video signal conversion so what goes in as composite or component comes out via HDMI; this makes for a neater install if you have legacy devices that don't have HDMI outputs. Sonically the speakers will benefit from sturdier cabinets and better components.

£600-£1000 For sub/sat based systems its mostly a case of 'more': Better amplification circuitry, beefier speakers, more inputs, up-conversion and cross-conversion of video signals, multi-room output etc. Something along the lines of the Monitor Audio MASS 5.1 sub/sat kit will give similarly priced conventional box loudspeaker 5.1 kits a real run for their money despite being far more compact.
 
Me and my mate have just watched guardians of the galaxy on my system he was very impressed with the picture and sound said it was better than the cinema. :)
System consists of optoma hd200x projector, 92" screen, Yamaha rx3067 amp, kef iq5,iq60c and iq1 speakers and an svs sb12+ subwoofer. Amp was £750, speakers £400 second hand, sub was £200 second hand.
Imho its the subwoofer that makes a home cinema system shine, no one goes wow at the treble but they do go wow when the sofas are rumbling, cheap 5.1 packages have woofers not SUB woofers. ;)
 
The only thing I really want is good quality sound, I don't need streaming, or this and that. As for the A\V unit I don't see what the point is in the video inputs , surely anything will be outdated in a few years when you have 4k\8k, so are there any setups that just concentrate on the quality of the sound, and not volume or features. As for the inputs all I really need are the standard inputs, Sky, Blu Ray, PC so no legacy devices.
 
Dark Light said:
The only thing I really want is good quality sound, I don't need streaming, or this and that. As for the A\V unit I don't see what the point is in the video inputs , surely anything will be outdated in a few years when you have 4k\8k, so are there any setups that just concentrate on the quality of the sound, and not volume or features. As for the inputs all I really need are the standard inputs, Sky, Blu Ray, PC so no legacy devices.
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It's a big market and so potential buyers have a wide variety of needs. You might only need a couple of HDMI inputs and some way of connecting the PC, but that might not be the case for many other purchasers. Manufacturers have to try to cover as many bases as possible. That's only reasonable. What you'll also find is that these features come as standard with the sort of AV receivers that can make a decent fist of music.

As for 4K/8K, if and when the dust finally settles and there's a firm final standard for each then we might all face the prospect of having to change our gear to be properly compatible.

You still haven't said anything specific about what "good sound quality" means to you. What have you heard so far that you thought was good? What's your frame of reference, and what specifically are you going to be using as audio sources? For example, are you talking about being able to hear the difference between the sound quality of DVD (DD/DTS) and Blu-ray (Dolby TrueHD/DTS-MA), or are you looking for a surround system that can do music; and if so are you planning on using the Blu-ray player as a music source or the PC. If it is the PC then are these ripped files from your own CD library (and in what file format and quality) or are you streaming from online music libraries, or have you just audio converted a load of YouTube music? As you can see, there's lots of information missing from your queries which makes it difficult to almost impossible to give you any kind of constructive help other than a few random shots in the dark.

Finally, what's a realistic budget for you? I ask that because it's easy to say you want something good enough to blow away the local cinema's £20K rig for detail but if you're expecting that for £200-£300 tops then that would be an unrealistic goal.

Over to you.
 
Dark Light said:
The only thing I really want is good quality sound, I don't need streaming, or this and that. As for the A\V unit I don't see what the point is in the video inputs , surely anything will be outdated in a few years when you have 4k\8k, so are there any setups that just concentrate on the quality of the sound, and not volume or features. As for the inputs all I really need are the standard inputs, Sky, Blu Ray, PC so no legacy devices.
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What you deem good sound quality is a personal opinion. The more expensive Curry's systems are up to £1200 or so. Are you wanting to spend that or get more for less? It's all about your budget, otherwise we could recommend a system for £500 or £5000.
 
lucid said:
It's a big market and so potential buyers have a wide variety of needs. You might only need a couple of HDMI inputs and some way of connecting the PC, but that might not be the case for many other purchasers. Manufacturers have to try to cover as many bases as possible. That's only reasonable. What you'll also find is that these features come as standard with the sort of AV receivers that can make a decent fist of music.

As for 4K/8K, if and when the dust finally settles and there's a firm final standard for each then we might all face the prospect of having to change our gear to be properly compatible.

You still haven't said anything specific about what "good sound quality" means to you. What have you heard so far that you thought was good? What's your frame of reference, and what specifically are you going to be using as audio sources? For example, are you talking about being able to hear the difference between the sound quality of DVD (DD/DTS) and Blu-ray (Dolby TrueHD/DTS-MA), or are you looking for a surround system that can do music; and if so are you planning on using the Blu-ray player as a music source or the PC. If it is the PC then are these ripped files from your own CD library (and in what file format and quality) or are you streaming from online music libraries, or have you just audio converted a load of YouTube music? As you can see, there's lots of information missing from your queries which makes it difficult to almost impossible to give you any kind of constructive help other than a few random shots in the dark.

