Hi Everyone,
I'm new to this forum and if I could be so presumptuous as to think anyone would be interested, I'll outline my recent decent into "audioholism" (hence the title).
I've always had a love of music and had a nice stereo system that lasted many years: Luxman stereo receiver and CD player and Sound Dynamics 200Ti speakers. I also had a 2.1 Bose Acoustimass setup, purchased in a moment of temporary insanity. Actually they were a WAF concession for the living room. I had this setup for about 15 years until about 18 months ago, we (I blame my wife actually...) blew up a tweeter in one of the SDs. These were great speakers and I really wanted to fix it, so I went to a local independent A/V dealer of good repute. Now, anyone who is familiar with Sound Dynamics, knows that it's one of API's brands. Well, when the shop ordered a new tweeter from API, it came already blown - to save me the trouble of blowing it up myself, I suppose. When the shop contacted API, they checked all their spare tweeters of that model and found them all to be defective! This speaker has been out of production for many years, so they only had a handful of spares left anyway and I'm guessing they were returns, or ones that had failed quality control. But, it left me in the market for a new pair of speakers. And, this is where the ball started to roll...
I demoed several different floorstanders and ended up back at the shop that attempted to get me a tweeter for my old speakers. They are a Paradigm dealer and for the best price/performance balance, I judged the Monitor 7 V5 to be the best out of the different brands I demoed. So, they went home with me.
But, the bug had bitten! I then decided, that in order to prevent any more blown speakers, I needed more power. Sooo, it was amplifier shopping time. After a lot of research, I settled on a NAD C372, integrated amp. 150 wpc, lots of headroom, power to spare. Got it during a no-tax event, which was 14% in my area - not insignificant. This amp, combined with the relatively high sensitivity of the 7s, chucked out volume well beyond what I can tolerate - and I do like to crank it sometimes.
I was now, a certifiable audioholic - I should've started going to meetings! Instead, I took a hard look at my HT setup. It consisted of a Sony HTiB that did the job (but that's about the best I can say about it), a Sony DVPNS325 DVD player and a gi-normous JVC 36" CRT. Something had to be done about this!
All this equipment, except the Monitor 7s, was in the basement rec room, with in-wall wiring to the living room for the 7s. I then decided to move the
7s to the rec room and bought a pair of Monitor 9s (for their greater bass extension) for the living room. I had demoed more speakers prior to this purchase as well and actually did an in-home comparison between the 9s and a pair of Polk Audio RTiA 7s. Although the Polks retailed for about 60% more than the Monitor 9s, they were on sale for a similar price.
My wife and I did as thorough a comparison as possible. We actually blindfolded each other and varied the volume while switching between the two pairs of speakers, in order to prevent the Monitor 9s far higher sensitivity from clouding our judgement of the SQ. Well, the 9s won it, despite the big difference in retail price. I've learned something valuable over the last few months - price is not an accurate indicator of quality and if you don't compare the speakers side-by-side, judgement of their relative SQ is inherently flawed. So, listening to different speaker models, in different stores and trying to tell which is best is almost impossible. Of course, if you're comparing apples and oranges, i.e. a HTiB with little cube speakers against a well constructed floorstander, of course the differences will be obvious. But if you're comparing speakers that are in the same class, it has to be side-by-side, IMHO.
Getting back to the HT, I thought a new receiver and some additional speakers to go with the Monitor 7s was in order. But, while this was under consideration, my wife threw me a curve ball. I now had to renovate our living room fireplace. This was to include built-in bookcases on either side of the fireplace, the full width of the room - right where my Monitor 9s were situated!! She said, "Why can't you just shove them up against the sidewall?" After a futile attempt at explaining acoustics to her, I gave up and resigned myself to the fact that either the 7s or 9s would have to go and be replaced by bookshelf speakers. I agreed to do this, on the condition that I get a subwoofer to go with them.
I went back to my Paradigm dealer and explained my situation. He sypathized with my plight, but of course, was quite happy to sell me more speakers! However, instead of going with Paradigm for bookshelves, he suggested that I listen to the Mordaunt Short 902i. They've had great reviews and when I listened to them, I had to agree - they are fantasic little speakers! Plus, they sold for C$300! That's about US$240! Unbelievable deal! I also bought a Reel Acoustics RSW 1215.2 subwoofer. Reel Acoustics is a relatively obscure little speaker manufacturer. The specs for this sub won't impress any SVS/Hsu owner, but my in-room measurements using my spl meter and a test disc, showed me a fairly flat response down to about 30 Hz. For music, it filled the bill. Plus, it was only C$300 as well! I'm nothing, if not frugal...
I set up these new speakers in my living room and they work very well in the location. I built temporary stands for the MSs, until the fireplace work was finished. I dreaded the thought of actually putting them in a bookshelf and couldn't convince my wife that a bookshelf speaker shouldn't go into a bookshelf (I'm sure many of you can relate to that!). So, I designed the cabinetry to be as open as I can possibly make it, in order to compromise the SQ as little as possible.
Anyway, back to the rec room! After selling the Monitor 7s to a friend of mine, the 9s went to the rec room and I started scheming for a new HT setup. I had stumbled across a great deal on a pair of Energy RC10s at a local Future Shop that was moving locations. They were trying to clear out as much stock as possible, so some buys were available. I got these speakers for C$290 - they retail for C$800! I figureed that I would compare them to the 902is and one of the pairs would become my new rear surrounds. My wife made that decision, by saying that the RC10s fit the living room decor better...sigh...
Now I needed a new receiver, subwoofer and centre speaker to complete the audio portion of the HT. After more research and shopping around, I bought the Yamaha RX-V1800. As I'm sure other owners will attest, it's a fanatastic machine. Setting it up required a steep learning curve though. A person needs a black belt in HT to get through the manual, for the love of God! I'm not sure about all the DSP modes though - don't know if I'll be taking advantage of all those effects...
For a subwoofer, I felt no need to wake the dead or rattle the fillings out of my head, so I could be fairly conservative here. I compared a Klipsch Sub12 and a Velodyne DPS 12. The Klipsch could certainly go LOUD, but the cabinet seems thin and vibrates at high spl - plus I think it's a tad ugly. The DPS 12, while not able to reach the volume of the Sub 12, I believe has a more even FR. They both reached a similar bottom frequency, but again the SUB 12 could play it louder. Still, I settled on the DPS. I think the build quality and SQ are better and it certainly looks better. I would never buy a piece of equipment based on looks, but it is a bonus.
That leaves me with the centre (center, for any American readers!). I'm still in the market for that one and it'll be either the Paradigm CC-190 or CC-290. Right now, I have my one functional SD 200Ti set above my TV, as a temporary centre.
Finally, we decided that the stereo components needed to be in the living room. It's a pain in the rump, going up and downstairs to change CDs. What can I say - we're lazy. If we did that, the CD collection would have to go there as well. Problem is, we have 450+ CDs. I'd have to construct some sort of media cabinet to store them all, which would take up a lot of space. Orrrrrr, I could buy a couple of Sony CDP-CX355, 300 disc players, box up all the cases and put them in storage. So that's what I did. Got them for C$100 off retail (each!), which clinched that decision. Loading and storing titles in the memory takes a looonnng time. If you get one of these machines, get a computer keyboard. Using the remote control to enter all the titles would take a few years and leave you with carpal tunnel syndrome! I also created an index and put it in a binder - just in case the memory should get deleted, which I've heard can happen. It all works very well and I'm quite happy with it.
That's it, in an admittedly large nutshell...
