kef kht-3005se or aperion 5b fusion speakers?

looks like the tx-sr805 will operate as a pre-amp.

john

sure will act as a pre. Thats how mine is being used, feeding a 70lb NAD amp.

Why the 805? The price was the same as the new 705 at the time, and heck I get better resale, as well as Burr Browns. Actually, I was always promoting this unit at the price point, and essentially talked myself into one!!!!

The Yam 663 wasn't available yet. It however is definitely more limited, with less features. However, I might consider this if I were you, if you ARE adding an outboard amp.

However #2: Always choose speakers first. That will be a large factor in how much power, if any extra, is even needed.

OTOH, the amp section of the 805 blows away the 663. Hell, the 605 is reviewed to have a better amp, let alone the Ultra amp in the 805.

Yam 663 limitations:

- 2 HDMI ins
- limited bass mgmt
- clips BTB/WTW for HTPC users
- lack of Audyssey, uses YPAO I believe

pros:

- as affordable as it gets for HDMI receiver w/ preouts
- dual sub outs. meh, why not, though a splitter works just fine anyways

i looked at the svs sb12plus you referred to
in black for $700. would you say that this is
reasonably well matched to an ascend 340 front, 170 surround
arrangement? if so, i think that would be much more sellable to
the significant other. i know it would not be as good as an open
unit, but i need to know if it would play well with the 340/170
ascend group.

john

sub and speakers.

The only thing that one might* consider is if you are using bookshelves with limited extension (can't go deep). Then you would want a sub that is "linear" into higher freq range.

Generally speaking, not only do smaller subs put out less, they are also less efficient. Takes more power to do the same, which is interesting.

the more I read about that expensive HSU, the more I like it. Haven't read much though. Looks like a beast for the money.

Choose your speakers first. One thing at a time. Im sure the subs will work just fine, though Im not going to hunt for 3rd party, credible, ground plane measurements for you.

john

john;

here's where i'm at right now:
- going to pick up a tx-sr805 soon
- ascend 340 fronts (towers)
- asking about 170 surrounds vs htm-200se (will get one or the other,
likely in their pearl color to blend into wall)
- deciding between svs sb-12 sub vs. a new one that ascend is saying
will be out very soon (trying to gather clues from ascend)
- thinking i can run all wires myself -- mount tv on wall, run hdmi +
power down wall to exit at floor -- run wire for fronts on floor --
run wires for surrounds up to ceiling & add crown molding to cover
them up as they circle around to same section of wall the tv wires
use, then down. i'm assuming i can run satellite wires out to 40-50'
without problems...

any thoughts about not being able to use much of the fancy thx stuff in the receiver w/out having 7.1? it would cost me one more surround and some wire -- your thoughts?

john

Nice choices. re 805, make sure its well ventilated. Open top, or open sides is a bonus, and you can always use $5 fans. I would most definitely go with a SVS for now, rather than wait indefinitely for the first effort at a sub. Very generally speaking, the better value for speakers come from speaker-first companies, and vice versa, subs from sub-first companies.

Remember how I said eD, epik, HSU, SVS, and AV123, but be very careful of your choice from the last one? Well . . . guess what, they are a speaker first company.

I found you 3rd party, credible, ground plane measurements of the SB12 for you, so I lied.
http://www.hometheatershack.com/forums/subwoofer-tests/5769-svs-sb12-plus.html

Id personally want more output down low. But, for the money, and the higher WAF, not bad at all. At all. You could do a lot worse, that's for sure. The HSU should kik ur butt though. Granted, a lot more.

40-50' is no problem. Try using at least 14 gauge wire. That should be good enough. Now, I am a BIG fan of Monoprice, but they have this "fault" of making thick cables. The insulation on their speaker wire is thicker than usual, which is a good or bad thing, depending who you ask, just FYI.

I really wouldn't sweat lack of THX modes for the rears. Seriously. The front soundstage is going to be soooooooooo much more important. The decision of how high your center channel it is, how free it is in space, its vert vs hor orientation, the simple choice of it all will itself entirely outweigh your surrounds and rears combined. Or something like that. The mains too (oh yeah, they are not "towers" but mains).

If you do follow my suggestion to hide the components, which would be FANTASTIC, please please please please please please please please please please please plesae use an upright center speaker. Please please please please please please plesae. NOTHING beats a good design or layout.

