2.1 Stereo System for Dorm

[RapidSnail]

The system will be used in a single doom (non-shared) primarily for music. Movies and games will also be used, but most sources will be from a DAP (iPod/iPhone) or lossless audio from a computer. I cannot use the traditional Logitech or 2.1 computer speaker systems. The sound quality is terrible and something I could not tolerate for very long.

I have seen two pairs of monitors that have caught my interest:

Axiom Audiobytes $349.00

Audioengine A5's $349.00

I have not been able to hear either of these systems in person, but they are both built by reputable manufacturers. The Audiobytes come with a matching amplifier, and the A5's are self-powered. Apparently, both are able to interface directly with Apple's DAP's which is a plus. A subwoofer would also need to be purchased, and Axiom offers an optional subwoofer upgrade for $179. I'm not sure how good this will be, but I also realize that my space will be small, so I do not need a large enclosure. Audioengine also produces their own subwoofer, but at $399, it may be a bit too expensive.

 

[herm0016]

if you do not want a traditional receiver and speakers you can look at getting a SonicImpact T-amp or other small stereo amp and then you can purchase any bookshelf speaker that you like, this will also let you upgrade speakers or amp in the future. Add to this a powered sub such as one of the dayton options at parts express, they are great subs for the money and have very strong amps. If you want powered monitors i have heard good things about the krk rockets and the m-audio stuff too.

independent reveiw of m-audio: http://forums.audioreview.com/showthread.php?t=27683

 

[RapidSnail]

I can't believe I was so stupid as not to mention that I have an Onkyo system in my room which I bought a while ago. It is the HT-S770 HTiB. I don't know if I could interface this with a computer, or if it will work with an external digital audio player (I haven't configured it in a long time). I only want a 2.1 (or 3.1 if I could use center channel) setup for space and practical reasons. But maybe I could use some parts from it, if not the whole thing. Would the subwoofer work with the monitors in the OP?

 

[RapidSnail]

Originally posted by: herm0016
if you do not want a traditional receiver and speakers you can look at getting a SonicImpact T-amp or other small stereo amp and then you can purchase any bookshelf speaker that you like, this will also let you upgrade speakers or amp in the future. Add to this a powered sub such as one of the dayton options at parts express, they are great subs for the money and have very strong amps. If you want powered monitors i have heard good things about the krk rockets and the m-audio stuff too.

independent reveiw of m-audio: http://forums.audioreview.com/showthread.php?t=27683

Those look like very well built monitors. But will the bass be good enough from bookshelfs? Apparently they respond down to 37Hz, and some people say that a dedicated sub is much better. But like I said above, could I use some of the parts of my current setup? Or maybe they aren't good enough to keep up, and there will be a noticeable discrepency.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

If you get a 3.5mm to stereo RCA adapter (just a couple bucks), you can hook up any portable device with headphone output to your existing receiver. Alternatively there are some dock products out there that give you RCA output on them and bypass the headphone amplifier in the devices which may give you slightly better results. (I don't own an ipod or one of those docks to tell you the difference, but I've gone from headphone output to receivers before without issues)

Same goes for your computer, an adapter is all you need to hook that up. Depending on what your soundcard is like, you could go digital or analog to the set.

As for your Onkyo sub, does it just have an LFE input, or does it have multiple inputs on it?
I'm in the process of downloading adobe reader right now to open the audioengine manual so I don't know all the details on that end yet.

EDIT: Ok, opened the manual. I didn't see anything about whether it's applying a crossover or what frequencies it's sending from the sub out, but you should be able to hook up that onkyo unit just fine to the monitors.

I'm wondering if you already have a receiver though, it might be a better idea to incorporate that into your system to have more connectivity options and have more control over subwoofer integration. You could keep using the Onkyo speakers or buy some higher quality passive speakers for it.

 

[herm0016]

like yoyo said, i think your best option with that set is to upgrade you speakers and keep the sub/receiver. this will give you the best sound quality for your budget. what sound card do you have?

