Speaker advice sought (1 Viewer)

[George Caronan]

Hello everyone. Hopefully by the middle of the year or maybe even earlier, I plan on upgrading my speakers and subs. Here is my gear and considerations:

1. Surround Sound Processor: AVM 20 V2.11

2. Amp: Parasound HCA-1500 X 2 [200 WPC] - bi-amp mains

3. Amp2: Parasound HCA-1206 [135 WPC] 2 centers, 4 surrounds [side and rear]

4. TV is a Mitsubishi 55" HDTV Widescreen [rear projection]

5. Wires are 14 WPG for mains/centers + 16 WPG for surrounds

6. Interconnects are all Monsters

7. From the main listening position, the specs are:
Mains: 9 ft [1 foot away from the wall]
Center: 9 ft
Subs: 8 ft [both are on the sides of the TV]
Side Surrounds: 6 ft
Rear Surrounds: 6 ft [4 ft apart]
Two story house with high ceilings

8. Listening is 50/50 on HT and music

Budget will be around $4,500.00. Subs are in the budget although I am currently using two Infinity 150-watters. I prefer floorstanders for the mains. What would you knowledgeable souls recommend? Bookshelves would be fine as long as they are bi-wireable/bi-ampable though I have a feeling there will be compromises when listening to music. I usually listen to Classic Rock with an occasional Sinatra or Classical for the fiance! My apologies if the post is a bit long but I am looking forward to all your opinions and expertise. Thanks to Ernest Yee for kick-starting this.

Regards,
-George

 

[George Caronan]

Correction:

Rear Surrounds: 3 ft [4 ft apart]

 

[Marty M]

At that budget you have some very good choices to make. I will start with the brand that I am the most familiar -- Paradigm. I have the Monitor series, but with your budget you should be able to find something in the Reference series -- like Studio 20 or 40. Another company that makes similar sounding speakers is PSB.

Remember, the best speaker set-up is the speaker set-up that sounds best to you.

 

[JakubH]

Just one comment - if your mains are going to be only 1 foot away from the rear wall, you may wish to avoid rear ported speakers, many can sound boomy this close to a wall in my experience.

 

[George Caronan]

Hello Marty. Yes, it always comes down to what will sound best to any buyer. At this juncture, I canvassing what people can recommend. I've read a lot in this site and we have some creative individuals out there with respect to their tastes and knowledge. Paradigms are on my list though I am looking at the Studio 40 V3s for mains. Paradigm is the parent company of Sonic Frontiers I believe so there is some sort of synergistic match there. I will check on the PSBs too! The floor is carpeted with open space on the right with side wall on the left. The Anthem is a very neutral sounding SSP which does not colorate the audio while the Parasounds are on the warm side...not bright sounding to my ears. Interested in what others would advise. Thank you for the response!

 

[cabreau]

George, since you are listening to 50/50 music/HT, give a listen to the Martin Logan Mosaics. The more I listen to speakers, the more I keep thinking about how beautiful those sounded. They have a regular cone for bass, but the midrange and tweeters are ribbons. These things sound GOOOOOOOOOOD. They are about $2200/pair for the towers. There is a matching center you can buy, but I'm not sure how much $$$$ it is.

Take a gander over to this thread...
http://www.hometheaterforum.com/htfo...hreadid=178723
and see what people have said (including me).

My second choice would be Paradigm Studio series (Studio 40's, 60's, or 100's...but at the price of 100's you can buy ML Mosaics). My other second choice would be the Boston Acoustics line of speakers. For less money than the Paradigm 60's, the VR-3's sound a bit fuller for music, IMHO.

Or...you could buy more amps and run 5 sets of Fluance speakers and just have 10 mains, 5 centers, 5 subs, 20 surrounds, etc., I bet that would sound good. Back to the Wall of Sound. LOL.

 

[Scott_N]

Some of my favorites are Totem,Dali,JMLab,Triangle,Energy, Dynaudio, and Quad.

 

[George Caronan]

Quote:

"Or...you could buy more amps and run 5 sets of Fluance speakers and just have 10 mains, 5 centers, 5 subs, 20 surrounds, etc., I bet that would sound good. Back to the Wall of Sound. LOL."

Cabreau,

That was funny! Got a kick out of it. I wonder if someone actually did something like that. The Paradigms would be a maker I would definitely consider. I read a such a Paradigm combination reviewed on Sound & Vision and they gave it positive reviews. The cost was around $4,500.00 but without factoring in the additional rear surrounds. Thanks for the feedback. Take care.

 

[Lew Crippen]

With that budget you have many outstanding choices. Since you are considering both music and HT, I’d recommend looking at the Onix Reference package 'A' This has two Ref 2s (floor standing), the Ref center and two Ref 1s (monitors) and costs about $4,000. This might leave you a bit short for a sub, but I'd ask the guys at AV123 what might be possible.

I've heard this combionation and it is very fine indeed.

With this kind of budget, you might also check out ACI. I've not listened to their offerings in some time, but they have always produced a very fine product.