Speaker Size Selection

[GlocksRock]

Where did you get them for $150 a pair!

craigslist. I also got a second set of BP8s from another person on craigslist for $200, but then sold them for $325 after I found my BP10s on craigslist for $400 for the pair. So really the BP10s only cost me like $275 after the profit I made off selling my second set of BP8s. If I had the room I would have kept the second set of BP8s and sold the BP1.2x but my room layout wouldn't have accomodated it. But I honestly think the design of the BP1.2 works better on the wall for surrounds, I just wish they were the BP2x, but I couldn't afford them at the time.

 

[Halon451]

Thanks for all the information and thoughts on this guys. So, I do want to get the JBL Venue Stadium 8" 3-way speakers, rated for 440W Peak power, and 110W continuous, sensitivity of 91 dB. I'm not sure if anyone has these speakers, or have heard them, or have any opinions of them.

I want to use these as my front mains, to complement the rest of my JBL Venue setup, which now includes two JBL Venue Balcony wall mounts for the surrounds, and a JBL Venue Voice for the Center Channel.

For an amplifier rated (speculatively) for 100 Watts per channel, and I'm likely getting less than or equal to half that per channel, with all driven - is this overkill, or would this setup work for me?

I have heard these speakers, and they are initially what brought me around to the JBL Venue line... I've been upgrading the rest of the speaker set in anticipation of getting the money to purchase the big ones.

Oh, believe me - if the wife would allow it, I would spend a king's ransom on speakers, upgrade to seperate amplifiers for all channels and blow the house down watching the infamouns shoot-out in the movie "Heat", but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime in the forseeable future.

 

[solomr2]

Oh, believe me - if the wife would allow it, I would spend a king's ransom on speakers, upgrade to seperate amplifiers for all channels and blow the house down watching the infamouns shoot-out in the movie "Heat", but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime in the forseeable future.

I LOVE THAT SCENE!!!

Because of that scene I went out and bought the original DVD release of this movie. This first release was weird because the movie is on two separate discs and you have to stop part way through the movie and switch discs. I think they've since remastered it and combined the movie into just one disc.

 

[ParadigmDawg]

I dont know guys; I just switched my mains to large and it decreased the bass from the sub by about 40% and sounded horrible. Back to small they go.

 

[Halon451]

I LOVE THAT SCENE!!!

Because of that scene I went out and bought the original DVD release of this movie. This first release was weird because the movie is on two separate discs and you have to stop part way through the movie and switch discs. I think they've since remastered it and combined the movie into just one disc.

I saw it originally in the theater. It was jaw-dropping to say the least - that's the moment I knew that cinematic audio had really gone to a whole new level... and here we are now trying to bring that into our homes.

 

[Halon451]

I dont know guys; I just switched my mains to large and it decreased the bass from the sub by about 40% and sounded horrible. Back to small they go.

Wow... I haven't noticed quite that dramatic of an effect either way. To tell the truth, I keep switching back and forth, and still haven't been able to decide which sounds best.

Right now - Mains are set to Large - Receiver crossover is at 90 Hz. I watched the new Transformers movie the other night (my nephew was over...) I have to say, it sounded pretty damn good. I can't wait to get the new front channel speakers though.

 

[GlocksRock]

I should probably rerun the YPAO to re-eq the speakers since I set the fronts and rear surrounds to large, then recalibrate the levels. But I don't think there will be too much variance if any in the levels, but it doesn't hurt to check. I guess I should probably relisten to some familiar demo dvd tracks that are bass heavy to see if I notice a lot of difference in LFE output, but I don't anticipate that I will.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I dont know guys; I just switched my mains to large and it decreased the bass from the sub by about 40% and sounded horrible. Back to small they go.

Well, that's not good.

I wonder why it would decrease the bass from the sub?

Oh, I see. The Sub was getting the Bass from ALL the channels: Front Left, Front Right, Center, Surrounds, PLUS LFE.

