General Home Theater Audio Thread

[GoodToGo]

I believe it is very important to post this info here for the capabilities of blu ray players (specifically PS3 via HDMI). It is very important to have a receiver that can play all audio formats and can strip the audio from the HDMI and send the video signal the TV. For that purpose, here is a list of receivers and Home theatres in a box that can comply with this requirement.

Linky

 

[shortylickens]

_____ ------ ====== NEW QUESTION!! ====== ------ _____

How can I keep the bass from pounding my ears and scaring me?

Have noticed a lot of modern DVD movies tend to overdrive the bass on their 5.1 track. My cheap Sony receiver and speakers reproduce the sound accurately and without overdriving, but the bass is often a little too boomy.

Dont have a graphic equalizer on my amp, just digital bass and treble controls. I have tried taking the bass all the way down to -6 dB, then playing with the treble, but booming sound effects and music tones always scare the crap out of me, they jump way too high and unexpectedly. The latest problem came with Ratatoullie. I suspect when they did the audio they pumped up the bass artificially because they expected folks to be watching it with cheap TV speakers and not a proper sound system.
When I take the main volume down so the bass doesnt pound my ears or scare me, I notice the lighter stuff like people talking is almost indiscernable. When I bring the main volume up to hear dialog, I run the risk of the bass thumping my heart.

My receiver is a Sony STR-DE597. It does 6.1 DD and DTS up to a 100 watts each channel, (I never go close to that). No equalizer but it does let me adjust the bass and treble from -6 to + 6 dB each. For most movies and music a -6 on the bass is all I can handle without hurting myself or pissing of the neighbors. It will also let me adjust for the distance of the speakers and their size.

The speakers are also Sony (I dont have a hard-on for the company but their stuff is reasonably priced and sounds good). Four large 120w speakers for the stereo and surround. They have seperate woofers, mids and tweeters. The woofers are 6 inches across, the mids are three and a half inches, the tweeters are slightly under an inch. The cones look to be the same cheap plastic which is probably holding your Pepsi right now, only dyed yellow. The boxes are some sort of faux wood, packed particle board or maybe even hi-tech plastic with a wood feel.
The center front and rear speakers are basically the same but smaller and dont have a woofer. They have a 4.5 inch mid and the same tweeter.
Don't have a subwoofer. Maybe I should, I could adjust the bass properly then.

I have the TV set in my small living room about 5 feet in front of my easy chair with the center speaker sitting right above it and the stereo speakers to the side. The surround speakers are to the side of my easy chair about 3 feet away.

The amp gives me the option to take the surround level up or down seperately from the front speakers. I took those down quite a bit but the bass still thunders from the sides occasionally.
At no point do any of my speakers ever reverb or rattle, so I believe amp and speakers are matched well and reproducing sound accurately.
My problem is no matter how much I tweak, I cant get bass down to a decent level and sound nice. It just always seems overpowered.
I suppose I could just replace the big speakers with some smaller ones that dont have proper woofers but that isnt really fixing the problem. They would also not sound nice with the handful of DVD movies which choose NOT to overdrive the bass.

Questions?
Tips?

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

That's rather odd that the bass is overpowering your system without anything over a 6" woofer in your system.

Does your receiver have a dynamic range compression setting? (Like night mode or something?)
This will even out the range of volume through the movie so you'll have an easier time setting the volume so you can hear the quiet stuff without the loud stuff being overpowering.

 

[shortylickens]

Nope. And it really isnt overpowering the system so much as working properly but too well.
Again I only notice it in certain modern 5.1 movies where they felt the need to overdo it. Some animated flicks like Ratatoulie and Barnyard, and most action/sci-fi movies like Star Trek Nemesis.

No night mode or dynamic range compression. Am afraid I might have to move the subwoofer on my computer over to the TV and just take it down to bare minmum. If I enable the subwoofer output on the amp and dont actually use one then I get NO bass, and that stinks too.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Too bad

I would agree that getting a subwoofer connected and getting the settings on it dialed in would give you the most amount of control over this problem.

Are you going to be able to hook up the computer subwoofer?

 

[shortylickens]

Yup. Its just a regular Yamaha sub with the single RCA connector. As it happens my computer amp also has a sub output.
But I really dont need bass to listen to Zero Punctuation.

