[jac006]

Hi, I was just wondering how I might hook up these Polk Audio RTI A1 Bookshelf Speakers to my mac book pro. Do I need to buy a receiver in order to do connect them, or what. Sorry, I'm kind of new to the scene. Any help would greatly be appreciated. If I didn't post in the right place, could you please point me to where I might be able to find such information. Thanks in advance!

Also, what do you think of these speakers? Are they better than the Polk speakers? The site says I don't need an amp/receiver so that's a good thing, but what do you guys think?

 

[HippieTom]

I would go with the Audioengine A5's. you can connect them right to your mbook. the polk needs a amp and thats some more $$$

 

[jac006]

Ok, that sounds good, maybe I'll do that. One question though: if I wanted to get the Polk's, what kind of receiver do you recommend?

 

[wudai_e]

I don't know your budget but looks like these pair are 8ohm speakers and shouldn't be difficult to drive and my guess is that any readily available mass-market receivers will drive them well. Since their recommended power is from 20-120W. top of my head is Harmon Kardon, Denon, Onkyo, Pioneer, or even Sony.

If you are not planning to add additional speakers and can do without fancy readouts from most modern recievers, just a simple 2 channel intergrated amp will be better sounding in general, I recommend looking at brand such as NAD and Onkyo.

If you want to go deeper, get a pre-amp plus a power amp but I think this approach will be an overkill.

Polk audio has their own forums and I recommend you seek advise from there as well.