Did I get all your questions?

you absolutely did, john.

i don't have a place to hide the components in my house, unfortunately. my media stand is open front & back, with two
shelves and a top.

with tv on wall, i can put center on top of media stand and have it roughly level w/ towers.

i'll wait to hear back from ascend about trade-offs between using
170's for surrounds vs. htm200se's...

the price for the svs pb12 (least expensive) is about right for me.
if nothing else beats that for the $, that's what i'll get.

wow, i think i'm getting close...excited to hear it all!

john

all I know are that the 170 wall mount easily, but aren't exactly sexy by any means. A bit boxy.

And also . . .if saving on surrounds means a better sub, I most definitely for that in your setup. Easy. No problem. Now, I doubt you can save enough to warrant the sub upgrade, or buying duals, but that's my vote nonetheless. Sub is a big part of the equation. Its handling everything under 80hz as a single unit, and is also handling everything under 80hz for all other channels that "normally" would be going to those speakers.

The big pink elephant in the room is now room acoustics. If its too live, and perhaps either harsh or smeared from all of the bare reflections, you'll have to think of rugs, carpets, drapes, blinds, etc if you are fully against room treatments.

Me? I own 15 room treatments. I might go more for ceiling. In fact, I have a bunch pieces of scotch tape on the ceiling to mark first reflection points already. Just not sure if or when I'll pull the trigger.

Re 805. Ill repeat myself once again. Its BIG. Its HEAVY. How many inches of height do you have in any shelf? Can they support roughly 55 lbs?

john;

the 805 will fit on a shelf -- the media center is pretty strong.
open on both ends so no problem w/ air flow either.

john

The more the better with this unit. If not, you might consider a fan. I don't use one, b/c I don't really care . . . but then again, Im not using its amp section (acting as a pre only).

john;

rough media center shelving heights:
bottom shelf - 1.5" off hardwood floor
upper shelf - ~10" above bottom shelf
top of media center -- ~24"

the top of the media center will be at about the same height
as the two 340 tower stands. if center speaker is there, they
are roughly even.

i can adjust the top shelf up or down as required. i could give the
receiver more room if needed.

looks like i'll be able to heat the house w/ the onkyo this winter.

john

I'm glad the purchasing decisions are starting to shape up for you. However, I just wanted to really define a statement/question of yours:

the price for the svs pb12 (least expensive) is about right for me.
if nothing else beats that for the $, that's what i'll get.

are you saying Sb or Pb. The Pb is the better value, for sure, for HT. Its way bigger though.

The Sb really gives it up down low. but you get your small size, while staying in budget. can't have your cake and eat it. It all works out I suppose.

Now, if you have big bucks, you can have your cake and it: JL Audio Fathom series. Way past your budget though, just an FYI. Its what I use.

john;

as it stands now:
- trying to find out if i'm better off w/ 6.1 or 7.1.
the onkyo 805 loses some advanced thx stuff without 7.1.
this will figure in to how much cable i order.

- talked to ascend, and their new sub is sounding compelling;
due out late '08, i'm on pre-purchase list.

- i'm going to do surrounds of htm200se.

how many people forego the front center when using ht?
how recommended is it for that (and musical) purpose?

john

I agree 7 is better than 6. What you will have to decide is how many ft apart they are, as well as the angle they make to your position. This will very likely decide which THX mode (or not) you will use. I cannot remember which is desired for how many ft apart, etc.

My educated guess for now, is doing it like the fronts. For best stereo imaging. Start with roughly an equliateral triangle, or perhaps just slightly less on an angle. IIRC, Ultra mode means that the rears are only several feet apart, OTOH.

But like I said, its the front you should, by far and away, the biggest thing you should be concerned with. Hell, even your sidewall reflections, but acoustics are something to people tend not to think about until already having jumped in the waters.

The sub placement and calibration will be more important than your rears.

The side surround placement and calibration will be more important than your rears.

Congrats on your surround decision.

How many people forgo the center? Definitely the minority. Search AVS, and you will find a healthy number of folks. For music, its a no brainer to use stereo. No brainer. No brainer. ESPECIALLY if the setup is like everyone else's: horizontal, MTM, sitting on a shelf.

For HT, the biggest benefit of the center is basically centering dialogue to screen. But if you are dead-on... then AQ might be of more importance, yes? The only negative I can think of for phantom is some compression due to 3 channels into 2 mains, but this is probably not going to happen unless you really crank it, and in any case, most likely, Im not sure that you would notice.

Re the Ascend sub. Im gonna look into that. Regardless, I vote that you cancel preorder.

I have never bought anything preordered, except for movies. I will ALWAYS wait for the unit to come out, be reviewed by fellow consumers, or others. How many AV companies do it really right the very first time? There's always growing pains. You name it. Now, if I HAD to blindly preorder something of which I have no idea how good it will be, AND its their very first try ever at it, I suppose Ascend is as good as any.

But personally, id wait for the chips to fall. YMMV.

thanks again, john.

i'll consider the advice on the sub.
looks like it wouldn't figure into system discount anyway.
yes, i'm going to have to start studying guidelines for
speaker placement.

i may go ahead and get the receiver before i even order the speakers.
i can plug the dvr & ps3 into it, then to tv to check out the
general setup.

once i understand where i want speakers, i can generate an estimate of
speaker wire requirements. ascend has wire they like a lot at $1/foot.
i'm thinking i'm going to need about 120 feet, so the cost will not be neglegible. what are your thoughts on wire?

john

What wire does Ascend like? The only consideration I have for speaker wire is if it simply thich enough of a gauge for the considerations of:

- minimal impedance of speaker
- distance of the wire run

Once you get much thicker than 14g, you may or may not have trouble getting them into the binding posts. I wouldn't know, as I only have 16g in the HT. Home Depot stuff. My stereo speaker wires are preterminated fancier, very thick things, but I got for... uh relatively cheaper. $100. But, my stereo speakers also have an absurdly low minimal impedance of 0.7 ohm. And the speaker wires look fancy They are bi-wired Tara labs. No, I don't believe in the benefits at all in biwiring, but its cool to plug up all the holes! hey, its my living room, heh

FWIW. I think Home Depot, Lowe's, Radio Shack, are totally fine for speaker wire. Id have no problem running this stuff to speakers that cost 10x more than the ones you are going to buy.

Remember to buy your HDMI cables from Monoprice. Then buy me a 6 pack of beer for the cable advice, because you'll still have a ton of money in your pocket.

john;

ascend sells Ultralink Brand 14 Gauge 4 Conductor wire
at $1/foot. what do you think of using their expensive
stuff for the front speakers, and the general 14gauge for
the surrounds? if it matters (since speakers matter), i'll shell
out the extra $, but don't want to if it's not necessary.

i figure i already owe you a sixer --

john

for ALL of your cabling needs. This will save you around $100 or much more. Speaker wire:

http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartment.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10239

john;

i get 14 gauge, but should i get
2 or 4 conductor, or 'oxygen free'?
these are much better prices!

john

just ordered receiver and speakers!

340 fronts
htm200se satellites (4)

their website says i can get them in black, silver or white.
i want the fronts to be black, but the satellites to be white
to blend somewhat with the walls. no place to specify color on
order process tho -- have to call them on monday.

amazon just lowered their price on the receiver to $600!
i believe i've confirmed that i can get hdmi inputs to the onkyo 805
to pass thru to tv without messing w/ the video signal.

after i get your feedback on wire, i'll order that too!

john

Onkyo 805 does not molest HDMI signals. Like I've said on several occassions here, the pic I get is the most beautiful my friends, family, or I have ever seen with BD and HD-DVD being sent by a 35 ft HDMI cable that costs about the same as a 2 ft Monster optical cable. HAH! On a 159" screen at 42 degree viewing angle no less.

Definitely 2 conductor. Unless you are looking to biamp. You will then need another 7 channels of amp. Don't worry about oxygen free, I'm sure the CL2 is the same in anycase, anyhow.

The only thing I wonder about 12g, if it will fit in the posts. Just go for 14g, you won't need anymore at 50ft, or even some beyond that. The biggest differences are between the smallest gauges, but 14g is quite healthily thick. Thicker than what Im using in my system in fact.

When you hook up the speaker wire, please make sure to twist the ends quite well. This will help prevent a stray wire, which is always bad news. Just one touching strand may give you fits, and even be dangerous to your components.

Gawd, Mono is so cheap, Im thinking of buying myself some thicker wire, just for the hell of it. Im hoping Im too lazy to deal with redoing my wires, and I think I just be. Good.

Other warning re 805: Some have lip sync issues that are not resolvable, because the audio comes too LATE. If its too early, then you use the delay function. assuming you have an Onkyo with this issue, the further you sit, the more ameliorated this is. I think, in fact when you get to 15, or 20 ft, you are perfectly fine due to the distance sound must travel.

HOWEVER, I think a lot of people are misdiagnosing. Im sure some people might get, but what a lot of folks don't realize is that all of your source materials have differing sync. Some very demanding audiophiles blame it on poor performing SMPTE engineers. ANYWAYS, I have zero issue. You can take a calibration disc to get sync correctly, but I guarantee you if you nitpick, you will drive yourself mad. I cannot remember correctly, but I think Indiana Jones might have bad sync for instance. When you channels on a TV you will get different sync.

What else, hmmmmmm.

Oh, if you have the EARLIEST fw on your Onkyo, you cannot upgrade FW. But as Ive said, I think that's no longer the case. Only the very, very earliest buyers from last year got this. And to repeat, Amazon seems to have much more recent FW. And one mroe time: don't worry about FW if everything works fine. Its always some inherent risk in updating.

Lastly regarding Ascend, I would actually be more happy for you if music was important to you. Ive already said this. Anyways, you will like the stage and imaging. OTOH, I would really consider forgetting the center speaker, depending on how you are going to place it. On top of a reflective cabinet, given no space, and if not at least protruding over the lip of it. Hm. My brother has my old HTIB. and it is currently on stereo. Yep. The dialogue is so much better, and clearer for multiple viewers. People do seem to prefer clarity over centering, but the fact is even with very cheap speakers centering is not that hard to even with just two speakers.

I'll come up with an off the cuff analogy. Lets say you have the perfect steak. But lets say you think a steak must come with a potato, even if the steak was 20 oz. Well, I have an old rotten over-burnt potato for you. You never considered just eating the tasty steak on its own, because as far as you know everyone else eats a steak with a potato. Sometimes people ruin a good thing, just because everyone else does the same thing. That was a bad analogy, but maybe you get my point.

Re the rack, and no space to hide it. Hell, put it off the side. At the back. Either corner in the back. Directly behind your couch. Anywhere else.

TWO BIGGEST THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

1) Get an upright center. This is the probably the best advice I've given you, and I hope it was one of my very first recommendations. I obviously think its the most easy and fundamental improvement 99% of could make, and the costs are almost negligible. They just do horiz because everyone else does, and don't know any better. However, Id do this if it cant be near ear level, or that the angle of vertical dispersion is minimal after accounting for viewer distance.

Example of ignorance. He honestly didn't know any better. He is guaranteed to suffer lobing from 2/3 speakers in any given seat. Lobing means that the speakers own drivers are CANCELLING EACH OTHER Out at multiple frequencies. Any given set of frequencies being cancelled out is dependent on the exact angle offaxis.
http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x110/avliner/HTR004.jpg

Example of someone who knows what he is doing
http://www.smxscreen.com/images/IMG_5261-1.jpg

B&Ws HT homepage. First photo is complete B.S. and = Pure Marketing. Terrible design for the simple fact that everyone thinks that a horiz = for center. The third photo is the way to do it. Three uprights. Take away the huge mixing board and amps, and I personally think it looks clean. There's a reason why the best HTs and studios use three uprights. This includes your local theters as well.
http://www.bowers-wilkins.com/display.aspx?infid=761


To me, trying to find the best horiz center speaker is like trying to find the best possible square wheel. Even most cheap round wheels outperform the most technologically advanced square wheels. Nothing beats a good design, pure and simple.

2) speakers position in relation to room boundaries is critical. when you get your speakers, play around. Put them where they look nice and hidden, stuffed in corners, and listen for say 15 minutes. Then bring em out way too far for your wive's tastes, say 5 ft from the front, and 3 feet from the sides. Just for an experiment. Then listen for 15 minutes. You will see. Then you can do your best in compromising. Ive repeated myself way too many gawdamn times. Positioning is more important than the actual speakers you have chosen, IMO.


Some threads where I've harped on this.
repeatin my original rec to you
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1067244
on speakers away from room boundaries being the best improvement
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14704190&highlight=#post14704190
I totally agree with the philosophy and explanation in this post
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=14650424&highlight=#post14650424

Try for yourself and you will see.

john;

yes, i'm hoping i can upgrade firmware on that. tons of positive feedback on the 805 on crutchfield site, even with regard to video (hdmi).

i ordered speaker wire from monoprice today. i still might get some of the expensive wire from ascend for fronts -- not sure yet.

i'm studying up on how to cut holes in wall, fish wire, and how to
put it behind crown molding. that should simplify matters greatly.

i'm thinking it's going to be important to have the wire for each pair of satellites equal length so i get no temporal shift? how about
placing multiple speaker wires together behind the molding. i guess there's so little juice going thru that they won't interfere w/ each other?

should i look to monoprice for wall outlet plates, etc.?

thanks,

john

NO need for expensive wire. I can see spending more if you think it looks cool. That's the only reason, and since these are hidden, I see zero reason. Whatever floats your boat though.

