Here is my situation and I am hoping I can get some advice. I have recently moved into a new home from an apartment lifestyle. I have be somewhat happy with a HTIB 5.1 system from kenwood (its a seperate receiver/speaker system) in my old apartment but in the new house I have a rather large TN room (20 X 20) and I find the system rather lacking. I wish to upgrade to a system (speakers and reciever) that will be able to better fill up this room.
Right now I have a 32" FlatTube JVC and Sony DVD player as well as a console system. Some day in the future I will go to a HDTV setup when the prices drop a bit more. I dont plan on using this system for music really.
My max budget for this is 2k however If I could get under 1500 I would be very happy.
Also this room has been wired for 5.1 and I would be happy with that for the time being.
I dont have a problem buying the reciever online however I would prefer to get the speakers locally if at all possible.
Thanks for the advice in advance btw. I have seen many topics from people about the same things however I thought that my room size might make your suggestions be a bit different.
spend the highest percentage of your budget on speakers than anything else. (75/25). Select your speakers first, then match a receiver that can handle the power requirements of your speaker. If you timbre match your front speakers with your center channel you will have a pleasing soundstage.
If you've stretched your budget, remember, you don't have to get everyting at once even though you're alread wired for 5.1. You can start with stereo, the front stage, or five speakers, then add a sub or rear surrounds at a later date.
Do you have a local source for listening to speakers? That's a good place to start. Bring your favorite CD's/DVD's and get to know what sounds good to you and the primary listeners.
When buying online, go with authorized dealers, so you'll have a warranty in case something goes wrong. They're a great source for products once you know what you want. (ie. Onecall)
With a little research you can have a great sounding system that matches with your existing equipment for your hard earned $2K
if you went for a reciever at around $500-$700 that would leave you $1300-$1500 for speakers and that would be plenty.
just to throw 1 reciever at you to give you an idea would be the harmon kardon hk525 85w x7 it has plenty of clean power to drive most speakers to levels you wouldn't even listen to.
now that is a 7channel reciever but you can use it just like an ordinary 5.1 system for now and upgrade later.
the most important part of your surround speakers setup will be your mains and center and should be matched(all the same brand and series) they don't have to be but should.
now you have a pretty descent size room so i would make sure you get some descent size speakers and with all the sound packed into the center channel these days with 5.1 and 6.1 material you need good quality center.
some of the other recievers to consider in your price range to me would be something from either marantz,denon,pioneer elite,nad they all make quality recievers in that price range nad probably the most expensive and possably the best.
as far as speakers go since you want to get them locally i'd say hit at least 4 to 6 different shops and see what your options are and what you like for your price range.
now remember don't be too skimpy on your speakers. to me that's the most important part of your setup. if you get a quality reciever and crap speakers well you got crap. if you get quality speakers and anyone of the recievers mentioned above you will get a good sounding system.
i hope i didn't get too "down to earth" and have given you some solid advice that you can use.
as i don't know your area or have looked into speakers lately i don't have any sugestions for those.
you could either make another post for surround speaker setup $1000-$1500 or after you go out and look post what you have found and ask about them i'm sure someone here would know(like gman or hawk or elitefan)i'm sure there are others but these are the guys i can remember that seem to know.
Congrats on the new home! From the size of the TN room, it sounds like a huge step up from the apartment.
You haven't stated what percentage of use this system will get. That is, are you looking for a system primarily for HT or do you use it for music, too? How high are the ceilings? Do you have any restrictions (i.e., are floorstanders ok; do you need any special finish or is there a finish on a speaker that is not ok; does the receiver have to be black, etc.)?
Just to start out, you are going to need good sized speakers to fill that large space, and you are going to need good power from the receiver. Don't take it for granted that 100 wpc is good power, because so many receivers are rated like that and they simply do not deliver anything near that kind of power.
I would suggest the following for your budget as a place to start. First, look into an NAD 742 receiver, available from Saturday Audio Exchange for $449. Then add a speaker system from NHT. A pair of SB-3s for your mains (MSRP of $600, can be had from Kief's for $470/pair), an SC-1 Center speaker (MSRP of $300, available for $235), and a pair of NHT SB-1s for the rear ($300/pair MSRP, available for $235), and then consider a PSB Subsonic 5i subwoofer from DMC Electronics for $329 (MSRP of $499). That totals a little over $1700, well within your budget.
Another way to go is to get the NAD with the following speakers from DMC:
thank you for the advice. To answer your questions I am mainly going to be using this system for HT 90% of the time and this room has 10foot ceilings. I dont care that much about the looks of the system and the speaker size can go anything from tiny style to huge floorstanding ones. Any color should work in my room nicely.