I am a bass-o--holic. I would not be interested in increasing the speaker volume unless the sub:speaker ratio was where it was right now. The warm punchy goodness fills my ears with ecstasy every single time. The louder it is, the better (to a reasonable level of course). Unfortunately at this point in time the level of bass cannot stay at as high of a quality as it is at lower volumes and still play as loud as I want it to. If I turned up the speakers without proportionally increasing the bass then the speakers drown out the bass too much for me. That is why I cannot raise the speakers and leave the bass where it sounds good.
It seems at my limited budget I am limited in options, but for future reference, can you in fact play digital music through a home theatre speaker system? And random question, in terms of headphones vs speakers, very high end speakers produce better sound than comparably ranked headphones right?
If under $500
this, or
this are probably your best bet.
As far as my system, is is an AV system.
I have no idea what it cost, as I have been acquiring gear over fifty years now.
A lot of the pieces, especially the vintage turntables are very valuable now.
The system plays just about anything. 78 rpm, LPs, just about all 1/4 reel to reel tapes and their code/encode systems (Dolby A,B and C, and dbx 1 & 2), compact cassette, FM radio, VHS, digital PCF-1 DAT, CD, SACD, DVD, DVD-A, BD and has a Direct TV DVR.
There are two computers, one is the audio workstation it can edit and master CDs to Red Book, download and play pretty much any audio codec including FLAC, and also convert them. It also streams and downloads from the NET. This will need a redesign and upgrade soon. Currently it is loaded with Wave Lab 6 and the sound card/DAC is external. It is the RME Fireface 800. I need to update the mother board and upgrade to WaveLab 8 and migrate from Windows XP to Windows 7. WaveLab 8 will be available sometime next month.
The HTPC will download and stream pretty much any stream out there. It will play and burn CD,DVD and BD.
The pre/pro as all the AV codecs required. So yes, this system is very universal and will grab and play pretty much any AV or audio stream or Download on the NET.
So this system handles a huge range of legacy and current hard media, and is fully up to date in the digital world, and certainly handles all I want.
I have all my studio microphones and this rig is capable of making a high grade studio recording, although I have not done that lately.
It is a 7.1 system and has a total of 14 power amplifier channels providing 3 KW audio watts to the system.
So the answer to "can you play digital music though an HT system?" is an emphatic yes.
I think good speakers best headphones. But headphone listening is something some enjoy, while others like myself don't particularly.