time for an small upgrade

[talkingfoodie]

Fellow Audioholics,

While you all are enjoying/enjoyed or going to enjoy your Friyay beer, i need few advice on my next purchase. Basically i am buying my next house and i have convinced (rather begged) my wifey to give me the freedom to just choose the home theatre. To my luck she agreed. i have to tell you I am still on tight budget with house purchase, but i am thinking along this line, please let me know if its stupid idea.

I have a YHT-196/HTR-2064 package currently.

In my new place i wanted to retain the same Receiver if possible + club it with a Dali Senzor 7 package (Dali Zensor 1, Zensor 7, Zensor Vokal and E12F)

Please let me know your thoughts. Also I would need some recommendations on

1. Speaker Stands
2. Good Speaker wires.
3. white cable trunking(wife doesnt want me to drill holes on the wall)

Thx

 

[talkingfoodie]

Gurus,

Can anyone please help here?

 

[shadyJ]

I take it you are in Europe? Dali is a fine brand. Their subs might not be power houses for the price though. Make sure you are getting a real discount on the sub.

As for speaker stands, just make sure it gets the speaker to where the tweeter is level with your ear at the listening position. Its not likely to affect the sound much. The placement and positioning of the speaker is what will make a difference.

Regarding speaker wire, just get 14 AWG wire, that should suffice for all but long runs. If you are looking at long runs of cable, you might consider 12 AWG.

 

[killdozzer]

I second DALI. Perhaps not many members from the States heard these, but I have when I was buying my speakers. They are really good in many price ranges.

 

[snakeeyes]

I second DALI. Perhaps not many members from the States heard these, but I have when I was buying my speakers. They are really good in many price ranges.

Which Dali have you heard? Zensor 3? I’m curious about those.

 

[killdozzer]

Which Dali have you heard? Zensor 3? I’m curious about those.

I was after bookshelves and in my town there's a dealership for DALI so I could listen to Zensor 3 & 1, Epicon 2 and Rubicon 2. I didn't ask for bigger ones. Zensor left an impression for being very cheap and sounded really good (Zensor 1 310$ here and 3 are 430$). In all honesty I would say Zensors show their magic with acoustic music not over-produced and bass heavy pop or EDM. The bass was nice with mid level volume, but I had a feeling that when play loud they would start distorting.

What I really liked was, for example, Tracy Chapman on these and Courtney Barnett & Kurt Vile.

Zensor 1 impressed me more because I remember thinking that for 310 it's a lot of sound. Zensor 3 play better and have deeper lows, but that was expected.

Both were very wide... had a wide sound stage. Then again, the shop had a dedicated listening room, quite decent, not too big and well padded. Speakers were placed a few feet from all barriers so they could really give their best.

I had my own CD as advised by swerd. When I played Florence and The Machine I wasn't quite happy. Florence is my test music for a mess. She yells when she sings, has a lot of instruments, there's alot going on in the mid section and it is demanding. I was hoping for more... clarity. I guess for the price they did alright.

Next was Rubicon 2 which in my country costs more than the LS50' I ended up with (2050$) and I liked KEF's better.

Playing the 5100$ Epicon 2 was more of a joke.

 

[snakeeyes]

Ya I think for my home theater, I will want Kef R500 or SVS Ultra towers for high output but in my bedroom I have Q Acoustics 3020 speakers that I want to move to another room soon so will need something in the bedroom soon as well. Something better than the 3020 but don’t want to spend too much.

 

[talkingfoodie]

@snakeeyes @killdozzer @shadyJ - thanks a lot for the reply. Yes you guessed it correct, I am based out in UK. I am wondering if the same AMP is good enough? Also if not Dali, how about Monitor Audio Bronze 6, Bronze FX, Bronze Centre and Bronze W10?

Or If Kef, which package should you guys recommend. If I can get away with my existing AMP, then I might have some budget. Any amps recommendations would be good too.

 

[shadyJ]

I think both Monitor and Dali are fine manufacturers. I don't think you can go wrong with either. Kef would be great as well.

As for your amp, it might be fine at low loudness levels, but I wouldn't trust it at high levels. It probably wouldn't sound terrible though, but that is an entry-level AVR. I don't normally advise people to up their amplification, but I think in this case its warranted. I would be looking at AVRs in a higher price bracket, like the $1k price range US, which is like 850 euros I guess. Marantz, Yamaha, Denon, will surely have some fine choices to choose from in this space.