But when you switched to LARGE FRONTS, it took AWAY the BASS from the Front L+R that was ALSO going to the Subwoofer BEFORE. So then your subwoofer would only get the bass from the LFE + Center + Surrounds. All the Bass from the Front L + R went to your Front L + R Speakers.

What if you increased the volume output of the Subwoofer?

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

I watched the new Transformers movie the other night (my nephew was over...) I have to say, it sounded pretty damn good. I can't wait to get the new front channel speakers though.

I just saw Die Hard 4 BD last night. WOW. Rumbling BASS in every other scene it seems.

I my own system, which may be totally different than others, if Transformers HD DVD soundtrack is a "10", then Die Hard 4 BD is a "20". IMO. AWESOME BASS.

Even though my Panasonic display screen says "DTS-HD", it's lying. The manual says that it is actually just DTS-Core.
Liar, liar, pants on fire Panasonic!

But I think it sounded just as good as any TOP NOTCH PCM or TrueHD I've ever heard.

Oh, yeah, there were plenty of bass/drums coming very distinctly from my SURROUND speakers, which are set to LARGE. Interesting, but maybe not as important.

Since LOW LOW BASS < 40Hz is non-directional, I assume the bass I heard very distinctly from my surrounds was upper bass like 40Hz-100Hz?

 

[Halon451]

I hope they start providing more movies with DTS encoding - from my own personal experience it seems to be far superior to Dolby Digital, for overall sound quality.

I'm going to have to get more power at some point - that much I can tell ya. The ol' Yamaha will treat me sufficiently well for a while, but sooner or later, I'm going to get that itch to upgrade all my speakers to large - and I want to have the power to feed those lower notes into them.

For now - I guess I'm okay with my current settings. I would still like better sounding dialouge from my center channel, as I'm still having some coloration issues, but with a lot of help I received from another thread, I think I've ironed out that problem as much as can be - simply hardware limited at this point.

 

[PENG]

If you are brave, get a pair of LSI7 (4 ohms) for the L/R, set everything to small, XO at 100, don't listen too loud and I bet you will like the sound because of the ring tweeter. Your Yamaha weights less than 20 lbs but according to the spec they do seem to have good dynamic power.

http://www.shopping.com/xPO-Polk-Audio-LSi7

If not, the JBLs should be fine for the RX-V361, and they do sound great in that price range.

 

[jostenmeat]

Even though my Panasonic display screen says "DTS-HD", it's lying. The manual says that it is actually just DTS-Core.
Liar, liar, pants on fire Panasonic!

But I think it sounded just as good as any TOP NOTCH PCM or TrueHD I've ever heard.

Oh, yeah, there were plenty of bass/drums coming very distinctly from my SURROUND speakers, which are set to LARGE. Interesting, but maybe not as important.

Since LOW LOW BASS < 40Hz is non-directional, I assume the bass I heard very distinctly from my surrounds was upper bass like 40Hz-100Hz?

Im not so sure it was lying (or was it?). The "core" is from DTS-HD HR, right? or not? I didn't look up the audio track on your movie, but the "core" of HR is still double the potential max bitrate of the former DTS. The core can be obtained by toslink, hdmi required for the full HR version, let alone the MA version. I don't know why Im bothering to type this, Im sure you know much better than I, since you have BD and HD-DVD, and I have neither!

Lastly, crossovers are not brick walls. So, you are hearing plenty of different low freq's possibly. Do you have any musical instruments at your place, keyboard, guitar? You can just "remember" the pitch, and find it. The lowest string of a tuned guitar is just barely over 80hz, IIRC.

 

[Halon451]

If you are brave, get a pair of LSI7 (4 ohms) for the L/R, set everything to small, XO at 100, don't listen too loud and I bet you will like the sound because of the ring tweeter. Your Yamaha weights less than 20 lbs but according to the spec they do seem to have good dynamic power.

http://www.shopping.com/xPO-Polk-Audio-LSi7

If not, the JBLs should be fine for the RX-V361, and they do sound great in that price range.

