Hello Everyone. I've been lurking for a few days. I figured I'd put a post up and see what your feedback is on some of my recent purchases.
I am by no means a full blown audiophile. I'm just a guy that has a bad habit of liking nice things. It's an expensive bad habit to have, but I will try to stay on topic and not get into that.
Anyway, the slippery slope went like this.......
I haven't bought new AV equipment since the 90s. I was pretty young, and I've had the same old Sony Pro-Logic receiver and a set of Yamaha 3 way Speakers for as long as I can remember. It hangs out in the basement with a rack of equipment and I like to listen to music down there and even watch old Laserdiscs on the projector (what?... it's fun). I know there is better stuff out there, in fact a few years back my dad bought some reference line Klipsch speakers and I was saddened by how great they sounded compared to my stuff. They are truly amazing. I find the best way to avoid spending money is to not ever experience the new awesome stuff. Once you do, it kind of haunts you until 1 day in an almost zombie like haze you find yourself researching the products which inevitably leads to a purchase.
No big deal though, I had fought off the urge to buy anything new until now....
A few years ago, I got my first HD TV, 52 inch Samsung LCD. It's a nice TV. it's HDMI though so using the old Sony reciever with it just didn't make sense. The Sony is completely analog, everything with the TV is digital. The cost of new digital AV stuff kept me from buying anything for awhile but then I recently got an Apple TV. Now my entire music collection is available upstairs in the living room on my TV. Well, I could deal with television and even movies on the TV. I still had my pro-logic set up downstairs hooked up to a projector if I really wanted to use surround sound. Anyway, the music on the apple TV and it's integration with my iphone was the straw that broke the camel's back. My entire music collection networked to a discreet and easy to use little apple product in my living room. (did I mention I'm a network engineer? Shooting my music over a network gets me geeked) I ended up breaking down and buying a low end Denon Reciever with the matched Denon branded surround sound speakers. I just wanted a good quality unit that had HDMI capabilities. At first I considered the all in 1 surround sound units from companies like Sony but I quickly realized they did not offer anything near what I wanted. The Denon just seemed like a good choice for the money. 4 HDMI inputs, ample power, lots of cool features and an elegant looking piece of electronics to boot.
I know this is probably junk to some of you audiophiles but it was a huge upgrade over just the TV, and holy hell the low end Denon is way nicer than my old Sony. You can tweak and calibrate all kinds of cool ****. Only regret is that it doesn't have a phono pre-amp as I would kind of like to hook up my record player to it now, but I know I can easily rectify that with an external pre-amp if I really want to. Either way, HDMI and digital audio in general is really cool.
Well, eventually I got tired of the 5.1 surround set up. It just didn't have the sound, volume, clarity or punch I wanted even in spite of the 100 watt powered sub woofer. I guess I just like to turn it up and the little surround sound speakers only have so much to give before it sounds like you are going to break them. Maybe it was the KMFDM or maybe it was the old school funk music. Regardless, this is where the Klipsch F-30s come in. I poked around a little but admittedly bought these because they were the best thing I could find at a reasonable price and HHgregg gives me 0 percent financing which makes it too easy to make big purchases. Am I lazy? You can tell me, I don't mind. I've had the F-30s for a few days now, I don't have much to compare them too but damn if they don't sound better than anything I've every owned before. I'm like a kid at Christmas right now. All of my music is new again and by my rough estimation my ears have lost a few years of their lifetime.
And so the slippery slope so far goes like this
$100 apple TV
$320 Denon DHT391XP Surround sound System
$700 Klipsch Synergy F-30 floor speakers
I'm noticing a trend in cost here that is making my wallet want to run and hide.
So far I'm very happy with the floor speakers. I just couldn't afford to buy something like dad has. I think he might have dropped about $2500 for his speakers. But this is definitely the nicest audio set up I've ever had.
So, that's my story. I'm curious what others experience is with these products, pros and cons. You know, the whole forum thing. I'm not new to forums, just new to AV forums. So lay it on me. Tell me I should have bought the polks or some other obscure high end brand or that My denon is a POS and I should have bought yamhaha X or Y. I guess I'm just looking to consume and digest some information on the topic and become more familiar before I go and fall further down the slippery slope. It seems the AV world offers a long fall down that hill and I think I've reached the point where a little education might do me some good or some bad if you look at it from my wallet's point of view.
