Help Buying Surround Sound!

all dvd players play cds. there are a lot of receiver speaker combos out there that don't include a dvd player. yamaha is a good choice. whatever you decide to get try and make sure all the speakers are the same brand. it's not a compatibility issue, it's a timbre range issue. search places other than cnet. There's even a system from zvox that gives you surround sound from one box. it sounds pretty good. check around there are lot of systems on the market for just about any budget.

Thanks luke for your support. My price range is around 200 to 250 $ but I live in a country where theres no online buying and stuff like that, and im mostly going to pick up my stuff from a "used stuff" store because im a little low on budget. I want to buy an A/V reciever and some good speakers. Now, i currently have a simple Pioneer stereo with two huge speakers, but i want to buy 5.1 What i want to know is, most of the 5.1 speakers i see are tiny, and i don't think they'll be as loud as my current speakers, i dont' want 5.1 that is not loud. My current pioneer owners manual says "Amplifier Section: Continuously Average power output is 50 watts per channel, min., at 8 ohms from 40 hz to 20,000 hz, with no more than 0.4% total harmonic distortion" and 75 W is written on the back of my current speakers. I wanted to know if the small 5.1 speeakers im buying can give me the same amount of loudness or even louder, and what is the power in Watts of RMS or whatever i need to look for on each 5.1 speaker to make it a loud surround sound system. Thanks so very much. and oh.......will i be able to watch tv at 5.1? because Television signal is not 5.1 i think.

sorry, I guess the output of my Stereo I described in the last post was only the average output and 50 Watts is NOT very loud hehehehe, well I found out this written in the manual, "Peak music power output........650 W(1kHz, T.H.D. 10%, 6 Ohm) and the speakers came original with the stereo so they are able to give me 650 Watts of power i guess, so how powerfull 5.1 speakers do I need to beat this or at least match this? Thanks.

That 650 watts number, is the max power output if you have all the possible channels connected to speakers & it is cranked all the way up. Its not the power per channel. The power per channel is 50 watts as you said. For the budget... I would imagine you would want to stay with whatever receiver you have & try to find 5 speakers that can appreciate all 50 watts that shouldn't be too hard. The center channel is definitely the most important, with front left/right speakers 2nd most important. Since your receiver can go down to 40Hz.... you MIGHT want to consider a sub-woofer, but it won't be TOO important considering your budget. Some TV transmits 5.1 digital sound, but I doublt you are in an area that has that.

Okay, forget my budget lol, because I can improve on my budget and also I can pick up high power cheap stuff here in used stuff shops. You are telling me to buy speakers and connect them to my current reciever but my current reciever is quite old and it does NOT support 5.1 audio. If i want to buy a new reciever and new speakers, whats the speaker output level i should be looking for that is loud enough (im not saying the BEST and the most expensive) but loud enough to meet my current crappy 50 watt per channel audio. And also, suppose if i buy 50 watt per channel 5.1 speakers, or whatever you suggest, what do I have to look for in the A/V reciever im going to buy, will that have to be some specific power also like an amplifier or all of the A/V recievers will work with the 5.1 plus the subwoofer? Thanks.

If you are going to get a new receiver, then I would suggest something that supports 5.1 (which means that it has a digital input) & that is around 75-100 watts per channel. Don't be fooled by the power stuff... remember, the relation between power & sound intensity is logarithmic; to double the decibels you have to increase the power by a factor of 10. So going from 50 to 100watts really only buys you a few more decibels. As far as the sub, usually you would get a powered-sub (that plugs into the wall itself) or an amp for your unpowered-sub.