Stereo Systems

[saniflush 0]

Seeing the Denon that tgr4lfe has for sale got me to wondering. I know there are a lot of techno geeks here.

What kind of systems do you have?

Yamaha

Amp/Receiver

Tape Deck

Sony

Widescreen

VCR

DVD

5-CD changer

Cerwin Vega

Speakers

[TitanTiger 20,572]

I have an old (circa 1989) Hitachi system that sounds great. Onkyo 5-disc changer

[Ranger12 46]

Sony DD/DTS 5.1 receiver

Sony speakers and subwoofer

Panasonic DVD player

Regular old Philips TV (holding out for a decently priced 1080i).

[BamaGrad03 0]

Denon DD/DTS 7.1 Receiver

Michaura FR/FL

Klipsch Center

Definitive Technology BiPolar in Celing rear

Toshiba DVD player

Toshiba 32" TV (waiting to cash in my hookup and get a Mits 57")

[bigsixfive 328]

Onkyo THX 6.1 receiver, powering

-2 Cerwin Vega LS-12s,

-two LS-8s, and

-whatever the matching center channel is.

I built a sub with my dad using a 15" CV car speaker. I've got it wired down to 2 ohms, and I'm driving it with an Onkyo amp. It shakes a lot of things, and my wife definately does not like it.

[BustemBigBlue 178]

[Ranger12 46]

A question for you 6.1 and 7.1 guys...does the extra speakers really make that much of a difference in a normal sized living room or den? Reason I ask is because I thought about upgrading, but then I had a couple of buddies that upgraded and spent the extra $$$ for the new receiver and speakers they needed to add, and both of them told me the difference is not worth spending the money for your average sized room.

[bigsixfive 328]

A question for you 6.1 and 7.1 guys...does the extra speakers really make that much of a difference in a normal sized living room or den? Reason I ask is because I thought about upgrading, but then I had a couple of buddies that upgraded and spent the extra $$$ for the new receiver and speakers they needed to add, and both of them told me the difference is not worth spending the money for your average sized room.

Personally, I don't think they do. If you've got a good 5.1 system and it is set up correctly, it will sound pretty dang good. Now, if the room is fairly large, a 6.1, 7.1, 7.2, etc system would have a little advantage. Most high end receivers are 6.1 or 7.1 now, so you can upgrade receivers but not buy the extra speakers.

I'll vouch for Onkyo if you're looking to upgrade. Their mid to higher end stuff is awesome (don't know about their low end). In college, we used to swap speakers and receivers with each other and compare. One buddy had a very comparable HK receiver, and my Onkyo blew it out of the water. We hooked each receiver up to my CVs and his Klipsches. I've had it at ear numbbing levels, and it hasn't distorted my CV's. Even that Onkyo amp, which only has a 2 ohm load on it (not exactly made for that), hasn't faltered. One thing to check is that they have equal gain across all frequencies. The gain vs frequency plot (or Bode plot, as you'll find out later) should basically be flat. The lower end receivers (which are usually still nice and get the job done most days) usually have a gain spike at a certain frequency. Pioneers (at least they used to) provided their output wattage at 1 KHz, because that's where their gain spike was. Other frequencies had a lower gain.

Check out Onecall.com if you get in the market. I got my receiver brand new, which retailed at $1000, for $430. I bought it a few days after xmas in 2001. The new year models had come out, and they were dumping inventory before the new year I guess. I haven't been there in a while, so I don't know if they still have killer deals every now and then, but its worth a shot.

[jumbo 0]

Living room

Bose 321 Gsx system (its amazing to have all the sound from 2 speakers and 1 subwoofer)

32 inch lcd hdtv

Man room

Pioneer 500 watt reciever with 2 Aiwa bookshelf speakers with a subwoofer

also connected to the reciever is a 100 watt 5 speaker surround system with subwoofer

a total of 7 speakers and 2 subs!!

52 rca rear projection Hdtv

[The Prowler 1]

Living room

Bose 321 Gsx system (its amazing to have all the sound from 2 speakers and 1 subwoofer)

32 inch lcd hdtv

Man room

Pioneer 500 watt reciever with 2 Aiwa bookshelf speakers with a subwoofer

also connected to the reciever is a 100 watt 5 speaker surround system with subwoofer

a total of 7 speakers and 2 subs!!

52 rca rear projection Hdtv

Yea...Yea, me too... J/K

Seriously though...

Living Room

a Bargain Town Surround Sound system complete with 10,000 feet of cords and..... a 6" Subwoofer, yeah.

a 27" Tube TV

and a portable DVD player... What's Up

Man Room

a Computer w/ a 20" Screen and speakers... and a 20" TV

[aumd03 2]

Onkyo 1000W 6.1 system

44 inch Panasonic LCD

Sony DVD player

Kenwood CD changer

Motorola DVR

I like to be an equal opportunity electronic shopper.

DTS is the way to go though. Makes a huge difference in my opinion.

[bigsixfive 328]

DTS is the way to go though. Makes a huge difference in my opinion.

Agreed. Definitely an audible difference between regular Dolby and DTS.

[abrnfanatc 6]

Living Room:

Yamaha 500watt system with surround sound set up. Samsung 42" plasma 1080HD on pedestal. Perfect for watching Spider Man and Power Rangers...

Man Room:

Sony 500watt system w/60 CD changer with Bose surround sound set up. Panasonic pure flat 32" 1080HD television. Perfect for watching football and action movies.

[BamaGrad03 0]

Right now, 7.1 is pointless. Very very few DVDs out there encoded with it. 6.1 with the rear center, however, is a decent addition. Some of the DTS ES stuff is encoded with 6.1.

But like previously stated, a nice 5.1 setup is pretty good.

[stoic-one 1,553]

I'm old school.

Klipsch Cornerhorns front, Klipsch Cornwalls for the rear.

Phase Linear Dual 500 and Carver M1.5T for amps. (had to run separate circuits for these)

Various MP3(100GBs), CD, and DVD sources.

A Pany Plasma for visuals...

It's pretty intense...

[aumd03 2]

Do you guys notice the plasmas generating a lot of heat? I know they generate more compared to LCD's but my dad installs some for control rooms for the military and he says the rooms are like saunas once you get a bunch of plasmas up in a room. Personally from what I've read, plasmas have more issues with burn in and shorter life span and are more expensive to produce. Seems like LCD would be the way to go.

[BamaGrad03 0]

DLP would be my choice.

But still LCD, Plasma, DLP...they're all nice.

[jumbo 0]

DLP would be my choice.

But still LCD, Plasma, DLP...they're all nice.

I went to CC and they had a blue-ray Dvd player hooked up to a 1080p Dlp, the picture quality was out of this world

[Ranger12 46]

I keep my 5.1 finely tuned. I get anal when the sound from one of the speakers seems off. I drive my wife nuts when I am complaining that something does not sound right and I am setting in the floor fooling with it until I think it is right.

I agree that DTS sounds better then Dolby. One of the first things I do when I am putting in a DVD is too look on the box to see if it is encoded in DTS also, and if so, I go to the setup menu of the DVD and switch it to DTS since most movies are defaulted to Dolby. I will not buy a receiver or DVD player if it does not have the DTS logo on it.

[BamaGrad03 0]

The DTS algorithm processes faster to the rears/surrounds. That's why it is much preferred. The surround "effect" is much better.