 

[erwos]

I'm noticing that Outpost / Frys has raised their prices on the Polks a lot. The guide should be updated to reflect this.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: erwos
I'm noticing that Outpost / Frys has raised their prices on the Polks a lot. The guide should be updated to reflect this.

I'm reporting the sale prices in this thread. The regular prices have always been bad over the last 3-4 years I've been checking with their site. Over that same time period, they've had regular sales at the prices I quoted on those items. I definitely wouldn't recommend buying any Polks at Fry's regular prices.

 

[erwos]

As a budget pick, these also look pretty good:
http://www.fluance.com/fluan5speaks.html

CNet gave them a pretty good review, and they're astonishingly cheap for what you get. For those of us trying to keep total costs down, this seems pretty reasonable. Doesn't include a subwoofer, but you're best off buying that separately anyways (as others have pointed out, the ED A2 300 is probably a better deal than most at $315).

Any opinion, YOyoYOhowsDAjello?

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: erwos
As a budget pick, these also look pretty good:
http://www.fluance.com/fluan5speaks.html

CNet gave them a pretty good review, and they're astonishingly cheap for what you get. For those of us trying to keep total costs down, this seems pretty reasonable. Doesn't include a subwoofer, but you're best off buying that separately anyways (as others have pointed out, the ED A2 300 is probably a better deal than most at $315).

Any opinion, YOyoYOhowsDAjello?

I actually had that set before I knew what I was doing. A friend had the cheaper Fluance set and it seemed like a good enough deal.

They get the job done, but I don't tend to mention them now as a good way to go. I have not heard the Polk R-series and I don't recall seeing the outcome of a comparison between the Fluance sets and the R-series, but I believe the Polks when they're on sale at outpost are probably a better way to go. Most of the positive comments on either of these sets is likely from people who are buying their first HT system... and with these models they're likely going online to find a good deal and then buying these systems without comparing them to anything else.

Unless there's something particularly lacking in the speakers, this usually results in a "these are awesome" reaction

I hope this isn't coming off as a snobbish sort of attitude toward them. $300 for a 5.0 set is certainly a tough order to fill. Going from a Logitech set to these was an improvement but once I got a chance to compare them against some speakers that really sounded good, there was no contest. If I had to do it over again, I'd follow my own upgrade path advice and get just a pair of speakers rather than trying to squeeze 5 speakers into a $300 budget.

You probably don't want my life story here since you just wanted to know about the speakers, but I got these back when I was in the dorms and was looking for the best bang for the buck. Back in these days AMD Athlon XP overclocking was all the rage (take that Intel), I found out Bose was a marketing ploy (take that, overpriced audio industry), so I thought there must have been a secret bang for the buck but excellent performance set out there that only "those in the know" could point me to. I thought Fluance was it and was indeed happy with it for a while before realizing what I was missing.

Overall for the set in particular, I was pretty impressed by what the $300 got in terms of size / weight / perceived quality. Looking back, I wish I had opened them up just to take a look at what was going on under the hood. The center was the weakest point in the system (which is unfortunate, because it's the most important for HT duty). The towers sounded like pretty good speakers to me at the time before I compared them to something better. At that point, the Fluance still sounded like pretty good speakers while the better ones sounded "real". I didn't have any measuring equipment back then so I couldn't tell you anything specific about what was missing and I don't recall anything particularly distinct about the sound... just that I knew once I heard the difference that I couldn't keep them any longer and be happy with them.

I know there are people that could have done that same comparison I did and not feel the need to change though. I can hear differences in sound quality much more easily when music is the source (vs. HT) and some people just don't hear a significant difference for any number of reasons. Knowing my own personality and attention to detail, I don't find it surprising that upgraditis fell in pretty quickly after getting them and came to a boiling point once I figured out what else was out there that I was missing. I've made a bunch of changes to my system over the years including several speaker changes, several subwoofer changes, and several receiver / electronics changes. The jumps in sound quality I experienced were most profound in the speaker and subwoofer changes which is why I am a firm believer in the upgrade path mentality.

I feel like getting the Fluance set was a mistake and I could have done better. That said, I was still able to sell them and recoup most of my costs without feeling like I was ripping someone off.

Boy, I am totally rambling... I'd better stop.

