3.1 speaker advice needed

[Danny W.]

It's time to make some changes to my home theater system. A dozen years ago we had 10-year-old Sony analog TV that needed better sound and a pair of 20-year-old Allison CD-8 speakers that I had no other use for but hated to part with. Our main music-listening system is on the other side of a 35-foot room and I couldn't come up with a way to combine the TV and audio system, as I had in our previous houses, so I threw the Allisons on top of the TV cabinet, added a Sony 5 x 100w receiver (STR-DE675) to drive them and ran the analog audio from the TV into a pair of inputs. To fill in the middle I left the TV's speakers turned on, adjusted the receiver volume to balance ands the TV to control the overall volume. It doesn't sound as bad as it might from the description, but it's not great.

Two years ago I replaced the Sony TV with a 47" Vizio. Since I still was using the TV's internal speakers I connected the Vizio's analog audio to the receiver, just as before. Recently i came up with a better use for the Allsions, assuming we can get them down from the cabinet. As I said before, it's time to change.

We watch mostly old movies, current TV shows both network and cable, and concerts or music shows. We had a Blu-Ray player for awhile, but rarely used it and now it's gone. Our main source is an cable HD DVR. The Vizio is online, but I rarely watch anything that way. I do sometimes use this system for music only, with the source being an Airport Express with music streamed using Airtunes. Our music preference is mostly jazz, but I also listen to some older pop, doo wop and surf/spy. Just for the record, I'm a retired EE, but I've been a gigging guitar player for 56 years and currently play in a working big band and a small jazz group, as well as doing some pit-band stuff. I hear (and make) live music every day and have a good idea of what it's supposed to sound like.

Our room setup doesn't really allow the use of surrounds and hardly anything we watch would really benefit from it, so we're sticking to a 3.1 system.

One constraint is that the fronts have to go into this:

As you can see, nothing will be at ear level.

The sub will have to be on the right-side wall, either in the front corner or right in front of our listening position, and it can't be too big.

Finally there's budget, which we're still working on. It would be great if I could come up with a $500 system, a $1000 system and a $1500 system. I've read all the budget speaker threads here and there's a lot of possibilities, but I'm hoping to hone in on a few "best for the price" systems that will fit into our situation. A few of the ones I've looked at have rear ports and I'm not sure how well they will work in the cabinet.

I have no possibility of hearing any of the systems anywhere except in my house, so I'm trying to not have to ship too much stuff back, which is why I'm seeking advice. Any insight on this would be greatly appreciated.

Danny W.

 

[lsiberian]

Some things are just not practical. This project is one of them. Good speakers need to be placed away from walls and outside of cabinets. I recommend a good pair of speakers placed out side of the cabinet. Have you considered in-walls? They might be more practical in this situation.

 

[twoeyedbob]

Would you consider maybe ,removing the wooden centre's
From the cabinet doors and trimming with acoustic cloth ?
I'd imagine you could get a colour to tie into existing decor...

Either that ,..or get some nice front ported or sealed bookshelf
Spkrs for either side of the tv and forget the centre spkr..

3rd option would be a soundbar in conjuction with a sub..
Not something i'd usually consider but i've read some favourable reviews for use in awkward spaces


Sent from my HTC Vision using Tapatalk 2

 

[Danny W.]

Some things are just not practical. This project is one of them. Good speakers need to be placed away from walls and outside of cabinets. I recommend a good pair of speakers placed out side of the cabinet. Have you considered in-walls? They might be more practical in this situation.

I'm not looking for great sound, just a workable solution. In this case, I have to work with what's there. If there had been a place for speakers outside the cabinet I would have put the Allisions on the floor where they would work a lot better than on their sides nine feet off the ground. There are no walls to put in-walls into, either, so I need to put the speakers in the cabinet.

Would you consider maybe ,removing the wooden centre's
From the cabinet doors and trimming with acoustic cloth ?
I'd imagine you could get a colour to tie into existing decor...

Either that ,..or get some nice front ported or sealed bookshelf
Spkrs for either side of the tv and forget the centre spkr..

3rd option would be a soundbar in conjuction with a sub..
Not something i'd usually consider but i've read some favourable reviews for use in awkward spaces


Sent from my HTC Vision using Tapatalk 2

Modifying the cabinet fronts isn't in the cards.

I currently have a Vizio SB4021M soundbar but I'm planning to pack it up and return it. The mids are very harsh and there's a gap in response between the bottom end of the soundbar and the top end of the sub that's very annoying.

Thanks for the thoughts,

Danny W.

 

[twoeyedbob]

A soundbar and sub would seem to be the answer...
Maybe try a well reviewed one...
?

