Need advice picking 5.1 system with 1500 budget

[Pogre]

How big is your room again? I have a large room and 2 VTF-3 MK5's. I wouldn't want any less. The 550p looks like a great bargain, but 2 of those just wouldn't be enough for me.

Deals on SVS or Hsu subs are gonna be hard to come by because they're that good. I've stumbled across the occasional deal on ebay for some SVS subs, but for the most part you can get the same pricing in their outlet.

 

[shadyJ]

The BAD - I have no sub yet! , I know tragedy. So, I've been sold on going with an HSU VTF-2 MK5 (12") or a HSU VTF-3 MK5 HP (15") but man is it hard to get a deal on one. I'm sure they are worth every penny of the going rate $539 and $799 respectively but the WAF might not be there.
I did find a HSU VTF-3 MK5 HP (15") B stock item for $697 I'm considering but it's still a lot.

A VTF-3 mk5 for 697 (+93 for S+H) is an steal. It will not last long at that price, and no other sub you have mentioned is in its league. I would grab it ASAP.

 

[TD4W]

How big is your room again?

The living room is 18' x 16' vaulted, then there is a transition open area (6x18 vaulted) to the Dinning room (14x11x9) and Kitchen (14x12x9) roughly 8200cubic feet. sorry for the confusion in the last post I stated square feet which is incorrect. The spaces also opens to the fourier as well, so the fist floor is really open. You can get a feel for the living room in pics of 1st post. kitchen and dinning room would be behind that view point.

A VTF-3 mk5 for 697 (+93 for S+H) is an steal. It will not last long at that price, and no other sub you have mentioned is in its league. I would grab it ASAP.

Yes, this is front runner, and by the end of the day I'm sure I'll have talked myself into it.

 

[Pogre]

The living room is 18' x 16' vaulted, then there is a transition open area (6x18 vaulted) to the Dinning room (14x11x9) and Kitchen (14x12x9) roughly 8200cubic feet. sorry for the confusion in the last post I stated square feet which is incorrect. The spaces also opens to the fourier as well, so the fist floor is really open. You can get a feel for the living room in pics of 1st post. kitchen and dinning room would be behind that view point.


Yes, this is front runner, and by the end of the day I'm sure I'll have talked myself into it.

Honestly in that big space, which is bigger than mine, you don't want anything less. In fact I would have no hesitation recommending 2 of them for you. Shady's right. Don't hesitate too long, you might miss it.

 

[William Lemmerhirt]

Hate to keep prodding, but these guys are right. I would avoid buying the jbl as a stop gap and just put the money towards a proper sub. If the second sub is a budget breaker, start with one. IMO, even 2 mk5's won't levitate the couch in that huge space, but a woefully undersized sub will just add distortion, and you'll be upset with the experience. I'd go for the HSU. You'll be glad you did.

 

[TD4W]

Pulled the trigger on the B-stock VTF-3 mk5 after getting the ok from the mrs. I can't wait for this think to get here.

You guys have been great. After all the great input I ended up with what so far is a great HT set-up for about $1800 which is pretty close to my original budget.

I just started scratching the surface of the options in the denon 3300 and...
Few questions for now with regard to the receiver:
1. Is the room calibration mostly for setting output levels and cross over levels or does the process also effect the processing (EQ) to individual speakers independently?
2. Once the calibration is all set, is there an easy way to know what each of the eq settings under "movie" Music" "Pure" etc. I guess in short I just don't know what to use when I'm watching different content. shows vs sports vs movies vs music ..etc. I mean I can just mess with them and settle on what I think sounds decent, but just wondering if there is a norm. I also have no idea what the eq differences are between these settings of if they are modifiable?, I guess they don't need too be modifiable, that's what audyssey is for?

I'll probably start all over with calibration once the sub gets here.

 

[NINaudio]

Pulled the trigger on the B-stock VTF-3 mk5 after getting the ok from the mrs. I can't wait for this think to get here.

You guys have been great. After all the great input I ended up with what so far is a great HT set-up for about $1800 which is pretty close to my original budget.