You asked for an opinion about these speakers and I'm writing about totally random stuff.

Uhhh... do you have any specific questions about them? Maybe that would help me stop this stream of consciousness.

 

[erwos]

Dunno. I was just torn between getting the Fluances and an ED subwoofer, or just going whole hog and spending $500 more on a full ED set. I'll probably do the latter, if only because I anticipate holding onto these speakers for a number of years and figure I may as well get something nice. For my purposes, there's probably not a lot of difference between $800 and $1200. *shrugs*

Also, only spending $800 on your speakers when you've got a $800 receiver seems kind of weird.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: erwos
Dunno. I was just torn between getting the Fluances and an ED subwoofer, or just going whole hog and spending $500 more on a full ED set. I'll probably do the latter, if only because I anticipate holding onto these speakers for a number of years and figure I may as well get something nice. For my purposes, there's probably not a lot of difference between $800 and $1200. *shrugs*

Also, only spending $800 on your speakers when you've got a $800 receiver seems kind of weird.

You also don't necessarily have to do the whole setup at once (upgrade path).

 

[AustinMatherne]

I need some help picking out a Receiver for my Computer/PS3. I plan on using the HDMI out from the PS3, and I have an HD TV Tuner on my network, so I do use the Computer for more than just music and games.

I just got a 24" Dell S2409W 1920x1080, with an HDMI input. I also plan on getting an ASUS Xonar HDAV1.3 when it comes out. So HDMI is very important.

Because this is in a somewhat small corner of a room, I'm figuring I should get the POLK R150 for the front and rear channels. Than the POLK CSR for the center, and the Dayton HT Series 8" sub.

As for the Receiver my budget is $300-$400. Really, I'm not sure what receiver to go with. I just want it to work well with the HDAV1.3 when I get it, and for it to support HDMI (not pass through).

All suggestions are welcome.

Thanks,
~ Austin


Edit:
What do guys think about the ONKYO TX-SR576 $299.99, or the ONKYO TX-SR606 $379.99, or the Denon AVR-788 $370.99?

 

[erwos]

Originally posted by: AustinMatherne
As for the Receiver my budget is $300-$400. Really, I'm not sure what receiver to go with. I just want it to work well with the HDAV1.3 when I get it, and for it to support HDMI (not pass through).

Of those choices, I would choose the Onkyo 606, hands-down.

 

[Tiamat]

what happened to sticky status?

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I believe it was Schadenfroh that stickied it originally.

I still don't have sticky power. Do you think it should be re-stickified?

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
I believe it was Schadenfroh that stickied it originally.

I still don't have sticky power. Do you think it should be re-stickified?

Definitely

 

[thomsbrain]

Yoyo, if you don't mind, can you provide some more details on your Bass Shaker setup?

--Did you mount them to your seats/couch/floor, or do they just sit there?
--If I understand your setup correctly, you're running two receivers (one for crossover, one for power) in addition to the BA pre and amp that drive your main speakers? And where is the Onkyo getting it's input from? LFE from the BA preamp? Any particular reason the Onkyo doesn't just power the shakers directly if it doesn't have any other duties?
--Can you describe the difference the shakers make relative to just running the subs? Do they create "impact" at more reasonable volumes?

I ask because I'm thinking of upgrading my receiver at some point and would then have a perfectly functional Pioneer Pro Logic receiver with no home. I was thinking I could use it to power a couple bass shakers similar to your setup.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I'm still using my college futon, so the shakers are mounted to it. I was originally using 4 on it, but now I just have two. The two shakers are screwed into a piece of plywood which is attached to the frame of the futon with heavy duty zip ties.

I redid the mounting to be a bit nicer, but I took some pictures of the original setup I had back in the dorms
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/sp...AURA%20Bass%20Shakers/

Right now I just have two of them presenting an 8-ohm load to one of the channels on the little sherwood receiver.

Originally I was running a regular receiver (HK 325 and then later a Pioneer 1014) with the subwoofer pre-out split. One half would go to the sub and the other would go to the sherwood's phono input. I'm using the phono input because even on maximum volume, the sherwood didn't power the shakers enough based on the level of the LFE signal it was getting from the pre-out of the main receiver.