 

[RapidSnail]

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
If you get a 3.5mm to stereo RCA adapter (just a couple bucks), you can hook up any portable device with headphone output to your existing receiver. Alternatively there are some dock products out there that give you RCA output on them and bypass the headphone amplifier in the devices which may give you slightly better results. (I don't own an ipod or one of those docks to tell you the difference, but I've gone from headphone output to receivers before without issues)

Same goes for your computer, an adapter is all you need to hook that up. Depending on what your soundcard is like, you could go digital or analog to the set.

As for your Onkyo sub, does it just have an LFE input, or does it have multiple inputs on it?
I'm in the process of downloading adobe reader right now to open the audioengine manual so I don't know all the details on that end yet.

EDIT: Ok, opened the manual. I didn't see anything about whether it's applying a crossover or what frequencies it's sending from the sub out, but you should be able to hook up that onkyo unit just fine to the monitors.

I'm wondering if you already have a receiver though, it might be a better idea to incorporate that into your system to have more connectivity options and have more control over subwoofer integration. You could keep using the Onkyo speakers or buy some higher quality passive speakers for it.

The sub has only one input labeled "Line Input" so I'm guessing that's what you were asking. Here's the manual for the Onkyo HT-S770. I'm concerned about a discrepency between the sub and new speakers, though. I'll just use the Onkyo sub if it can keep up with good monitors, but I'm not sure how to predict the performance. What setup would you recommend for around $600 with/without my current equipment?

Originally posted by: herm0016
like yoyo said, i think your best option with that set is to upgrade you speakers and keep the sub/receiver. this will give you the best sound quality for your budget. what sound card do you have?

Creative Fatal1ty X-Fi FPS that I got very cheap a while back. Not the best, but quality DAC's are expensive.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

With $600, I would personally be keeping the receiver (my French is a bit rusty, but it looks like you have options for 60, 80, 100 (default), 120, and 150Hz). How big is this room going to be?

I had an SVS PB-10 in a 12x10 foot dorm room and it was pretty crazy. Before that I had a 10" dayton which handled the space just fine really.

I honestly don't have much experience with powered monitors to have much useful advice for you from that route since I'm mainly HT oriented and passive speakers are far more common. Since you already have that receiver though, I think it would be wise to keep using it and then spending part or all of your budget on a pair of speakers or a new 2.1 set.

What kind of space restrictions are you working with? (many of the good bang for the buck subs tend to have pretty large enclosures which might not work for you if this room is small and you're concerned about taking up too much space)
Also, is this going to be near-field listening or are you going to be sitting farther back?

What are your thoughts about your existing onkyo set as is? Does the sub satisfy you now? (Assuming it's in a room size comparable to the future room)

 

[RapidSnail]

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
With $600, I would personally be keeping the receiver (my French is a bit rusty, but it looks like you have options for 60, 80, 100 (default), 120, and 150Hz). How big is this room going to be?

I had an SVS PB-10 in a 12x10 foot dorm room and it was pretty crazy. Before that I had a 10" dayton which handled the space just fine really.

I honestly don't have much experience with powered monitors to have much useful advice for you from that route since I'm mainly HT oriented and passive speakers are far more common. Since you already have that receiver though, I think it would be wise to keep using it and then spending part or all of your budget on a pair of speakers or a new 2.1 set.

What kind of space restrictions are you working with? (many of the good bang for the buck subs tend to have pretty large enclosures which might not work for you if this room is small and you're concerned about taking up too much space)
Also, is this going to be near-field listening or are you going to be sitting farther back?

What are your thoughts about your existing onkyo set as is? Does the sub satisfy you now? (Assuming it's in a room size comparable to the future room)

I don't have exact specifications or measurements, but it is a dorm room at the University of Connecticut, if that makes a difference. The room is going to be occupied by myself only (grant for specific health issues) and is the typical squarish/rectangular shape. Space really shouldn't be an issue, and I'd have to see specific sub examples to make the call on that.

Most of the listening should be near-field, but maybe farther away sometime. Nothing eccentric though. Normal listening for the most part. I enjoy my Onkyo set that I have now. I bought it on recommendations from this forum and others around the web as one of the best bang-for-the-buck HTiB's. My room is carpeted however, and I'm not sure how much difference there will be on hardwood.

