Home cinema/Surround sound

[SimonB]

Matt, the DD18 is about 3.5k. I said cheaper, not necessarily cheap. I don't own a sub, never have, just opinions I have read from people that 'know'.

Agreed re the speakers, wasn't trying to suggest that discreet speakers can't work, we will probably go for in-wall speakers in our new build, just that you sometimes, for example, see one rear speaker effectively rear firing and the other side firing etc. Often I think it would be better to do without them, especially where there is no opportunity to compensate/calibrate for such odd positions.

70k system, that must have sounded pretty good, never heard anything in that kind of league.

 

[matt]

REL start at about £399 and go up to somewhere in the region of £5k.

£70k was amazing. Whether it's worth that sort of money is debatable...

 

[cambournepete]

On the subject of discreet speakers. All four of my surround speakers (i.e. the side channels and two for the rear) are barely noticeable, flush mounted in the ceiling. I was sceptical at first but it's surprisingly good. Nowhere near the compromise I was expecting in favour of not having a room full of ugly speakers.

Which speakers do you have?
SWMBO is very keen on discrete front speakers... :roll:

 

[TrimTheKing]

On the subject of discreet speakers. All four of my surround speakers (i.e. the side channels and two for the rear) are barely noticeable, flush mounted in the ceiling. I was sceptical at first but it's surprisingly good. Nowhere near the compromise I was expecting in favour of not having a room full of ugly speakers.

Which speakers do you have?
SWMBO is very keen on discrete front speakers... :roll:

My rears in the cinema room are an earlier model of these they fit almost perfectly flush with the ceiling/wall and the sound is very good. They also have a grill to cover them, not just the bare speaker like this pic.

 

[SimonB]

On the subject of discreet speakers. All four of my surround speakers (i.e. the side channels and two for the rear) are barely noticeable, flush mounted in the ceiling. I was sceptical at first but it's surprisingly good. Nowhere near the compromise I was expecting in favour of not having a room full of ugly speakers.

Which speakers do you have?
SWMBO is very keen on discrete front speakers... :roll:

Anthony Gallo do some very nice small speakers and matching subs. I've never heard them but they appear well thought of. Another option would be Kef Eggs, but someone who's opinion I respect rates the Gallos over the Eggs.

One advantage of an in-wall speaker is that they can be larger yet still remain somewhat discreet. Several manufactures offer varying colour covers to match decor and I think some even can be painted.

 

[matt]

On the subject of discreet speakers. All four of my surround speakers (i.e. the side channels and two for the rear) are barely noticeable, flush mounted in the ceiling. I was sceptical at first but it's surprisingly good. Nowhere near the compromise I was expecting in favour of not having a room full of ugly speakers.

Which speakers do you have?
SWMBO is very keen on discrete front speakers... :roll:

Mine are specifically designed for ceiling fitting so probably would not work too well from the front. N'theless, these are they: http://www.kef.com/GB/Custom/Ceiling

 

[SimonB]

REL start at about £399 and go up to somewhere in the region of £5k.

I take back my cheaper comment then.

 

[matt]

Anthony Gallo do some very nice small speakers and matching subs.

Being curious I went in search. I'm sorry, I thought we were talking about AV equipment...

 

[SimonB]

Anthony Gallo do some very nice small speakers and matching subs.

Being curious I went in search. I'm sorry, I thought we were talking about AV equipment...

Umm.. errr... maybe he makes them in his spare time

 

[woody67]

Blimey - there's some cracking info on here lads. Here's me getting ready to plumb in my Binatone 2 watt speakers !! :shock: :wink:

Really though fellas thanks for all the time you've spent and all the useful gen you've given. I think I'll have a quick bash at the hi-fi speaker route as it's a modern telly
http://www.comet.co.uk/comet/dyn_imgs/p ... 532215.jpg

Thanks again

Mark

 

[SimonB]

Mark, don't know if you've already looked into this, but assuming it's the PS50B551T3WXX model then it has stereo Audio Out on the rear of the TV and so should be straightforward to connect up to your hi-fi.

Looks like a v nice TV - 1080p and 4 HDMI sockets - should be pretty future proof. Interesting that the one review on Comet says the same as you, that it really needs external speakers.

 

[woody67]

Simon - Cheers fella, to hook it up to a hi-fi, I assume I'll need some separate leads? We've got tons of those coloured multi ones (red,white,yellow)

Mark

 

[woody67]

UPDATE! - Apparantly one of our hi-fi's (and don't wet yourselves laughing Matt, Simon B et al ) is a DVD/CD player home theatre! :shock: It's an LG FFH-DV25 so I assume we're half way there?

Mark

 

[matt]

UPDATE! - Apparantly one of our hi-fi's (and don't wet yourselves laughing Matt, Simon B et al ) is a DVD/CD player home theatre! :shock: It's an LG FFH-DV25 so I assume we're half way there?

Mark

This ad was at the bottom of the page as I read the above post. I was just thinking that all you'd need is some extra speakers and then, unfortunately, noticed the tag line in the ad. The irony :lol: :

 

[woody67]

Matt - I've got extra speakers but for some reason only L & R front will work, but centre and rear speakers won't . The aux leads I am using from hi-fi to telly are red and white, do I need summat else to initiate the other speakers?? Am fed up now...there's no where to get extra speaker wire at this time of night. :wink:

Mark

 

[SimonB]

Mark, not too sure about the other equipment you have and how you have it all connected. If you were to run the two RCA connectors (red and white as you have) from the TV to a line level input on your hi-fi (eg CD, Aux etc) then you will only get two channel audio, ie front L & R, no matter what the source is (DVD, Sky, games console etc) and no matter how they are connected (SCART, HDMI etc).

A common way to connect equipment for surround sound is to connect the video out of the DVD player (eg HDMI, Component, SCART, etc) to the input on the TV and then run a digital connection (Coax, Optical) to the surround sound amplifier/receiver/processor.

The digital signal carries all the surround sound channels in one cable and the amplifier decodes this (eg Dolby Digitial, DTS etc) and routes the output to each speaker.

Since you don't have a surround sound amplifier I assume you are either connecting audio and video separately from the DVD player to the TV, or via HDMI.

I looked at the manual for the LG unit and whilst it has an Aux stereo input, since it appears to be an all-in-one there doesn't appear to be a way to connect a digital input, or multi-channel analogue input into the unit to let it do the surround decoding.

It would seem your only option to get Dolby Digital is to use the LG as the source DVD player and amplifier with all 5 speakers and subwoofer (if it comes with it) attached.

If you can't do that then it looks like you're back to just getting 2 channel stereo from your other hi-fi.

 

[cambournepete]

Mark, not too sure about the other equipment you have and how you have it all connected. If you were to run the two RCA connectors (red and white as you have) from the TV to a line level input on your hi-fi (eg CD, Aux etc) then you will only get two channel audio, ie front L & R, no matter what the source is (DVD, Sky, games console etc) and no matter how they are connected (SCART, HDMI etc).

Unless the TV outputs the Dolby pro-logic matrix signal, if I remember ho it works correctly...