Eventually I added some fmod low pass filters between the main receiver subwoofer pre-out and the sherwood receiver. That helped me just get the very low frequencies to the shakers. Originally when I was using just an 80Hz crossover for both the subs and the shakers, the shakers were too distracting to me. While watching movies, sometimes they would even come on when some male with a deep voice talked, which wasn't what I was looking for. I just wanted them to give a bit more kick when some explosion happened or something similar. The fmod low pass filters helped a lot with that.

Now my setup is one of the digital outputs of my BA pre-pro goes to a digital coaxial input on the Onkyo. I have the Onkyo set to a 50Hz crossover point. The subwoofer pre-out on the Onkyo then runs to the sherwood's phono input for amplification.

Honestly I probably could get the Onkyo to power the shakers directly, but I believe I decided not to do that because it didn't have a phono input (I'm not at my apartment so I can't check), and I didn't want to crank the volume way up on the Onkyo to compensate for it. It's very easy for me to adjust the sherwood's volume without a remote since I mount it right behind the seating. If I were to use the Onkyo from my rack, I'd need to program another volume control into my remote to change the shaker volume.

I could be more efficient with how I set it up, but it's working now and it does everything I want it to.

As for the difference it makes, I just wanted to mention that I only use them for movies rather than music. When I decided to try bass shakers, I had only read about them and never tried them out. I wasn't quite sure what to expect when I got them, and it took a while to really get them set up the way I wanted. Two essential things to get it right were
1. Easily controllable levels on the bass shaker amplification
2. Control over the frequencies sent to the shakers independent of the subwoofer

I would describe it as getting most of the impact and vibration that I would get from cranking my system up a LOT without having to turn the whole system up that loud. I do like to have my movies fairly loud, but I don't like to have it so loud that my subwoofers are shaking the whole room with every explosion. I have had several points in my home theater experience when I've had a lot of sub for my room dimensions which resulted in easy pressurization. Despite having two 12" SVS subs in my setup now, I still don't feel like I have the ease of pressurization that I had with the 10" SVS in my dorm room. To get the same kind of effect I had then in my much larger area now, I'd really have to get my system cranked up to reference level. With the shakers, I can get that same kind of effect (and then some) independent of my overall system volume.

Due to the shakers being connected to the furniture vs. a subwoofer sitting on the floor, the vibrations are much more directly transferred to the seating and are also more isolated vs. the rest of the room. I'm in an apartment (above a bar, so it's not that big of a deal), but the effect shakers give isn't really transferred to the rest of the room as it would be with subwoofers. That means that I can experience the tactile feeling of movie LFE effects without cranking my system loud enough to have the cops called on me.

I have had some people come over and get freaked out by the shakers. I'm not sure if they'd learn to love them, but I suspect that in general, they're not for everyone. I think that the shakers have been one of the best relatively cheap additions to my system. I think the only downside to having them is that I'm pretty spoiled now. Whenever I go to an action movie in the theater now, I feel so disconnected from the action. Not that I've been in a lot of explosions to know what it feels like, but explosions feel so flat and distant without that tactile rumble to go with them now.

 

[thomsbrain]

Thanks for the informative response. I actually found your pics of the mounting right about the time you must have been writing about it. I'm not sure if I could replicate something like that with my couch, which has a cloth bottom at the very bottom that would prevent me from reaching anything solid inside it, IIRC. Anyway, something to think about for the future.

I also noticed you have set of Onyx Rockets and x-series speakers in various locations, and I was wondering if you could write a bit about the difference between those speakers to your ears. I'm considering the Onyx speakers based on praise from teh intarwebs as well as from someone I know who has x-series speakers and is happy with them (lives too far away to demo, though). I'm leaning towards the x-series partially because of price, and partially because the "Bigfoot" Rocket center is just too damn big for my proposed setup. I'd like to get mains and a center for $800 or less.

I currently have a Bose Acoustimass 3 (2 satellites and passive bass module) and a cheapo Sony 12" sub. I loved the setup when I got it (it was a big improvement), but over time you become familiar with the limitations of your system and they start to distract you. Anyway, the setup got me through college and beyond, but I think it's time to move the Bose speakers to surround duty and get something half-way decent for mains and center to make a 5.1 system.