Finally, what's a realistic budget for you? I ask that because it's easy to say you want something good enough to blow away the local cinema's £20K rig for detail but if you're expecting that for £200-£300 tops then that would be an unrealistic goal.

Over to you.
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That's the thing, I don't really have a frame of reference, all I really have is an old 2.0 system that I didn't buy and the absolutely rubbish sound from the TV. I have heard systems in stores before, but because of the ambient noise you can't really take anything from that.

As for what it's for, almost entirely TV via Sky or Blu-Ray and maybe PC in the future via optical, not really for music although there is the chance of that, but I am not getting it for music. And as for budget, it all depends what you can get, if a £100 system is fine then the budget would be £100, if it's worth it I can justify it. Although I can't really spend more than I have, so maybe £600, although that doesn't mean I will only be looking at £600 systems.

As for the A\V, is there is any need for it to handle video input, can't I just get a system that only handles audio and then have video go direct? That way whatever I will be using it for in the future it will be able to handle, audio input don't really change that much, I was using an amp that was like 30 years old with a Sky+ HD STB and it worked fine. I just want something that will last, also why I am able to justify the expense.
 
The simple fact is that you can spend pretty much as much as you like. I've been in a shop that want $500k for one of their systems.
For all that, it's possible to get entry level sytems from say £250 upwards. Sure, it won't be great, but then it's an entry level system.

Work the other way around. Think of how much you fancy spending. Add 50% to it, then go into a shop who actually sells the gear (e.g. Richers) and buy from them. Problem solved. If you spend more, will it get better, yes is the answer, but that's why you need to set a budget.
 
Dark Light said:
That's the thing, I don't really have a frame of reference, all I really have is an old 2.0 system that I didn't buy and the absolutely rubbish sound from the TV. I have heard systems in stores before, but because of the ambient noise you can't really take anything from that.
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If that's the case then pretty much anything in an AV receiver + sub/sat kit over £300 is going to sound better than a typical Currys all-in-one system at twice the price.

Dark Light said:
As for the A\V, is there is any need for it to handle video input, can't I just get a system that only handles audio and then have video go direct? That way whatever I will be using it for in the future it will be able to handle, audio input don't really change that much, I was using an amp that was like 30 years old with a Sky+ HD STB and it worked fine. I just want something that will last, also why I am able to justify the expense.
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If you want good sound quality then it pays you to work with the best audio formats possible. In the case of Blu-rays and DVDs then that's something called a bitstream file. It's a data stream of encoded audio containing individual channels for all the speakers and sub. The data is decoded by the AV receiver. If you have a Blu-ray player then by far the most common way to access this data is by the HDMI connection which carries both picture and sound. So yes, you need something to handle HDMI video because the audio is piggybacked in the signal.

Sky also uses HDMI for multichannel audio, but also uses Optical or sometimes Digital Coax as an alternative. All these forms of connection will supply the AV receiver with the bitstream data. The red & white phono connections you've used will give audio, but it is limited to just stereo audio. AV receivers have the ability to take stereo audio and process it in to a simulated surround effect, but it's not as convincing as audio decoded from the bitstream data.

A PC could possibly use a similar range of audio outputs to a Sky box.

If I was you then I wouldn't get too fixated on legacy video support. It will be in every single AV Receiver as a standard feature within your price bracket, so it's not like you can buy a Receiver that excludes the feature.

The other common question is "Can't I just connect everything to the TV then take a sound lead from there to the amp?" It is certainly possible to do that but you'll throw away any bitstream audio and with it all the advantages of multichannel audio from Sky and Blu-ray will go too. That's because the TV will more than likely convert any multichannel audio from its HDMI inputs down to a basic stereo sound as used by the TV's internal speakers. You really don't want to connect that way if sound quality is a priority.

Dark Light said:
And as for budget, it all depends what you can get, if a £100 system is fine then the budget would be £100, if it's worth it I can justify it. Although I can't really spend more than I have, so maybe £600, although that doesn't mean I will only be looking at £600 systems.
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As I said in a previous post, £300 is a sensible starting budget. £100 isn't realistic for a decent sounding surround system.

Minstadave mentioned an Onkyo/JBL and a Yamaha/Tannoy system. Have a look at those and arrange a demo at a local store.
 
'As for the A\V, is there is any need for it to handle video input, can't I just get a system that only handles audio and then have video go direct? That way whatever I will be using it for in the future it will be able to handle, audio input don't really change that much, I was using an amp that was like 30 years old with a Sky+ HD STB and it worked fine. I just want something that will last, also why I am able to justify the expense.'

Digital digital digital, (unless you've got an old turntable), this means hdmi or optical,all pcs now come with hdmi as do graphics cards. Just about every device is now geared to hdmi output as well. In the digital world its all bits and bytes, there no distinction between video/audio they're bits of information to be moved around and processed.
Think of the AV receiver as a hub , it sends the video where it needs to go and decodes the digital audio and sends it to the speakers.
 
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