Hear my plea:

A few months ago, I moved my old JVC mini-system downstairs and hooked it up to the TV to create a simple speaker system. My parents really love the external speakers and recently gave me the go-ahead to create and buy a better Home Theater system for the family room. I'm psyched because this is my big chance to make them understand why I enjoy headphones and audio equipment so much, because frankly, they disapprove of my hobby.

I've been slowly introducing them to nice audio equipment (my mom just got a nice Boston Acoustics radio) and now I need help proving that good sound is really nice to have. If this goes well, I'll have more leeway with audio products in the future. If this is a failure and my parents decide they like the cheap mini-system setup better, then I'm screwed with future audio purchases. I need a $1,000 (maybe stretch to $1,500) system with everything (speaker, receiver, amp, cables, whatever, probably no DVD player yet). I've searched the archives that haven't really found anything that solves my problem. And a lot of the links to equipment were broken or the equipment was discontinued. I went to hometheaterforum.com and only managed to confuse myself. I also went to cheaphometheater.com but don't really know what to make of it.

Furthermore, my mom wants speakers with wood enclosures. I sort of said that if we spend more money, then we can get speakers that look nice (the mini-system's really ugly).

Summary: I need to show my parents the importance of good sound
-$1,000-$1,500 for everything
-2 Front Speakers (nothing fancy, no subwoofer is necessary)
-Receiver
-Amp (do I need this since it's a pretty strict budget?)
-Cables
-Speaker Stands (probably...)

Issues
-Need pretty speakers for the parental unit of the maternal variety
-Auditioning is a no-can-do
-To the parents, the less boxes and remotes, the better

Thank you so much for any help!

Well, as this is just digital (+radio) you could try one of the new digital amps. How about the sony avd-s50es cd/dvd/sacd player with digital amplifier? $300 or so for (apparently) very good sound, according to the chaps on the audio circles. I haven't tried this but was looking into digital amps before getting into vinyl. Or for a bit more you could look for the avd-s500es, which uses the new chip (s-master pro).
And one box for the parents

From what I have heard (literally, not figuratively) of diural crossovers, you should have a great time with aperionaudio.com's speakers. Get the 5 bookshelves and add a sub. You would be right around $1300-1500 or so. See if you can splurge for the 10" or bigger subwoofer. They offer unconditional money back INCLUDING SHIPPING BOTH WAYS so there's nothing to lose. Then you just need to add one of the new digital receivers and you're good to go.

If you need to save money, I would consider getting ultra cheapies for the surrounds temporarily or just going with a 2.1 or 3.1 setup. The 3.1 setup with 10" subwoofer would fit very nicely into your budget and you could experiment with cheapie speakers for the rear surrounds.

Well, you can get five average speakers, with three of them sitting around doing nothing when listening to music (non-sacd) or two good ones.
You could try looking at paradigm's offerings (monitors). I have mini monitors as I'm a little nomadic at the moment and am quite impressed with them. You may be able to do better with your budget. There may not be need for a subwoofer - I'd get the main speakers first and see if you need more bass.

This is for home theater and the parents aren't audiophiles. They need to be impressed

Polk has a nice set of 5.1 small speakers with a sub plus a receiver. Can't remember the model number. I remember when I heard it, I was quite impressed by those small speakers.

Quote:



They will be! At any rate, the sony s50es is 5 channel, but with best sound in 2-channel mode. I'd really go for this.
The mini-monitors you can get for <$300, but there are lots of other good choices. At least go for decent front speakers.

Well I see oddball doesn't necessarily want the whole 5.1 gig. That's a different story then! The realm of possibilities has just exploded

Wow, thanks for all the help!

Right now, I'm thinking of going with two of Aperion's book shelf speakers ($360), 8" Subwoofer ($399), and the Sony AVDS500ES ($500 the place that I found). Two stands are another $96. I'm also going with two 10' lengths of the Kimber 4PR Speaker Wire ($92), Monster Cable Subwoofer cable ($40), and Monster component video cable ($20). Unless my calculator is lying to me, that comes to $1507, plus s/h for the receiver/dvd player (everything else is from Aperion).

Comments, suggestions, or links to better prices? I know that Monster Cable isn't the best, but I can't soder and I have to meet price requirements. My parents initially wanted to spend $500 on the whole thing.

I forgot another issue: my parents flip when I buy used, so it's out of the question. They flipped when I bought my used Denon DCP-150 online and they'll flip again.

The realm of possibilities has just exploded? Uh-oh. But I'm not really in a rush to create a system yet since I'll be away overseas for a month soon. I just want to get a plan done so when the home decorator comes (working on the room I want to get speakers for...so that's why I want wood enclosed speakers) I can make sure it all works. Again, thanks.

If you buy used, you'll save so much money. Why would your parents flip when you buy used? I bought almost all my rig used (except for headphones, for hygenic reasons...).

I dunno, they just think I'm too desperate to get the item if I buy used. They also don't trust Ebay or half.com or probably Audiogon no matter what I say. It's enough of a battle for me to buy audio stuff for myself. I don't want to make it more complicated by asking to buy used stuff. They think it'll break. They think someone's trying to fleece me. They don't trust the internet. If I found someone locally or a local used audio equipment dealer, I could buy used. But not from someone I don't know on the internet.

$500 for the s500es is a good price. Seems odd to spend more on the sub than the main speakers, but I don't know much about subs. If you were to put the money into floor-standing speakers with three cones covering the frequency range you might be likelier to get the right balance of low to high frequency - I hope someone more in the know will confirm or deny this.
You can probably do with less high-end cables for these speakers.

My personal take on it is to take it easy on the cabling and wires. You can always upgrade those later if you feel the need to. Also, I would seriously recommend one of the new digital amps, whether sharp, panasonic, or tripath based like the jvc rx-es1sl. It will save you money and they're supposed to sound quite good. I'm considering a tripath based amp myself but my shoestring budget is quite a bit thinner than yours This would save you enough money to afford the 10" subwoofer, maybe more, which would provide you a whole lot more satisfaction out of the box than fancy wire, IMHO at least.

The best thing about aperion audio is the shipping refund both ways, so it's very safe. Otherwise, your best bet is to audition the hifi stores and see what's available to you Worst comes to worst, audition, see what you like, then buy for the best price you can find online.

The sub is expensive because of the large cabinet, the relatively expensive woofer, and the amp. And S&H. With commercial speakers, you can pay a whole lot and not get too much, but that's how it goes. I think good new floorstanders will blow her budget pretty quickly. "Bookshelves" don't do deep bass unless it's some kind of monster sized bookshelf or, in my experience, you're driving it with a sunfire amp. Of course, the sunfire amps are twice her budget

(the s500es is digital)

Hehe, I figured it was...but it's also quite pricy

[size=x-small]Ok, I admit it, I hate Sony [/size]