surroung recomendations (1 Viewer)

[John Souza]

Hi, guy's just joined great site

My questions is I just bought a new pioneer PDP4350HD and now have to get my home theater going.I plan on getting a new PioVSX-1015 as the reciever.I also have a NHT SW2P sub and A210 or 2.1 (I think that's right) fronts and a crappy Infinity center channel. The speakers are all from around 1993. I would like to get some surround speakers for mostly movie watching.What do you guy's recommend in the $500 range? p.s. the room is only about 11'5" x 11's" so kinda small. and the couch/love seat are against the wall.

Any help would be helpfull.
Thanks
John

 

[eddieZEN]

Instead of blowing $500 for surrounds I'd replace the Infinity center channel with say the Ascend 340 center ($314 shipped) and go cheap on the surrounds---maybe a pair of Polk R15s from jandr.com for $100 shipped.

Your center does at least 60% of the work for HT, and your surrounds maybe 10% so that's where I'd invest first. You could use the Infinity center channel for the rear center if you want to go 6.1 too though that will be hard with your couch against the wall unless you wall-mount.

The only way I'd ever spend more money on surrounds is if I were doing a lot of SACD or DVD-A surround music listening. Or if I watched 90% sci-fi and action flicks cranked pretty darn loud.

Just my .0000002 cents!

 

[John Souza]

Eddie,
Thanks alot for your reply.
So the Ascend 340 is a really good center? Who make's that model?

Thanks again.
John

 

[eddieZEN]

You're very welcome, John.

Ascend Acoustics is an Internet-only brand, their speakers are all assembled by hand in California and offer a breathtaking quality-to-price ratio, especially their CBM-170 bookshelves. If you like an exquisitely detailed yet non-fatiguing speaker, they are the way to go. The CMT-340s are a bigger and newer model, with an extra driver and a wide dispersion tweeter which makes them ideal for larger rooms. I especially liked the center channel version of the CMT-340, it was a 500% improvement over the crappy Wharfedale center I had before---really opened up the dialogue of movies and TV, very clear and natural sounding, such that I didn't have to turn up the volume as high to understand what the actors are saying. In fact I like it so much that I now will often listen to a lot of vocal-dominated music (Suzanne Vega, Norah Jones, etc.) in 3.1 instead of stereo!

I also heard of Ascend only from audio forums like this. I did a Google search and found a massive paper trail of glowing reviews---actually did not find a single really negative review of their speakers. Then I found a local Ascend owner who let me come over and listent to them, and I was sold in the first 5 minutes. Even without the local listen I probably would've still chanced the 30-day return policy anyway.

Go to their website, ascendacoustics.com and you'll also find a users' forum, this is where you can get feedback and also possibly find a local Ascend owner who'll let you come audition them.