The sub is very nice, and can put out some pretty good bass, although I haven't tested with superior equipment. The room I'm in now is comparable to the dorm, but my room now is more square (don't count me on it). I don't know if I should just bring the top left and right channel speakers along with my sub and receiver, or if I should invest in a pair of stereos and use the receiver + sub combo, or if I should totally redo stuff.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I'm thinking that maybe you don't want to change out the sub yet since in a small room, even a basic sub is going to be able to handle the volume requirements, so for an upgrade you'd be looking for something with better extension and quickness, but if you're ok on overall volume it's not as big of a deal. With music as the primary concern, you're also probably ok on extension already... so you're down to whether the onkyo sub is too boomy / sloppy for you.

On the other side of things, I have no doubt that a speaker upgrade is going to improve your music listening a LOT more. If you were to upgrade your sub, you'd probably want to get into the $300+ sub range to make it a significant enough upgrade to justify it... and you'd probably end up with a sub that was 60 pounds or more. If your dorm days are anything like mine, you're going to be moving in / out of places a lot and that might be another pain to consider for the sub upgrade.

If you get some speakers with good bass extension, you can lower the crossover point on the receiver too and the speakers will handle most of the bass leaving the sub to cover an even more limited range than it's doing already.

As for your plans...
Totally redoing 2.1 + receiver (or 2.0 powered monitors + sub) is going to be tight on your budget to get quality stuff.

If it's primarily near-field, monitors might be a good idea. A couple things to consider though with your future plans... if you're eventually going to be turning this into a surround system, it could be tougher with monitors. It could be a pain to try to integrate them with a receiver / pre-pro and it also might be tougher to get additional speakers to match them if you're looking for a horizontal center channel or single speakers.

If you don't go with monitors, I don't see any blaring reason to replace the receiver unless you wanted to do audio over HDMI with a blu-ray player or something, and even then, that would eat up half your budget to get a receiver with those features.
With your description of the sub you have now, I suspect that you'd be happy keeping that with your system for now and possibly leaving that as a future upgrade once you move into a larger space.

That would leave you with ample budget to get a really nice set of passive stereo speakers. With this strategy you could get a really nice pair and "get it right" rather than trying to upgrade 3 different components at once and possibly leaving yourself in this same situation down the road. You'd leave yourself an upgrade path of upgrading either your receiver or subwoofer down the road knowing that you already have the speakers you want. I've had really good experiences with internet direct options, but there are a lot of good retail options in this pricerange as well.

Have you looked at the auditioning section of the sticky thread? I could throw some suggestions at you, but going out and listening to products in your area OR getting a demo from a current owner OR taking advantage of some 30 day trial periods from internet brands (or a combination of those) is going to help you pick out the best option for your own taste.

 

[RapidSnail]

I agree here. I think the receiver + sub that I have now will satisfy for most purposes. I don't really plan on going with surround during my college years. It just wouldn't work well with the atmosphere. The sub is something that, as you said, requires $300+ to justify the purchase. I heard the same thing on the AVS forums, and I concure.

So I think this leaves me looking for a good pair of passive speakers in the $500-600 price range.* I don't really know where to start looking, and I don't have any dedicated hi-fi stores in my area (at least that I'm aware of). Circuit City and BestBuy don't cut it. I suppose I'll start looking through the recommendations in your sticky thread.

And will a receiver act somewhat as a headphone amp and as a portal for a DAP to stream music to the speakers?

*For instance, something like this?

 

[herm0016]

for that budget you have a lot of options. Check out www.audiorevew.com there are always threads about people getting new bookshelf speakers. B&W, av123, totem, paradigm are just a few of the brands you should consider.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I'll let someone else to a better job answering the headphones question. I've tended to have better results plugging into receivers (and especially my pre-pro) than computers / portable devices directly, but I have yet to invest in a good headphone amp to take it up a level beyond that. I'm not familiar enough with a lot of headphones, but do you know if yours are a model that really benefits from a headphone amplifier? It might be worth considering putting that on your list of future purchases

For the DAP, are you just talking about an ipod or something?
For something with a headphone jack, you can just use an adapter to plug into one of the analog inputs on the receiver.
http://www.monoprice.com/produ..._id=665&seq=1&format=2

I haven't heard the RS250s, but from my experience the rockets don't really excel at near-field. I needed to be back a bit from 550s (which have a vifa + two 6.5" vs the 250s with vifa + one 6.5") before they really sounded their best. If you wanted to look at AV123, the
ELT mini monitor
http://av123.com/component/pag..._virtuemart/Itemid,37/
or
X-LS encore (backordered)
http://av123.com/component/pag..._virtuemart/Itemid,37/
would probably be better bets.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

I'm going to go ahead and mention this since it's not on my list.