I just started scratching the surface of the options in the denon 3300 and...
Few questions for now with regard to the receiver:
1. Is the room calibration mostly for setting output levels and cross over levels or does the process also effect the processing (EQ) to individual speakers independently?
2. Once the calibration is all set, is there an easy way to know what each of the eq settings under "movie" Music" "Pure" etc. I guess in short I just don't know what to use when I'm watching different content. shows vs sports vs movies vs music ..etc. I mean I can just mess with them and settle on what I think sounds decent, but just wondering if there is a norm. I also have no idea what the eq differences are between these settings of if they are modifiable?, I guess they don't need too be modifiable, that's what audyssey is for?

I'll probably start all over with calibration once the sub gets here.

In addition to setting output levels and speaker distances, Audyssey does apply some measure of EQ to each speaker in order to correct for some of the anomalies that are introduced by your room. You'll need to do the Audyssey EQ all over again once you add the sub into the mix. I've never really used the various eq settings, you can play around with those and see if you like them. I usually just leave it in the normal auto decode mode.

One option you will definitely want to use is Dynamic EQ for movies and music. It really does help to make everything sound better at most listening levels in my experience. I usually use the 5 or 10 db setting in my receiver.

 

[TD4W]

I'm digging up an old post but I figured Id follow up to give my impression of my set-up now that I've had it a while.
-Denon3300/(3)NHTSuperOnes 2.1 for LCR/(2))NHTSuperZero 2.1 for surrounds/HSU VTF-3 MK5 HP.

After a year of ownership I'm glad I spent the time to ask everyone's opinion on this forum because the final result is really quite awesome. This set-up worked great for movies but is pretty solid for music. The room these speakers have to fill is pretty huge and they do a great job, in fact I often have to turn the sub gain down a bit because the wife's gives me dirty looks when the windows start to vibrate. I know there is room to grow/improve sounds quality but this is really solid for now. This sub is no joke.
At some point, I will be in the market for some towers R&L to beef up the front stage. I guess a new center speaker as well.
If I was going to upgrade one thing should the center speaker be the first thing? or the towers?

 

[shadyJ]

I'm digging up an old post but I figured Id follow up to give my impression of my set-up now that I've had it a while.
-Denon3300/(3)NHTSuperOnes 2.1 for LCR/(2))NHTSuperZero 2.1 for surrounds/HSU VTF-3 MK5 HP.

After a year of ownership I'm glad I spent the time to ask everyone's opinion on this forum because the final result is really quite awesome. This set-up worked great for movies but is pretty solid for music. The room these speakers have to fill is pretty huge and they do a great job, in fact I often have to turn the sub gain down a bit because the wife's gives me dirty looks when the windows start to vibrate. I know there is room to grow/improve sounds quality but this is really solid for now. This sub is no joke.
At some point, I will be in the market for some towers R&L to beef up the front stage. I guess a new center speaker as well.
If I was going to upgrade one thing should the center speaker be the first thing? or the towers?

I would say that if you listen to music more than anything else on your system, then upgrade your left and right fonts, but if you do more movie and TV watching than anything else on your system, upgrade the center speaker. If you are looking to upgrade the center, look at some of the three-way designs from NHT. If you are looking at upgrading the tower, look at the higher end tower from NHT.

Regarding rattling windows, you can add damping and bracing to loose things to prevent rattling. Think about addressing the loose windows for a tighter fit so you don't have to exercise as much restraint on the subwoofer.

 

[Crazy8s846]

I have a denon avr, klipsch bookshelf speakers and klipsch sub for $800 on the classifieds

How do you get to the classified, I cant find the link. Thanks in advance.

 

[lovinthehd]

How do you get to the classified, I cant find the link. Thanks in advance.

It's in the basic list of subforums. https://forums.audioholics.com/forums/audio/classifieds-sell-your-gear.37/

 

[Crazy8s846]

It's in the basic list of subforums. https://forums.audioholics.com/forums/audio/classifieds-sell-your-gear.37/

It's in the basic list of subforums. https://forums.audioholics.com/forums/audio/classifieds-sell-your-gear.37/

Thank you.

