The Best $500 Front Stage...

[Ryan1938]

Hey guys... New member here and I'm looking for some advice. I have a Denon 1613, a 25 year old Yamaha YST-sw100 sub, and a pretty large and open room. My aim is to create a 3.1 system using what I already have and knowing that I will eventually get around to replacing the sub and maybe eventually adding a rear stage as well.

I have $500 to spend and want to get the best front stage I can using bookshelf speakers.

The Bad.
- This room is really big. It's close to 30' by 30' and has concrete floors.
- The sub is way too small for the space.
- I only have $500 to spend on the speakers and have to use bookshelves...

The Good.
- While the room is large, the "listening area" is actually pretty small - say 10' by 12'.
- I have plenty of room to use three bookshelf speakers rather than two bookshelves and a center channel.

If you were in my position, what speakers would you start looking at?

Thanks in advance!

 

[fuzz092888]

Would you consider DIY?

 

[Ryan1938]

I love the idea of DIY, but realistically I just don't have the time.

 

[fuzz092888]

I love the idea of DIY, but realistically I just don't have the time.

I understand that whole time thing, but I'm not exactly talking about from scratch construct cabinets type of thing. Kits like this, aren't extremely time consuming and you can get a autobody shop to paint them for you. If not that's fine there are a ton of other options, but I just wanted to throw that out there in case you didn't know about them. These are excellent speakers and you can drive them to levels that will definitely fill your room.

TriTrix MTM TL Speaker Components And Cabinet Kit Pair 300-702

 

[zieglj01]

http://www.htd.com/Products/level-three-speakers/Level-THREE-Bookshelf-Speakers
If you were in my position, what speakers would you start looking at?

Thanks in advance!

I would get a pair of bookshelf speakers - and at least a better sub over that Yamaha boom box sub.

Look at HTD - and 10% off till the 4th
HTD Level THREE Bookshelf Speakers

 

[shadyJ]

If you can, just use a regular bookshelf speaker for a center speaker. I would go for three identical bookshelf speakers, and get higher sensitivity ones, they will get louder. Three HTD Level Threes ought to do well, also three Hsu HB-1 mk2s. A good set of speakers that you could afford to pair up with a decent matching center speaker is the Infinity Primus p163 with its c351 center.

 

[Ryan1938]

Yeah... I really want to do three matching bookshelves. Here are the four I'm currently looking at the hardest:

1. HSU HB-1 (great because you can buy them individually rather than in pairs)
2. Boston Acoustic A 26
3. Energy CB-20
4. Ascend CBM-170

 

[Ryan1938]

Yeah, I really want to do three matching bookshelf speakers. Here are the four that are leading the way right now:

1. HSU HB-1
2. Bouston Acoustic A 26
3. Ascend CBM-170
4. EnergyCB-20

 

[shadyJ]

Make sure you can buy them individually and not just as a pair. It looks like you can buy a CBM170 for a center, but you might have to purchase that through Ascend's package system order form. I don't know where you could buy the Energys individually.

 

[Ryan1938]

Yeah... that is an issue... I was thinking about buying two pairs (If I found some speaker that blew me away) and then placing the left over single on eBay or something...

 

[ratm]

I have the HTD Level 3 fronts (bookshelf and CC), and can attest to their quaility. It sounds amazing to me (driven by an XPA-3). VERY detailed and crisp, solidly built. The only time I have ever had an issue is when I tried to play TDK rises at reference level (the opening plane scene) and it caused the L&R to clip (they are rated at 120 watts, I think, which might explain that). After paying some bills this tax time, I am upgrading to the towers.

FWIW, if you do end up going with HTD, call them and ask for B-Stock. They had none listed on their site, but I called anyways and they "found some". Ended up being 15% less.

 

[ImcLoud]

Cbm170se's would be in budget. They sound really good