Hmmm... it's something to consider. I've stood next to those JBL's though, and I have to say that something inside my mind really leans toward those big floor standing speakers. Not sure if I'm brave enough to feed a couple of 4 ohm speakers with my Yammy though. I think it could handle it as long as I kept it restrained as you suggested.

I appreciate the feeback though.

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

Im not so sure it was lying (or was it?). The "core" is from DTS-HD HR, right? or not? I didn't look up the audio track on your movie, but the "core" of HR is still double the potential max bitrate of the former DTS. The core can be obtained by toslink, hdmi required for the full HR version, let alone the MA version. I don't know why Im bothering to type this, Im sure you know much better than I, since you have BD and HD-DVD, and I have neither!

Lastly, crossovers are not brick walls. So, you are hearing plenty of different low freq's possibly. Do you have any musical instruments at your place, keyboard, guitar? You can just "remember" the pitch, and find it. The lowest string of a tuned guitar is just barely over 80hz, IIRC.

I would like to think that when the Panasonic DMP-BD10A says "DTS-HD" that it really means at least "DTS-HD HR". Panasonic does not distinguish between "HR" and "MA" ON SCREEN, not even in their new DMP-BD30, which Bitstreams both DTS-HD MA & DTS-HD HR.

I always assumed that DTS-Core means just plain DTS, not DTS-HD HR.
DTS is just really screwing this whole audio up, confusing so many people.
I think on the DTS site, when they say DTS-HD, it means BOTH DTS-MA & DTS-HR. Really messed up.

At first I was reading the upcoming Samsung BD-UP5000 could Internally Decode DTS-HD MA. Now I'm not really sure. Maybe it can only Bitstream DTS-MA like all the other DTS-MA players out there.

Probably not even worth it. Shoot. I think if it sounds great, it doesn't matter.

Oh, I have an acoustic piano and a Yamaha keyboard. I think I remember how the bottom lower keys sound, which should be 30-60Hz. I SEEMS like the surround bass was close to this range. But you may be right.

 

[jostenmeat]

I would like to think that when the Panasonic DMP-BD10A says "DTS-HD" that it really means at least "DTS-HD HR". Panasonic does not distinguish between "HR" and "MA" ON SCREEN, not even in their new DMP-BD30, which Bitstreams both DTS-HD MA & DTS-HD HR.

To the best of my knowledge, that unit cannot (and never will be able to) unpack MA. If that is true, then there is no need to distinguish (or confuse!).

I always assumed that DTS-Core means just plain DTS, not DTS-HD HR. DTS is just really screwing this whole audio up, confusing so many people.
I think on the DTS site, when they say DTS-HD, it means BOTH DTS-MA & DTS-HR. Really messed up.

I feel ya. They should stick with HR or MA. Otoh, Its nice of them to think of people who do not have the benefits of HDMI, and still get double the bitrate from before with their trusty old optical/coax. Also, this type of confusion seems rampant in this AV world that I am new to (this is not an excuse! but just commonplace to me). Example: upconversion on a receiver. Does that mean 1) hdmi conversion 2) analog conversion to hdmi 3) upscaling of video from either/or analog/hdmi sources 4) any combination of the above?

At first I was reading the upcoming Samsung BD-UP5000 could Internally Decode DTS-HD MA. Now I'm not really sure. Maybe it can only Bitstream DTS-MA like all the other DTS-MA players out there.

It was you that posted about this, right? Man you had me way too excited! (still a very interesting unit, nonetheless). It appears that it may not be able to handle MA out of the box. At least they have the Vastline chip that has the potential to do so (because that nice Panny you own does not I believe).

Probably not even worth it. Shoot. I think if it sounds great, it doesn't matter.

That's definitely been argued! Now, I wish I could test this in my home! Cause I feel like I might be missing out!