 

[talkingfoodie]

@shadyJ thanks for the comments. So i managed to get my wifey to listen to some music
1. Monitor Audio - she liked it, me too
2. Dali Zensor 5 - she loved it , me too
decided we will go for that , but while we were waiting for the guy to give me a quote
we same Dali Opticon 6 so we asked him if he could give a demo of that too, then he said he has something else to show and he then demoed Focal Aria 926 and my wife said this is it. So the guy mentioned i need to up my AMP to something more powerful and recommended Yamaha RXA 1070 and he said, you can buy these two now and add other stuff later. I was checking the Focal reviews and its give me mixed reviews so my obvious plan was to come back here.

I originally thought of retaining my AMP, but seems like it aint and option if i want to go for a good speaker system.

current quote:
£2548 - yamaha RXA1070 and Focal Aria 926

My budget was 2K - 2.5K for a full set of speakers and may be a good AMPS. What you think, is it worth taking the plunge with just the yamaha RXA1070 and Focal Aria 926

 

[Andrein]

You might want to consider KEF as well. Saw quite a lot of models available in UK. I have a1070 and can say that most likely you wont need an amp, given the size of houses in UK (unless you live in Buckingham palace).

 

[shadyJ]

@shadyJ thanks for the comments. So i managed to get my wifey to listen to some music
1. Monitor Audio - she liked it, me too
2. Dali Zensor 5 - she loved it , me too
decided we will go for that , but while we were waiting for the guy to give me a quote
we same Dali Opticon 6 so we asked him if he could give a demo of that too, then he said he has something else to show and he then demoed Focal Aria 926 and my wife said this is it. So the guy mentioned i need to up my AMP to something more powerful and recommended Yamaha RXA 1070 and he said, you can buy these two now and add other stuff later. I was checking the Focal reviews and its give me mixed reviews so my obvious plan was to come back here.

I originally thought of retaining my AMP, but seems like it aint and option if i want to go for a good speaker system.

current quote:
£2548 - yamaha RXA1070 and Focal Aria 926

My budget was 2K - 2.5K for a full set of speakers and may be a good AMPS. What you think, is it worth taking the plunge with just the yamaha RXA1070 and Focal Aria 926

That would be a fine setup. I think you would be very happy with that system, no doubt.

 

[KenM10759]

Too bad you folks in GB aren't seeing the sell-off of the KEF R series that we have going in the USA right now. Averaging 30% off, rather nice. I think you are getting something like a trade-up of just about anything for 20% off, something like that. New R series likely to be announced on 16 August.

 

[talkingfoodie]

You might want to consider KEF as well. Saw quite a lot of models available in UK. I have a1070 and can say that most likely you wont need an amp, given the size of houses in UK (unless you live in Buckingham palace).

I wish I lived in Buckingham Palace.
But this room is fairly big as per UK standards - its our lounge which around 9 m X 4 m

 

[talkingfoodie]

Too bad you folks in GB aren't seeing the sell-off of the KEF R series that we have going in the USA right now. Averaging 30% off, rather nice. I think you are getting something like a trade-up of just about anything for 20% off, something like that. New R series likely to be announced on 16 August.

We do get KEF here but at a jacked up price. i havent heard a KEF yet. What do you reckon, Q550 or R500. At some point i was considering this
http://www.audioaffair.co.uk/kef-r500-5-1-speaker-package
But then i am broke now after the house purchase

 

[talkingfoodie]

That would be a fine setup. I think you would be very happy with that system, no doubt.

Do you think, I would need bookshelf ,centre and sub too or i can live with this and then may be expand later? or do you think i should probably go for a package set up?

We use mainly for Movies, Music - Acoustic Rock, Country, Reggae, Pop, Indie mainly

 

[shadyJ]

Given your tastes in music, I think you can get by without a subwoofer. If you like the rumble of the big summer movies, yeah get a sub when you can- and a good one, not a little goofy sub. In the UK, I would look at the big ported subs from SVS, BK Electronics, and XTZ.

 

[Andrein]

Svs subs should be available in UK. I bought 2 of them through amazon uk 2y ago.

 

[Andrein]

Also if you dont want to pay all at once, most of the companies in UK selling hifi stuff offer low or 0 % loans.

Btw i bought some stuff from AudioAffair. You can also try ProAc 148 (towers) or 118 (bookshelf) for comparisson. Personally i liked them more than KEF for instance.

 

[talkingfoodie]

@Andrein @shadyJ - thanks a lot for your suggestions. today i had some free time at work so decided to visit a richer sounds store near work. The guy hooked in a pair of Dali zensor 7 and KEF Q550 and played. But i dont know, i was so hooked into Focals, everything else seems way below.

So i asked the guy - do i really need a £849 worth Yamaha RXA 1070 or anything else is fine. He said, its really good, else you go for a £549 worth Yamaha RXV585

This is the set up I am planning

Aria 926(to begin with), Will add CC900 centre and Aria 906 over the time. May be a nice sub as @shadyJ suggested.

Now my last question would be - which Sub, any suggestions?