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: thomsbrain
Thanks for the informative response. I actually found your pics of the mounting right about the time you must have been writing about it. I'm not sure if I could replicate something like that with my couch, which has a cloth bottom at the very bottom that would prevent me from reaching anything solid inside it, IIRC. Anyway, something to think about for the future.

I also noticed you have set of Onyx Rockets and x-series speakers in various locations, and I was wondering if you could write a bit about the difference between those speakers to your ears. I'm considering the Onyx speakers based on praise from teh intarwebs as well as from someone I know who has x-series speakers and is happy with them (lives too far away to demo, though). I'm leaning towards the x-series partially because of price, and partially because the "Bigfoot" Rocket center is just too damn big for my proposed setup. I'd like to get mains and a center for $800 or less.

I currently have a Bose Acoustimass 3 (2 satellites and passive bass module) and a cheapo Sony 12" sub. I loved the setup when I got it (it was a big improvement), but over time you become familiar with the limitations of your system and they start to distract you. Anyway, the setup got me through college and beyond, but I think it's time to move the Bose speakers to surround duty and get something half-way decent for mains and center to make a 5.1 system.

I believe there is a wait (backorder/new revision) for the X-series, just for your info.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: thomsbrain
Thanks for the informative response. I actually found your pics of the mounting right about the time you must have been writing about it. I'm not sure if I could replicate something like that with my couch, which has a cloth bottom at the very bottom that would prevent me from reaching anything solid inside it, IIRC. Anyway, something to think about for the future.

I also noticed you have set of Onyx Rockets and x-series speakers in various locations, and I was wondering if you could write a bit about the difference between those speakers to your ears. I'm considering the Onyx speakers based on praise from teh intarwebs as well as from someone I know who has x-series speakers and is happy with them (lives too far away to demo, though). I'm leaning towards the x-series partially because of price, and partially because the "Bigfoot" Rocket center is just too damn big for my proposed setup. I'd like to get mains and a center for $800 or less.

I currently have a Bose Acoustimass 3 (2 satellites and passive bass module) and a cheapo Sony 12" sub. I loved the setup when I got it (it was a big improvement), but over time you become familiar with the limitations of your system and they start to distract you. Anyway, the setup got me through college and beyond, but I think it's time to move the Bose speakers to surround duty and get something half-way decent for mains and center to make a 5.1 system.

Would you be able to temporarily remove and then replace part of the cloth underneath the couch in order to screw some shakers into the frame of the couch?

You might want to look at the "butt kicker" to see their mounting options and see if you could replicate something like that (or even buy a butt kicker system... of course that's more expensive and wouldn't make use of your spare receiver).

I have a pair of X-LS classics which I compared against a pair of Onix Rocket 550 MKIIs. I now have the 850 sigs up front and haven't had the X-LS speakers in my apartment since then (I'm using X-LS at my work office).

Since they're the classics, they're going to have a different sound than the new X-series encores.

I have been really impressed with my X-LS for how much they cost. They didn't have the clarity of the 550s and sounded a little muddy in comparison. They're also a little too laid back for me. I adjusted the equalizer on my work PC to bump up the high frequencies a few dBs and I'm quite happy with them now. I believe both these issues were focused on in the improvement process from classic to encore so I bet they're a more balanced and higher performing speaker now. I also didn't do much high volume listening on the X-LS since I only demo-ed them for a few days before taking them to the office system so I'm not sure if the differences would be even more apparent at higher volumes.

They do have the risk free trials at AV123 now, so you've got nothing to lose by buying a pair and testing them out for 30 days before deciding if you want to keep them. You also might want to start a thread over on the AV123 forum to see if someone in your area can give you a demo of X-series or Rockets.

If you can't get bigfoot to work for you, then it's probably good to just skip the Rockets idea.

There are several internet direct options out there for 3.0 on an $800 budget too.
You could get 340s from Ascend Acoustics, or... well just about every ID speaker company has some solution at that pricepoint.

 

[thomsbrain]

Thanks again, Yoyo. I'll take your advice into account. This is a great thread for those of us who are interested in sound but lack experience. I know tons about audio recording techniques but ironically know comparatively little about the playback side of things. Reading this thread has helped me a lot.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I'm glad it's helping you. Good luck!

Of course come back if you want more advice and go ahead and make your own thread to get more people reading your specific questions.

 

[Howard]

Whoah, just found this thread.