Are bigger speakers better in home theater for a big room?

[Mancave]

My HT is 22' L x 14' W. Family room too. Anyway, I'm looking at speakers. I have a yamaha sub someone gave me. Not the best but I can feel the base so I'm keeping it for now. But I need fronts and a center channel.

If I get bookshelf speakers for the fronts and a good cc, will I be dissappointed? I have heard two different things. One is that you need big speakers for a big room. Second is that you don't because the sub will handle the lower frequency and "move the air" so the fronts don't have to. Thanks.

 

[jonnythan]

That's not a very big room. Many bookshelf speakers will be fine.

And you always need a sub. At the very least you need a lot of power to create bass and a receiver can't output that much power.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

My HT is 22' L x 14' W. Family room too. Anyway, I'm looking at speakers. I have a yamaha sub someone gave me. Not the best but I can feel the base so I'm keeping it for now. But I need fronts and a center channel.

Before anything else, what are exact VOLUME of Space? (not a room) where your HT is located (total volume, including ANY open spaces)

I don't recollect yamaha have built any decent subs, especially not ones people gave away

Do List all the equipment with correct model numbers (not specs)
List what are trying to achieve and most importantly - what's your budget

 

[zieglj01]

My HT is 22' L x 14' W. Family room too. Anyway, I'm looking at speakers. I have a yamaha sub someone gave me. Not the best but I can feel the base so I'm keeping it for now. But I need fronts and a center channel.

If I get bookshelf speakers for the fronts and a good cc, will I be dissappointed? I have heard two different things. One is that you need big speakers for a big room. Second is that you don't because the sub will handle the lower frequency and "move the air" so the fronts don't have to. Thanks.

I can hear a telephone ring in a room that size > bookshelf speakers
can work - the key thing would be the sub.

 

[Mancave]

Before anything else, what are exact VOLUME of Space? (not a room) where your HT is located (total volume, including ANY open spaces)

I don't recollect yamaha have built any decent subs, especially not ones people gave away

Do List all the equipment with correct model numbers (not specs)
List what are trying to achieve and most importantly - what's your budget

If I understand, I have about 2464 volume, LxWxH, 22x14x8. There is an open space, door size to a kitchen about 15 feet from the tv, straight. There is a big opening to a living room to the right of the tv/speaker setup. The opening is probably the size of sliding glass doors to a patio.

Yamaha HTR-5930 is the receiver.
SW-P270 is the subwoofer

Yamaha YHT 270SL Overview & Specs sorry. not enough posts to put the link

is the original setup. I'm using the center channel, none of the other speakers. It's all too small. Now, as funny as this is, I bought some Denon USC-500 speakers from an old stereo setup, D-500. I paid $7.50 for the pair (yes, 3.5 each.)

So as you can see, I don't have much. I am going to keep the receiver for now and put my money into speakers.

I have about $200. Keeping the sub because I don't think I can even begin to get anything decent.

...Man, how big a room do you guys have? Around here that's a big room.

 

[walter duque]

I think bookshelf and dual subs is the way to go. At times I do think about changing my setup. I was playing around with some cheap Jensen outdoor speakers one day (powered them with a Perraux (500 watts X2 ) "I know it sounds a little crazy" turned on my 2 subs and it sounded great. Even with expensive towers you'll need a sub or two or three or four, plus you're gonna cross them over, so you'll never get the full potential of big towers anyway. You'll be fine with bookshelf speakers and a couple of subs. I think you'll be ahead of the game going that route.

 

[Mancave]

Why do I need all those subs? I used to have a Mirage S12. It as overwhelming. I remember "fatigue" from using it too much. I had Klipsch center channels and fronts and they were bright, but everything was room filling. I had to sell them all for bills.

I'm thinking I don't know what HT is supposed sound like.

 

[ImcLoud]

Some people dont give bookshelfs enough credit, ascend, wharfedale, focal, Kef and many others make really capable bookshelfs, and if you are crossing them to a sub or set of subs, you really dont need towers... smaller cabinets sound better to me for some reason...

And dont worry about filling your space with subs, lol, I too have a large room 400sq ft, with high ceilings, and only use 1 vtf2 turned up half way on the sub, and -5 at the avr and it is way to much bass at times...

 

[zieglj01]

I have about $200. Keeping the sub because I don't think I can even begin to get anything decent.

...Man, how big a room do you guys have? Around here that's a big room.

The sale ends in 2 hours - for Pioneer SDF-2K speakers,
They were also designed by Andrew Jones - they are nice
Pioneer s DF2 K Audiophile Speakers in Perfect Mint Condition not A Scratch 012562983158 | eBay

However, you will still have 8 days to buy them.

 

[BoredSysAdmin]

Amazon.com: Jamo S 426 HCS 3 WENGE 5-Piece Home Theater System (Wenge): Electronics

This will get you with solid starter system. You'll have to replace the sub later on

 

[ImcLoud]

Amazon.com: Jamo S 426 HCS 3 WENGE 5-Piece Home Theater System (Wenge): Electronics

This will get you with solid starter system. You'll have to replace the sub later on

I bought these for my sister, they sound really good... for the price... and we paid $200 they werent on sale energy rebadges these and sells just the towers for $200 lol

 

[TLS Guy]

The issue really comes down to power handling.

I have pointed out again and again that there is very little power in music in the last three octaves, blow 80 Hz. The vast majority of the power is between 180 Hz and 1.2 kHz. I look at the power spectrum meter all the time when working in Wav files. The issue is that subs are very insensitive and inefficient and take a lot of power to produce the meager sound energy present below 80 Hz.

There are very, very few bookshelf speakers that can handle the energy in the bad I described at concert level even in a small room. For most moving coil transducers it takes more than one voice coil per speaker in the mid band to get satisfactory results.

 

[JerryLove]

There are very, very few bookshelf speakers that can handle the energy in the bad I described at concert level even in a small room. For most moving coil transducers it takes more than one voice coil per speaker in the mid band to get satisfactory results.

Then that problem should extend to the majority of towers: which even if 3-way tend to crossover by 300Hz or so.

You seem to make the argument for an MTM (or TMM) design; bookshelf or otherwise. Or stacked bookshelves.