Don't worry about speaker wire length. The signal is travelling close to the speed of light. IOW, just moving your head 1 cm to the left will make a much, much bigger difference than a 25ft speaker wire difference (in terms of phase).

Also, if speaker wires running together, that's totally fine. Its a high level signal, and so interference is much more difficult to come by, as opposed to being a low level signal.

The only thing I might say is that you may or may not want to leave extra slack for ease of moving around components, etc.

No idea on the best place for plates. FWIW, installers often just have wire come right out of the wall. Its easier to hide and cover up if you ever remove the speakers. Mounts usually stay and look ugly IMO when in plain view.

great advice...i will make the wall hole as
small as possible & not use plates, etc.

everything is in various states of shipment -- really excited to
hear a 21st century surround sound system. my
20 year old receiver was a trusty friend, but now it's sold to
a friend of my wife's.

i'm reasearching how to fish wire thru walls, etc.;
since i'm going to mount surrounds fairly high (about 1.5' from ceiling), i'm going to have to fish wire from there up to where
the wall meets the ceiling. a hole there, then run along the wall/ceiling interstice to be covered by crown molding.
this should save me from having to go into the ceiling or
under the floor (crawl space).

john

what's your take on surge protectors?
panamax? newpoint?

john

This is a big can of worms. I have not found enough evidence to have me come up with a strong opinion. Because there are all sorts of opinions from many very knowledgable people.

The most demanding opinion that I respect believes everything should be on UPS. He is one mad-scientist of a speaker builder, has done supporting systems for orchestra halls that cost 6 digits, professionally recorded 100s or maybe 1000s of classical radio broadcasts and the like in his state, and also is a doctor who is placed in charge of his hospital's power. He says that drops in voltage are just as deleterious as spikes and surges.

If you do the above, I wouldn't plug in amp/receiver/sub to it, unless you really have plenty of watts rated. For when you turn on the amp is actually the moment in demands the MOST energy, to charge the capacitors, AFAIK.

Then you have others who say just use a quality surge protector, something better than entry. I think Bob The Moderator here believes in adding up a bunch of various protectors in the home for cumulative effect, IIRC. You can search his posts here. Anyways, re surge protectors, get enough joules, as in a few thousand or more or something. Some have MOV run in parallel across hot and ground lines which means they fail repeatedly after the multile surges during the day.

Anyways, I know nothing.

Brands that are value oriented are TrippLite for surge. APC for UPS. Belkin comes up for both at times. I use two monster rack mountable units because they were the cheapest actually for anything "decent" and yet component-style/rack mountable. They were about $130 or so apiece. The Belkin UPS connected to my PJ was slightly more. Refurbished for APC works fine, and they are known to have excellent CS. Call em if you're interested.

One thing I did was have my HT on its own dedicated circuit. Something to consider. But seeing how Ascends are not extremely hard to drive, and that you have a receiver, and not a 150lb amp, I don't know if its necessary.

Beyond that, it gets very involved! I will stop here. Just get a TrippLite, and you will be fine.

thanks again, john,
i'll look into that brand.

john

just bought tripp lite 6-plug + coax + phone
from amazon. appreciate the advice.

john

Something I wanted to bring up. Before you run wires, with all that effort, really think about positioning.

I mean really think about it. Is your couch in the ideal spot. Please use the viewing distance calculator that I attach a lot here. Because once you mount the speakers, you will have very minimal leeway without major compromise to the surround field.

OK. Lets say it IS ideal. For 7.1, use sides at 90 degrees, and rears behind you.

When it is 5.1, you actually would put the sides further back than 90 degrees, although definitely not all the way behind you. The reason being is that with 7.1 you do not worry as much about compromised directionality or unstable imaging. Total wrap around. But since I believe you are 7.1, go for 90 on the sides.

I predict your surround effects are going to be plain sick.

Just make sure that everything else is really placed as well as you can predict. Because after the install it'll be a pain to change it up.

sincerely,
j

john;

i'm looking into hsu subs right now.
the VTF-2 MK 3, and the model just below it, vtf-1 look
interesting. can you tell me what you think of one of these
matched up w/ ascend 340 fronts + htm200 surrounds?

thanks!

john