Normally these are ~$950-ish, but piano black is $499 right now
Swan D2.1SE
http://www.theaudioinsider.com...-d2-1se/products_id/69

These were the winner of the October 2007 Affordable Audio shootout competing against some pretty tough competition.
http://www.affordableaudio.org/aa2007-10s.pdf

Bad news is this price may only be good until tomorrow?
http://av123forum.com/showthread.php?t=34891

 

[RapidSnail]

Originally posted by: YOyoYOhowsDAjello
I'm going to go ahead and mention this since it's not on my list.

Normally these are ~$950-ish, but piano black is $499 right now
Swan D2.1SE
http://www.theaudioinsider.com...-d2-1se/products_id/69

These were the winner of the October 2007 Affordable Audio shootout competing against some pretty tough competition.
http://www.affordableaudio.org/aa2007-10s.pdf

Bad news is this price may only be good until tomorrow?
http://av123forum.com/showthread.php?t=34891

Damn! Those are tempting. I may jump on those, if it works out with my budget (I may need a good printer, so that would cut on costs). Thanks for the link!

If I upgrade in the future, a sub will be next, but I think that since these monitors go down to 43Hz, there should be nice bass coupled with my current Onkyo sub.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Looking back at my 2:30AM response, I didn't mention a couple of things
- I have no idea what these are like near-field
- I don't think there's a matching center for future use in a surround set (if that matters to you for after your college years)

If you're considering these, I would recommend going on AVSforum and any professional reviews finding out as much as you can about them. They're probably a pretty safe bet based on the Affordable Audio shootout results, but you wont really know if they're for you until you hear them (and let them break in if you're into that). Looks like you get 30 days to try them out (I didn't see details about their trial period so I'll assume it's customer pay shipping both ways if not satisfied.

Hey, Anandtech made their blog... how can you lose?
http://www.theaudioinsider.com/blog/

 

[RapidSnail]

jello, I've been doing some ready on the Swan's, and I think I'm going to pull the trigger. I read a professional reviewer's opinion who said he was thrilled with the sound coming from $1000 units. So I think at $500 these should be a steal. I probably won't even need to bring the sub I have now as the bass is supposed to be very good and the Onkyo could be a hinderance.

The only thing I'd like to know is if these monitors will work with my receiver. It's an HT-R520 rated at 1000W, but I don't know if ratings are like with computer PSU's. Is there an efficiency curve that I need to be worried about? If the receiver can power these speakers without issue than I will go for it, but I want to be sure before I buy.

Edit: For what it's worth, from the product's specification page, the receiver can put out 130 W per channel at 8 ohms impedance at 1 kHz. TAI labels the power draw from the speakers at 10-150 W, while the power draw from Swan's product page is state at 10-120 W.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Power ratings on receivers are indeed quite often bogus. Especially in the HTIB market (like the one you have), they'll give outrageous wattage ratings in order to give a high total number when they're added together.

Here's one example someone put together comparing manufacturer specs vs. output @ clipping all channels driven.
http://www.geocities.com/Area5...llow/3401/ratevsac.htm

Onkyo claims 130watts to 1 speaker playing 1kHz (an easy to do frequency)
They'll then multiply that by the number of channels rather than testing them all driven at once.
130 x 6 + 220 sub = 1000

Sometimes they'll even rename a receiver to go with a HTIB set and the wattage ratings will be dramatically increased for the HTIB specs vs. the standalone unit.

Ok, so the rating can't be trusted... but you'll still probably be ok.

Since you're going to be in a small room with these, that's going to help keep your power requirements down.
You can see how different factors affect things with this http://myhometheater.homestead.com/splcalculator.html

What you want to watch out for is playing them too loud so your amp starts to clip and cause distortion. I don't know what your listening habits are like, but unless you're going to be having dance parties in your room, you'll probably be fine.

Something to keep in mind is that the lower frequencies can be the toughest part for an amplifier to drive in many cases. I also have read that these have great bass output and using the Onkyo sub would probably be unnecessary and perhaps even be a detriment to the system overall (especially for a music system). If driving them full range though causes problems with the receiver being able to drive them, then setting them to small and letting the Onkyo sub handle the low end could help take some of the strain of the amp.

After all this stuff about wattage, I'll mention that I'm using a pair of 87dB 1W/1M speaker with a little Sonic T-amp http://www.amazon.com/Sonic-Im...mplifier/dp/B00009W44B that only puts out about 6 watts cleanly and it's fine for me. That's my office system so I never really crank it, but when I'm there at 7-8pm after everybody else is gone I've been able to get the system going pretty well with only those 6 watts. Most of the time you're only using a few watts unless you're listening quite loudly so even if your receiver can only really put out oh... 50 watts / channel, you'll still be in pretty good shape. Once you get into a bigger space (and somewhere that loudness restrictions aren't as strict), then a new receiver or receiver + amp would be a good upgrade.

 

[RapidSnail]

I figure that these speakers are going to be an investment for me and will last quite a long time. If I do find the receiver lacking in demanding scenarios, I can always buy a more powerful receiver in the future. A sub would be the purchase after a new receiver. I don't plan on turning this system into a 5.1 or more, it's going to be dedicated to 2.0/2.1 music listening with movies and games thrown in but not with as much importance.

I also won't be holding any parties in my room . I would, however, like some volume out of the unit, so I'm hoping it will work well. If I need really high volume, a nice headphone + amp + DAC may be a good investment out of respect for other people. I'm going to go ahead and order these units, and see how they turn out.

By the way, is it possible to buy a separate amp (is it called a pre-amp?) that would power the system while my current receiver handles the decoding and conversion? Or would it be better to look for a more powerful receiver unit instead?

Edit: Ordered! All thanks to jello for the help and recommendation! :thumbsup::beer:

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Originally posted by: RapidSnail
I figure that these speakers are going to be an investment for me and will last quite a long time. If I do find the receiver lacking in demanding scenarios, I can always buy a more powerful receiver in the future. A sub would be the purchase after a new receiver. I don't plan on turning this system into a 5.1 or more, it's going to be dedicated to 2.0/2.1 music listening with movies and games thrown in but not with as much importance.

I also won't be holding any parties in my room . I would, however, like some volume out of the unit, so I'm hoping it will work well. If I need really high volume, a nice headphone + amp + DAC may be a good investment out of respect for other people. I'm going to go ahead and order these units, and see how they turn out.

By the way, is it possible to buy a separate amp (is it called a pre-amp?) that would power the system while my current receiver handles the decoding and conversion? Or would it be better to look for a more powerful receiver unit instead?

Edit: Ordered! All thanks to jello for the help and recommendation! :thumbsup::beer:

If you were to hook up an amp to a receiver, your receiver would then be functioning as a pre-amp or pre-processor or whatever you'd want to call it. In order to do that, you need a receiver with pre-outs so you can send the signal to the amp. I believe your receiver only has a subwoofer pre-out, so you wouldn't be able to use your current receiver with an amp.

EDIT: Oh, and be aware that your Onkyo sub and receiver are going to look like cheesy toys when you compare it to these

 

[RapidSnail]

My damn credit card got denied even though I have the necessary funds. :| Tomorrow I'll have to see what limits are on it, and if I can get it to go through. I'll be out of luck though if the deal ends.

And yes, my current system is just a toy. The receiver will be the next upgrade in the future, but I hope it can hold through.

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Bummer

Might want to shoot an e-mail to sales@theaudioinsider.com letting them know your issue and if you can lock in that price if the deal is scheduled to end?

I guess you get one more night to sleep on the decision now too

 

[YOyoYOhowsDAjello]

Did you sort it out? Looks like they're back up to $899 now