Sent from my HTC Vision using Tapatalk 2

 

[shadyJ]

In that situation, you might go with something that has controlled directivity, ie horns. Klipsch style speakers, they might not be affected as much by nearby surface reflections. I would be looking at Klpsch Reference speakers, RB-61s and RC62s. You might also look at Hsu Research HB-1 bookshelf speakers and HC-1 center. You should also look into KEF speakers, they don't have the same kind of controlled directivity, but their terrific off-axis response may make the reflections not as severely impact the sound as typical speakers.

 

[Danny W.]

In that situation, you might go with something that has controlled directivity, ie horns. Klipsch style speakers, they might not be affected as much by nearby surface reflections. I would be looking at Klpsch Reference speakers, RB-61s and RC62s. You might also look at Hsu Research HB-1 bookshelf speakers and HC-1 center. You should also look into KEF speakers, they don't have the same kind of controlled directivity, but their terrific off-axis response may make the reflections not as severely impact the sound as typical speakers.

Thanks- I have been looking at these. The Hsus have rear ports, so I'm not sure how well that would work, but some other brands are front-ported.

If I knew I'd be considering horns again after 35 years I would have kept these:

Danny W.

 

[twoeyedbob]

I suspect you'd struggle to fit them in your cabinet..

Sent from my HTC Vision using Tapatalk 2

 

[Danny W.]

Knowing that so many of you have been waiting with bated breath to find out how my HT redo went, here's an update.

I auditioned a number of speakers at a BB Magnolia Home Theater, most of which I didn't particularly like, but I did like the Def Tech SM55 (also a Magnepan floor-stander, but that's a different story). Wasn't too happy with the price for LCR on the Dec Techs, so continued to research other small speakers. A couple of months ago I came across a guy selling a trio of the SM55's and bought all three.

While that was going on I changed my mind about keeping the Sony receiver and bought a Yamaha RX-V673 when the price dropped on those. My main reason for this was to be able to route all my sources through the receiver, instead of having the HDMI sources going direct to the TV. Doing it that way I was getting lip-sync issues that couldn't be fixed using my Vizio's adjustment. In addition, it was confusing for my wife to sometimes select the source on the TV and sometimes on the receiver. When I bought the Sony it was supposed to be an inexpensive stop-gap measure while I got the system sorted out, so after twelve years, it seemed time.

The Yamaha and the Def Techs arrived around the same day. I had also ordered 50 feet of 12-gauge zip from Monoprice and 6 pairs of Deadlock banana plugs from Sewell Direct. Service from both places was outstanding and the products were fine. One of the plugs was defective--Sewell sent me another pair immediately. The plus made wiring up everything much easier.

To get the receiver online I ran an ethernet cable from the Apple Airport Express I've been using to source streaming audio via TOSlink to the system and removed the TOSlink. As soon as I turned on the receiver it automatically updated itself, which took about 30 minutes via wi-fi.

Getting the Def Techs installed took a bit, since I had to run wires invisibly through the cabinet and bore out some holes, but it came out looking great. I'm still experimenting with having them tilt down.

Having lived with it for a a few months, I'm very happy with the outcome. The receiver works very well. The "scenes" buttons make source selection really easy. I really like the ability to have it turn on muted. It seems to have more than enough power for our listening area at the levels we listen to it, which are lower now than they used to be many years ago. While I don't believe Def Tech's frequency-response numbers for a minute, the sound has surprising heft and impact, especially considering I don't yet have a sub. On Dolby-encoded source material the stereo spread is excellent and the center-channel not only keeps voices on the screen, but has virtually eliminated our need to keep the captioning on. The system also sounds quite good playing streaming audio.

I still have work to do on it--haven't run any sweeps or applied any EQ and need to get a sub. The sub is another piece that well-meaning experts here will tell me is impossible, since the small theater area is just a piece of a 14,000 cubic-foot room, which despite the size, limits me to about a 15" x 15" floor space for the sub. When we tried a soundbar, the tiny sub provided an acceptable (to us) low end. I'm going to try an SVS-SB12NSD and see how that goes.

The other part of the project happened down at the other end of the room, where I have a NAD C375BEE driving pair of Thiel CS3's aimed across the width of the room. I installed the Allison CD8's facing the length of the room and wired it all up with another spool of Monoprice 12-gauge and Sewell Deadbolts. The original wire I used was from HD and it had all turned green over the years, so I rewired the whole system, which took 49 feet of the spool. The Allisons sound much better standing upright against a wall than they did on their sides on the top of the cabinet. I can now have great sound no matter which part of the room I happen to be in.

By the time I add a sub I'll have about $1,500 into this, but the result has exceeded my starting expectations by quite a bit, so I'm glad I did it.

Here's what it looks like now:

Danny W.