speaker advice

drew64

drew64

drew64

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Joined
18 Feb 2009
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691
Location
Cambridge
hellooo, resident newbie here.

ive currently got a Creative 5.1 speaker set, which A. sound awful and B. are broken (occasionally get bad volume flucations)
ive also got an old sound blaster x-fi that its all connected to.

what im currently looking for is to upgrade both of these:

was looking at getting

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SC-002-AS&groupid=701&catid=11&subcat=

as ive heard good things about them (im probably wrong, often happens)

and now i need to look at speakers, which is what confuses me.

im not overly fussed about surround sound, so im undecided between a 2.1 set or a 5.1 set.

using my PC for gaming and background music, so i guess that'll make a difference to the choices.

my overall budget Inc. the soundcard is around 200-250.

any help or advice would be very much appreciated.

one thing i do need, is for the quality to be good even when quiet
 
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drew64 said:
impression im getting here is that 'PC' speakers suck?
Click to expand...

You are about to embark on the same journey I have been taking this past couple weeks :D . I'd link you my thread but for some reason I can't fathom its disappeared off the face of the internet (I've queried it with the powers that be).
 
drew64 said:
impression im getting here is that 'PC' speakers suck?
Click to expand...

Depends what your doing with them.....

For music, ther average pc speaker is ok to a pont, for example due to space constrictions where my pc usually is at the mo i have a pair of creative t20's which produce rather good sound for such small units. But this weekend im supposed to be doing an essay so iv moved my pc to a big table and can have my old mini(ish) hifi back as my pc speakers. Now i have much better speakers for music (iv been grinning all weekend for actually being able to hear so much more). Down side to this is my games sound a bit weird again....

Anyway, with £250 blow it on somethign that makes music sound really good and games should also sound rather good (mainly with that sort of money a good level of bass should come almost naturally). :D
 
Yeah Im thinking to move from pc speakers to decent kit,, but Im looking at about £6-£700 with what I want to buy,. Like ppl say theres no point rushing out and buying the kit,, a lot of research and planning when your going to be spending that sort of money on sound kit. I'll prob get my kit a bit at a time.
 
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okay, so i'll need speakers and an amp?
and this would connect through my sound card? or do i not need the sound card?
and i assume this would work like a 2.0 set? as the sub woofer wouldn't be necessary?
 
drew64 said:
okay, so i'll need speakers and an amp?
and this would connect through my sound card? or do i not need the sound card?
and i assume this would work like a 2.0 set? as the sub woofer wouldn't be necessary?
Click to expand...

you still need either an onboard sound card or a seperate one.. generally the spereate ones have better sound quality but that depends on what motherboard you have/compare it to

you can start off by using your onboard sound and upgrade to a sound card later if you want to

a 2.0 set should be fine and you can always add a sub at a later date if you feel you need it. too

again this depends on the speakers you get/ size or your room/ speaker placement etc
 
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I'd keep the X-FI as for what you want it is perfectly adequate, if you only have a few hundred to spend on speakers and are not an audiophile then a set of Z-5500's or equivalent are likely to do you very well.

Or you could go for a cheap set of speakers for the front and spend the rest on a decent headphone rig (Headphones + DAC + AMP) I have a set of Grados (£60) and a Beresford 7520 Dac with a fantastic headphone amp built in (£180) with sound quality to match speakers costing several times more than this combo cost me.
 
Forgot to say, for gaming 5.1 is better

For music 2.0 or 2.1 is better.

It just depends on what you do most. I have a 2.0 set up as music is what matters to me. :)
 
problem i have with 5.1 is i dont have an easy way of mounting the rear speakers behind me, so while the speakers are mainly for gaming i was considering 2.1 for convenience.
but if http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=SP-021-LG&groupid=702&catid=702&subcat= are good i may have to check them out.

the main thing i need is for the speakers to still sound good when quite quiet, as i often have to turn it down later in the night.

(reason i dont use a headphone set up is cus im often on skype etc. and like to keep the sound seperate)
 
If you are at all confused at this prospect, then if you have a Hi-fi specialist that is in your area then you could always visit the shop and get some advice.

Kefs are lovely speakers, used to have a pair of Crestas before they were damaged by an unfortunate finger poking accident. :mad:

Cambridge audio do very good value entry level Amplifiers, so they are well worth a look.
Also for speakers there are the highly rated are Tannoy F1 customs, which can be had for £90 delivered with 10m of cable if you look around.
http://www.tannoy.com/ResidentialDetail.aspx?pid=280&sid=65

Either way in terms of music listening, it'll be a big step up from PC speakers; which are not really designed for it.
 
£90? That's a good price, I'm tempted to go for some myself... :)

Tannoy active speakers are pretty good also, I've heard the Precision 8's are supposed to be pretty nice and he won't need an amp also.
 
try logitech Z cinema USB speakers. I tore out an asus Xonar PCI-e sound card a while ago because my creative S750's blew. I paid £135 for these speakers and i have not looked back since.

They only come as a 2.1 set sure, 7.1 would be awesome but as such they emulate 5.1 which is a negative because they will never be as good as true 5.1 (although you can't tell much difference, trust me :) ) but the positives far outweight the negatives.

For example they connect via usb, they do require software to be fully supported by the OS but don't require drivers as such (so the master volume is controlled either through windows or logitechs own software) and they work on every OS that i have ever tried (64 bit OS are apparently fully supported but i'm poor and i can only afford 32 bit os), i have also not had to worry about things like motherboard layout or shell out an extra £90-£130 for a descent sound card (or settle for onboard sound either), all in all the sound out of them is fantastic and they're well worth the money imo.
 
okay, thanks again all for the advice :)

so far because its mainly for gaming, it's between the Z-5500's or getting a set of Kef IQ1's and an amp (which look pretty but i'll need to read up on amps and stuff)

the question i have with the kef's and all the other speakers infact, is do i still get a decent sound out at lower volumes? as thats going to be really important
 
Since they are bookshelf speakers your not going to be driving them at huge volumes anyway. Thats what floorstanders are for!

They will sound very good even at lower volumes.
 
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