Choosing a set up

bholicki

I was put in charge of putting together a surround sound for our churches youth room. It will be used for Bluray movies, sporting events, UFC fights, video games and so on... I am looking for the best bang for my buck. All the help I can get is appreciated. The room dimensions are 23' x 21'. Budget is $2000 could go higher if needed. I am looking for a 5.1 set up. Thank you!

jbooker82

You can put together a really nice system from Polk's ebay store. The enitre setup will be referbished. I would take a refurbed RTI A hometheater setup over a bran new monitor II setup from new egg. The RTI A's are designed as a Home Theater speaker line and sound incredable. They are a little bright if your purchaseing them for %100 music.

http://stores.ebay.com/Polk-Audio-Direct/Home-Audio-/_i.html?rt=nc&_fsub=153926419&_sid=686154689&_trksid=p4634.c0.m14.l1513&_pgn=3

Right now polk's ebay store has the setup in both cherry and black finishes so it is a good time to buy.

Towers:
RTI A5's = $480 a pair

Rear surrounds:
FXI A4's = $285 a pair

Center Channel:
CSI A4 = $175 or the Larger CSI A6 = $278

Subwoofer:
DSW Pro 550WI (10 in) = $350 or DSW Pro 660WI (12 in) = $400


So if you go the small route (CSI A4 and DSW Pro 550WI) your looking at $1290 with $710 bucks left over for the AVR. If you went with the CSI A6 and DSW Pro 660Wi your looking at $1443 with $557 left over for the AVR.

The CSI A6 is a large center and make sure you measure to make sure it is going to fit where your going to put it.

jbooker82

Accessories for less is a good place to get AVR's for a big discount. They are also refurbs but you can add a 3 year warrenty for 44 bucks. They mostly sell Onkyo though.

http://www.accessories4less.com/make-a-store/category/AVReceiver/Home-Audio/Home-Theater-Receivers/1.html

TX-NR709 is a pretty desent avr. It has a bunch of online music services lilke slacker, and pandora. Pre Outs if you ever decide to add an external amplifier, 3d pass through, and 4k upscaling.

The older ones that end with 8 dont have the 4k upscaling. I have a Onkyo TX-NR808 and am happy with it. It is the same price as the TX-NR709. The 709 has 4k upscaling but only rated at 110w where the older 808 doesnt have 4k upscaling and is rated at 135watts.

There are other differences too. Here is Onkyo's web page.
http://www.onkyousa.com/prod_class.cfm?class=Receiver

txcoastal1

reported mangos756

jbooker82

3rd option would be

RTI A7's = $700
CSI A4 = $175
FXI A4 = $285
DSW Pro 660WI = $400

Gran total $1560 leaves you $440 left over with in your budget. Wich with an Onkyo TX-NR709 or TX-NR808 puts 89 bucks over your budget but would be an awesome setup.

Lietuvis91

It doesn't sound like you guys need anything real high quality, just something that sounds good for a reasonable amount of money. Plus, something tells me that "youth room" will mean lots of kids messing around, which means you probably don't want to be too heart broken if something "accidentally" breaks. I would go with something more basic, like infinity primus 363 & 162. I think they make good kids playroom type speakers, that won't break the bank and still sound very nice and best of all are easy to drive, so you don't need a high end receiver. Any of the onkyo's listed above would do just fine.

You should also think about whether you want towers. I think that maybe going with bookshelves might be a better plan since you can hang them where no one can reach them. I can see a tower speaker getting tiped over and getting broken. And I'm not suggesting you have a bunch of rascals in this group, I just know how playful the younger crowd can be sometimes.

Anyway, just food for thought....

decal

Lietuvis91 wrote: »

It doesn't sound like you guys need anything real high quality, just something that sounds good for a reasonable amount of money. Plus, something tells me that "youth room" will mean lots of kids messing around, which means you probably don't want to be too heart broken if something "accidentally" breaks.

Agreed. I suggest a HTIB from one of the major manufacturers.

halo71

Wow, UFC at church? :eek: Now we've have KFC at church before but never UFC.

rebuy

Check out the Polk Blackstone series. They are small, good sound without using up all the church money and can be used in a room without using up a lot of space. That is a much better option than a run of the mill HTIB. You gotta remember that a lot of people might be using this equipment so you want to use the KISS method with a lot of prying hands. Something that can be run by pushing a few buttons and has quality at the same time.

Lietuvis91

I was also thinking Blacksotes would be a good quality, simple, easy to setup option.

jbooker82

I guess I skipped over the whole church thing. RTI A's would probably be to nice of a setup for some kids to appreciate.

decal

halo71 wrote: »

Wow, UFC at church? :eek:

I was thinking the same thing !!!! What are you teaching your youth, an eye for an eye !!!!:eek::eek: