Posted on the wrong board, sorry, so I'll post here again.
Ok, you guys are probably going to laugh because my equipment is nowhere near most of yours. I'm a little spoiled in the sense that I listen to two beolab pentas when I'm at home, which make my setup sound like crud. But anyway, I'm definitely buying two Athena Audition Series F2's. At the moment I have klipsch promedia's 2.1, I bought a KLH subwoofer from a friend and modified it using a 1000 watt driver, it hits much better but it needs more power as well.
I'm a real newbie as far as amps/receivers go, so I need some advice and didn't know where to start.
Everything runs fine now but the sub is a little underpowered (100 watts, needs about 200-ish). I have no receiver and I'm running all the cables out of the audio out on my high quality sound card.
I realize that I will be needing two things. A) A receiver for the two Athena's + subwoofer. B) possibly a seperate amplifier for the subwoofer as well.
As far as the receiver goes, I've narrowed it down to two choices, but I'm very open to suggestions. My budget for the receiver is $300 or less (yeah I know not enough, but I'm a college student, have to make cuts everywhere) Rather humerous as these two choices are worlds apart, which is what usually happens to me.
I'd like to use the Digital coax out on my sound card if possible, but I can't find a cheap digital receiver that I like.
1) Onkyo TX-8511 - Stereo receiver, high quality powerful, sounds beautiful, can drive anything, etc, etc. Bare bones in terms of technology, no digital in, no subwoofer out, etc.
2) Panasonic SA-XR25 - Digital receiver, 6.1 (more than I need, but there are no stereo digital recievers that I can find), not very powerfull, the sound quality is good, but not as rich/warm/etc as the Onkyo. Digital is the big plus as I could draw the most from my sound card without having to down the signal into analog right away.
Bother receivers are ~$300 price range, of course I'll shop around untill I can find it for cheaper.
Open to suggestions if anyone knows of any good digital receiver that happens to be stereo and has some actual power/richness like the onkyo.
As far as the auxilary amplifier goes for the subwoofer, I'm really not sure there either. I have looked at several subwoofer amps, they all seem very expensive. Local stoors like bestbuy were no help in that area and Tweeter etc was far too expensive.
I'd like to use the receiver to give the subwoofer some more punch perhaps It has its own crossover, so I don't have to worry about damaging it with higher frequencies. Good/bad? Obviously a dedicated amp would be better, but will this work?
Thanks for any help you can give, I'm very appreciative in advance.
At your price range, you should consider the Onkyo 601 receiver. You can get a refurbished one with warranty for less than 300. Try ecost. Some of your local retailers may have refurbished units.
If you like the Onkyo sound you won't be disappointed with the 601. You can use it for stereo now and a surround system later. I believe it supports a 6.1 system. You won't need a separate amp for the sub.
Just a word of caution: The 501 is even cheaper but is a big step down from the 601 in build and parts quality and power. Definitely worth the extra bucks for the 601.