 

[TD4W]

Id say I'm 80% movie/tv, 20% music.. so ..
After reading a bit I'm not sure if I want to "upgrade"(which I think might be subjective) the center with something like
C LCR Center Channel Speaker
or
M7
which will take me away from having a matching LCR.. this seems like a constant discussion point. Maybe saving up and upgrading the whole LCR at some point is the way to go and skip the tower/center speaker idea... I dunno. Would probably save a few bucks in the long run and result in audio that's just as good?
Say I had $900 for the LCR could I really get 2 towers and a dedicated center to outperform a matching (3) bookshelf speaker set up? Any ideas/suggestion would be great. I know the budget is low, in the audio world.

 

[Pogre]

I think you'll need to bump the budget a little more and plan to replace all 3 for a significant improvement. Having a matching center channel is more important than having a "better" one that doesn't.

 

[snakeeyes]

Maybe describing what is lacking might help. Also $1500 is tight. $900 is crazy tight. Think you need $2000 ish.

 

[TD4W]

As it stands I have $300 bucks(do to a sale price) in the LCR so jumping to 2k would be a tough. I don't have a particular grip other than I think hearing peoples voices and conversations at times is difficult relative to all the other sounds going on, especially if the sub is dialed up. In general I think the sub can outplay the rest of the set up, which I'm not surprised by since I invested a bit more into it receptively.
I think my first step it to improve with a new set of bookshelves (3) at the 1k mark at some point to see if I can squeeze some more awesome out of this setup up without breaking the bank.

 

[snakeeyes]

As it stands I have $300 bucks(do to a sale price) in the LCR so jumping to 2k would be a tough. I don't have a particular grip other than I think hearing peoples voices and conversations at times is difficult relative to all the other sounds going on, especially if the sub is dialed up. In general I think the sub can outplay the rest of the set up, which I'm not surprised by since I invested a bit more into it receptively.
I think my first step it to improve with a new set of bookshelves (3) at the 1k mark at some point to see if I can squeeze some more awesome out of this setup up without breaking the bank.

Okay so in that case I would look at the 3 way centers and upgrade that. You probably already know 70% or more of the sound from 5.1 is via the center channel speaker.

 

[Pogre]

As it stands I have $300 bucks(do to a sale price) in the LCR so jumping to 2k would be a tough. I don't have a particular grip other than I think hearing peoples voices and conversations at times is difficult relative to all the other sounds going on, especially if the sub is dialed up. In general I think the sub can outplay the rest of the set up, which I'm not surprised by since I invested a bit more into it receptively.
I think my first step it to improve with a new set of bookshelves (3) at the 1k mark at some point to see if I can squeeze some more awesome out of this setup up without breaking the bank.

That sub will only outplay the rest if you set it that way. Have you tried just bumping the center a few dB? Depending on what I'm watching I'll sometimes add as much as 5 to the center.

 

[lovinthehd]

As it stands I have $300 bucks(do to a sale price) in the LCR so jumping to 2k would be a tough. I don't have a particular grip other than I think hearing peoples voices and conversations at times is difficult relative to all the other sounds going on, especially if the sub is dialed up. In general I think the sub can outplay the rest of the set up, which I'm not surprised by since I invested a bit more into it receptively.
I think my first step it to improve with a new set of bookshelves (3) at the 1k mark at some point to see if I can squeeze some more awesome out of this setup up without breaking the bank.

Why would the sub be "dialed up" particularly? How did you integrate the sub originally? You like extra bass and change the gain setting on the sub manually for particular things?

 

[snakeeyes]

Why would the sub be "dialed up" particularly? How did you integrate the sub originally? You like extra bass and change the gain setting on the sub manually for particular things?

Also, not sure you saw this detail in the reviews but the HSU gain knob is pretty sensitive. On my VTF2 just a small change is significant. I believe the VTF3 might be like that too.