Budget 5.1 Home Theater Speakers

[crayzkirk]

I'm looking for a relatively inexpensive set of speakers for my home theater. I have an Onkyo TX-SR373 receiver that has the five speaker outputs plus two sub-woofer outputs. Everything that I seem to look at has a central sub-woofer that all the other speakers plug into. I have a Yamaha speaker system, which I purchased several years ago, that has the five individual speakers and a powered sub-woofer. Can't seem to find anything other than some all in one systems that look like they would connect to a PC or something that's over $1,000.

Suggestions?

CK

[srvy]

Originally Posted by crayzkirk

What about this?

https://a.co/d/fd5F9vN

What's DolbyAtmos?

Probably fine, Klipche to me until you get into their high dollar audiophile line like Heresy are very bright and harsh. Many like that though and they sell the shit out of it. You might look at Polk in that price range. To my ear, they sound much better.

[srvy]

Also, Jamo has some in your price range that sounds very good. They used to be made in Denmark and maybe still are. They are owned by Klipche now though.

Update I went to the Jamo sight they dont seem to have any retailers in USA all seem to be in Europe. Thats a shame but I suppose Klipche has a lot to do with that.

You can still get older model Jamo on Amazon but its from a third party seller.

https://www.amazon.com/Jamo-809-Floo...c-e99c377ae4f0

[crayzkirk]

Originally Posted by srvy

Probably fine, Klipche to me until you get into their high dollar audiophile line like Heresy are very bright and harsh. Many like that though and they sell the shit out of it. You might look at Polk in that price range. To my ear, they sound much better.

Okay, I don't have an AVR ready receiver so Atmos is out. My hearing isn't so good anyways so the high end stuff is lost on me. I have a Yamaha NS-AP1800 currently which is discontinued. It would be nice to find a place where I could actually listen to these different systems.

[stanleychief]

Originally Posted by srvy

Probably fine, Klipche to me until you get into their high dollar audiophile line like Heresy are very bright and harsh. Many like that though and they sell the shit out of it. You might look at Polk in that price range. To my ear, they sound much better.

I second this. I have a few friends that like Klipsch, but they aren't really my cup of tea. They come off as harsh to me as well, unless you go with the top of the line. Polks have a more laid back sound for sure.

Everyone has different tastes, I suppose, otherwise, they wouldn't sell.

[stanleychief]

Originally Posted by crayzkirk

Okay, I don't have an AVR ready receiver so Atmos is out. My hearing isn't so good anyways so the high end stuff is lost on me. I have a Yamaha NS-AP1800 currently which is discontinued. It would be nice to find a place where I could actually listen to these different systems.

To be quite honest, Atmos, although amazing at times with the right material, doesn't quite live up to the hype. If your receiver doesn't support Atmos, then the speakers would only be useful later if you plan to upgrade.

I think you'd be surprised when you hear higher end gear in the right setting what a difference there is. The problem is that most people demo speakers at a place like Best Buy, where the listening rooms aren't setup correctly. Things like imaging and staging are completely lost there.

I didn't look before I started this reply, but are you in KC? Nebraska Furniture Mart carries a lot of the brands we are talking about here. (Focal, Klipsch, Polk, Sony, SVS) Their showroom is marginally better than Best Buy, but ask for Scott Ledgerwood, and he'll do you right. I bought my Anthem AVR there, and referred another friend that did the same.

[stanleychief]

Originally Posted by srvy

Also, Jamo has some in your price range that sounds very good. They used to be made in Denmark and maybe still are. They are owned by Klipche now though.

https://www.amazon.com/Jamo-809-Floo...c-e99c377ae4f0

I feel like a lot of old loudspeaker brands built up their image through audiophile grade offerings but sold out to larger companies in the past few years, which favor profit over quality.

From a DIY side of things, it's difficult to buy really exceptional drivers without spending a fortune. Before 2005, you could buy Vifa & Focal drivers which were used in a slew of audiophile speakers (some over $20k!). Now that they have disappeared, you are stuck with ScanSpeak if you're looking for a quality Danish driver.

Jamo and those other Danish speaker builders probably used Vifa back in the day and faced some hard choices once Vifa was scooped up by Tymphany and discontinued. Joining Klipsch was probably a great thing for them, since Klipsch likely manufactures their own drivers in house now.

[notorious]

Originally Posted by stanleychief

I feel like a lot of old loudspeaker brands built up their image through audiophile grade offerings but sold out to larger companies in the past few years, which favor profit over quality.

