garmachi.com

[Indy]

So, I caved this winter and finally did the dirty deed. Yes, that's right. I finally bought the speakers that I will most likely be buried with. I know that my words may fall upon deaf ears as many of you aren't "nutty for audio" like vanch and I. But if you happen to be, I am now the proud parent of a Pair of Paradigm Studio 60 v.4, and matching center and surround speakers.

Realizing that viewers of this thread will either really get what I am talking about or really not give a crap and quickly look away, I am going to go into full geek mode.

Chapter 1:
While I am a very happy owner of Carver CM-1090, I had to determine how to power 5 speakers with 2 channels...or not. Since I can't seem to locate anything 5 channels that was actually produced while Bob Carver actually worked for the company (or Sunfire), I elected to buy an amp that I had sat through a full listening test with back in the early 90's; an Acurus a125x5. Torroidal transformer/stable to at least 4 ohms @ 175 wpc/Class A/Five Channel/Discrete circuitry amplifier. Which originally sold for over $1200. I lucked out and bought a used one in very good condition for $350.

Chapter 2:
After watching blu-rays on Vanch's setup, I realized the potential of blu-ray technology combined with fine audio and immediately, upon hearing the difference, made the decision to blu-grade after I got speakers that would actually reveal the medium's potential. So, Vanch and I have both been drooling over Oppo's BDP-83 (http://www.oppodigital.com/blu-ray-bdp-83SE/blu-ray-BDP-83SE-Features.aspx) which pretty much does everything an audiophile could ask for at 1/2 to 1/8 the price of it's competition. Just the other day, I look on their website and they released a "juiced" version of the player which has revamped DACs and power supply. This thing is the cat's meow. I bought it this morning. I'm planning on bypassing the preamp section all together because this player has volume control albeit, lossy. It should still sound amazing until I can scrounge enough to buy a preamp. Vanch says (and I agree) that separates are the way to go.

Chapter 3:
Since I'm geeking out, I might as well make it a complete purge. Over the last few weeks, Jerome and I have been beta testing Star Trek Online. It's pretty cool. If you are a trekkie at all, checkkie it out (I couldn't resist). Both he and I like it enough to have pre-ordered it and are already enjoying the game in pre-launch.

Chiggidy check it.

Indy
_________________
Pioneer broke my heart.
Denon broke my wallet.
Oppo broke my thinking.
- EWL5 (Power Member on forum.blu-ray.com)

[Big-J]

[sledge]

[Indy]

If you enjoy most of what you know about Star trek, you'll enjoy the game. The creators of the game were very faithful to Roddenberry's spirit.
_________________
Pioneer broke my heart.
Denon broke my wallet.
Oppo broke my thinking.
- EWL5 (Power Member on forum.blu-ray.com)

[meit]

Are you anti-subwoofer? You obviously don't need one nearly as badly as I do. And what exactly did you get for the center and surround channels? From what I can see, the CC-690 and ADP-590 are the matching set.

I was also enrolled in the beta for STO, although I didn't preorder. I will probably get it eventually, but I have higher priorities right now. I never even made it to Lt. Commander, so I was stuck with the ship that Ricardo Montalban stole, despite it's lack of Rich Corinthian Leather. I also rolled a Gorn character for PvP, but he only made it to level 2.

[Vanch]

I *just* got back from Indy's palace of paradigm pleasure. It's nice. It's real nice!

"Class A" sounds amazing. Detail, clarity. Wonderful. I'm a little sad I dont have one!
_________________
rifles and bibles
doubters and disciples
i am the total incomplete
i am lurking underneath
i am the ultra-heavy beat
i am the antigeist

[Travisimon]

I have to admit that I am a little jealous. Since we are recording our album at this moment, I would like to have something other than an aiwa to mix it on. :-(
_________________
It's a volcanic planet. You'll be safe there.

[meit]

Aiwa still exists? I had one of their shelf systems about 10 years ago. It didn't hold a candle to the Kenwood receiver and Advent speakers I replaced it with, which in turn didn't hold a candle to the Onkyo receiver and Paradigm Cinema speakers I replaced that with, especially after the woofer cones on the Advents dry-rotted.

[Travisimon]

Oh yeah. Aiwa still exists when you spend your money on guitars, amps, foot pedals, kaos pads, guitar cords, and beer. It's like the more shit you acquire, the more shit you need. I'll gladly take anyone's outdated studio speakers.
_________________
It's a volcanic planet. You'll be safe there.

[Garmachi]

I have always wanted a kickass sound system. Vanch and I went to a high end audio shop in Savannah a few years ago (and I used to frequent one in college) and I really enjoyed it.

Yet still, to this very day, I watch movies using the speakers built into my TV, and for music, I listen to MP3s on my computer. It's "good enough".

If I wanted to get started, where should I begin? I have no amp, no loudspeakers, nuthin'. I don't want to spend a lot of money, and most importantly, I'm limited on space.

Suggestions?
_________________
My pants don't smell like sunshine anymore.

[sledge]

[Vanch]

You could start by letting us know what "a lot of money" means to you in relation to a stereo. A lot of money to me is those $15,000 magnepans we heard in savanna, hooked to separate macintosh amps that were probably $8k/piece. Now that's a lot of money.

If you're going cheap, getting 5 speakers is easy if you get a good brand like Paradigm or..well I can only think of one cause I don't know who else does a good HTIB besides them. Once you've got the speakers, you need something to power then, and a good receiver is gonna be about $500. You will then need to be sure the player you have will play all your DVDs and Blu-Rays in Dolby-HD, DTS-Master Audio, DTS, Dolby Digital 5.1, etc. You will need an HDMI capable source to do the first two, unless you're going straight analog like Indy. So you'll need a blu-ray player that will play those through HDMI.

So you're looking at $1000-1500 for a really nice budget system that will make your friends jealous that just paid $500 for a sound bar and $500 for a receiver at best buy.

If you only want to spend $300 on an audio system, well you're gonna have to ask someone else, because it's gonna sound better than your tv, but not going to give you wood in action movies.
_________________
rifles and bibles
doubters and disciples
i am the total incomplete
i am lurking underneath
i am the ultra-heavy beat
i am the antigeist

[Garmachi]

Looks like I have a long way to go.

My DVD player is at least seven years old and doesn't even have an HDMI output. I think I'd probably need to completely overhaul my system.

I'm not interested in making anyone jealous, but it would be cool to watch movies on something other than my TV's speakers.
_________________
My pants don't smell like sunshine anymore.

[meit]

Well, I got the Paradigm Cinema 90 compact theater 5.1 set, which cost me about $800, then bought an Onkyo TX-SR606 for $400 to drive them. The 606 is discontinued, but the 507 that came out last year does everything the 606 did except upscaling, and you can probably get it for less than $400. You just give up a little bit of amplifier power, but the receiver is overkill for those speaker anyway. Does that fit your definition of cheap?

[Garmachi]

That's at the upper end of my "cheap".

Unless we're talking about telescope equipment.
_________________
My pants don't smell like sunshine anymore.