From a DIY side of things, it's difficult to buy really exceptional drivers without spending a fortune. Before 2005, you could buy Vifa & Focal drivers which were used in a slew of audiophile speakers (some over $20k!). Now that they have disappeared, you are stuck with ScanSpeak if you're looking for a quality Danish driver.

Jamo and those other Danish speaker builders probably used Vifa back in the day and faced some hard choices once Vifa was scooped up by Tymphany and discontinued. Joining Klipsch was probably a great thing for them, since Klipsch likely manufactures their own drivers in house now.

God I miss those days.

Go on Parts Express and get high-end Focal and Morel components. I built several active systems with Focal stuff that was unreal, and the price was not bad at all.

Sigh.

[crayzkirk]

Originally Posted by notorious

God I miss those days.

Go on Parts Express and get high-end Focal and Morel components. I built several active systems with Focal stuff that was unreal, and the price was not bad at all.

Sigh.

And you could take apart your car and fix it with a Craftsman socket set from Sears...

It's getting hard to find components to fix stuff; forget the surface mount stuff because my eyes and hands can't do that anymore. One of the receivers that I fixed just had a couple of shorted transistors. Had to order them online because there's no market for parts because no one fixes anything.

[notorious]

Originally Posted by crayzkirk

And you could take apart your car and fix it with a Craftsman socket set from Sears...

It's getting hard to find components to fix stuff; forget the surface mount stuff because my eyes and hands can't do that anymore. One of the receivers that I fixed just had a couple of shorted transistors. Had to order them online because there's no market for parts because no one fixes anything.

I don't even attempt to mess with systems in cars now days.

The built-in equalization in factory head units are progressive in volume, thus ****ing up the ability to add after-market gear and have it sound good. They started that in the mid 90's but almost all cars have it now.

Don't even think about replacing the factory head unit or it will take away a vast amount of function in the car.

I see that JL and Audiocontrol have modules to counteract this, I don't want to go through the effort anymore.

Must be old.

[DJJasonp]

i'm a bit of a audiophile, and for budget, you cannot possibly get better sound for the money than the Andrew Jones signature pioneer speakers:

https://www.amazon.com/Pioneer-SP-BS.../dp/B008NCD2LG

https://www.themasterswitch.com/revi...ndrew-jones-51

[Third Eye]

Originally Posted by DJJasonp

i'm a bit of a audiophile, and for budget, you cannot possibly get better sound for the money than the Andrew Jones signature pioneer speakers:

https://www.amazon.com/Pioneer-SP-BS.../dp/B008NCD2LG

https://www.themasterswitch.com/revi...ndrew-jones-51

I bought a set of those back in 2011 and loved them for the money. I don't they they actively produce them anymore though.

[Jewish Rabbi]

Originally Posted by stanleychief

To be quite honest, Atmos, although amazing at times with the right material, doesn't quite live up to the hype. If your receiver doesn't support Atmos, then the speakers would only be useful later if you plan to upgrade.

I think you'd be surprised when you hear higher end gear in the right setting what a difference there is. The problem is that most people demo speakers at a place like Best Buy, where the listening rooms aren't setup correctly. Things like imaging and staging are completely lost there.

I didn't look before I started this reply, but are you in KC? Nebraska Furniture Mart carries a lot of the brands we are talking about here. (Focal, Klipsch, Polk, Sony, SVS) Their showroom is marginally better than Best Buy, but ask for Scott Ledgerwood, and he'll do you right. I bought my Anthem AVR there, and referred another friend that did the same.

Atmos is awesome when done right (in-ceiling speakers, not the directional ones that bounce sound off the ceiling). Unfortunately not a ton of content for it right now, hell most TV is stereo not even surround.

[scho63]

Polk Audio used to have some kick ass stuff at good prices but I don't think they have kept their same high quality as years ago.

[srvy]

They had been owned for a while by a company called Sound Technology. They had owned Bowers & Wilkins, Denon, Polk Audio, Marantz, Definitive Technology, Classé, and Boston Acoustics. In 2022 ST sold there holdings to Massimo a worldwide conglomerate in medical equipment. Anyone's guess if they are still the same quality or not?

[Miles]

Originally Posted by Jewish Rabbi

Atmos is awesome when done right (in-ceiling speakers, not the directional ones that bounce sound off the ceiling). Unfortunately not a ton of content for it right now, hell most TV is stereo not even surround.

It seems like the streaming services are progressively getting better about providing more Atmos content even though it’s implemented through Dolby digital plus. However, some of them are not mixed well or make much use of the overhead Atmos speakers.