Whats a good audio-stereo equipment forum??

[ccoltas]

Does anyone know of a good Audio-Stereo (and video too I guess) Equipment forum or Bulletin Board?

Not AVS. I know of that one. Its good, but I was looking for others.

[Pace]

This one perhaps?

Ask Greebe your audio questions, and Desktop Video your, er, video ones?

P.

[Liquid Snake]

AVS? Where is that? I've been looking for some also. I've been thinking about putting a home theater together.

[Greebe]

LS, it's right here.

[Greebe]

Bwahahahahaha

[Bohrn]

Besides all the good stuff these guys will tell ya, there is this. www.audioreview.com


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AsusP3B-F,P3 880 Slot1, 512megsPC133,G40032megSH, Diamond MX300,13.5gigs of HD's,52X CDrom,WinME, PD 6.21 ,Altec Lansing ATP3Subwoofer,
Envision 17",Terrayon Cable modem w/D-Link nic,1 grey cat,1 black cat & 1 calico

[ALBPM]

http://www.audioreview.com/message/c...um/dcboard.cgi

http://www.audioasylum.com/

http://www.audioreview.com/

http://www.remotecentral.com/

There's a few

Paul

[Liquid Snake]

ROFL Rags! Hehe, Bose!

I already found www.audioreview.com, but I'll check the other sites mentioned too.

[ccoltas]

I'll check those out. I'm not looking for someone to tell me to buy this or buy that. More like, what receivers have such and such a feature and that way I narrow my search down. Opinions and advice are fine too, you have to take them with a grain of salt. If someone does suggest something like a particular component or especially if they suggest a certain speaker, I may be inclined to LISTEN TO IT FOR MYSELF and consider it as one of my choices.

[This message has been edited by ccoltas (edited 01 April 2001).]

[Greebe]

Then I'll just sit here with my mouth closed and watch you wander around aimlessly like you have done so admirably in the past.


P.S. at least a third of the answers you recieved about your TV and VCR dilemma were from me... tho indirectly by MURCers whom respect my input on such matters.

[Liquid Snake]

OK then I've pretty much settled on the speakers I will be purchasing after listening to them in the store (Polk RT1000i fronts, f/x500i surrounds, CS400i center, PSW350 sub). I'm lost when it comes to the receiver though. No idea what to purchase! I've been looking at the H/K AVR 7000, but too many have reported reliability problems with it. No $ to get separate amps, pre-amps. Then there's the matter of DVD/CD players, and cables. I'm more confused than ccoltas

[KvHagedorn]

LS, sounds like you stopped trying when you left Circuit City. That's not the place to look. Look at a real audio store before you decide.. Polk is overpriced for the sound quality. The HK stuff was good the last time I checked, but they don't have the best surround processing. They also don't have as much current as you might think. Try Yamaha or Denon. As far as the RT1000s go, I would rather have the RT800s and a real subwoofer.. the subs in the RT1000s bottom out on extreme material. But first I would listen to some other speakers elsewhere. Listen to the B&Ws and (if your budget is not as large) the Paradigms. Velodyne makes a new subwoofer called the SPL-1200 which is about the best all around sub I've heard for anywhere near reasonable money (though it's a lot.. $1400) tight, clean, musical, powerful, and takes up half the space of anything else that sounds that good.

BTW, you can listen to my advice or not as you will, but I've been in the industry for 12 years and do custom high end audio systems now, and my advice is take no advice, but avail yourself of every listening experience you can have at every store you can go to, and in NYC, I know you can do better than CC.

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Kind Regards,

KvH

[This message has been edited by KvHagedorn (edited 02 April 2001).]

[Liquid Snake]

Circuit City sucks, what made you think I went there? I was at a local electronics store, but I'll check out the (many) audio shops around the city.

[aaroncgi]

That BOSE cracks me up, Rags! When I was working for The Good Guys, the salespeople joked that it stood for 'Better Offer Something Else'. Highly overpriced and highly overrated, though if you don't know any better, Bose can sound decent.

As for a receiver recommendation, there are plenty of good ones out there. On the top of my list would be Yamaha. They have the best DSP (not surprising given their extensive musical instrument background). Also, in our experience repairing many of the major brands, including Yamaha, Denon, Sony, Technics, Kenwood, and Pioneer, the Yamahas are the most reliable. The Denon's do seem to be getting better, however.

Another one to consider would be Onkyo.

Often the choice of a receiver really comes down to the ergonomics, as so many of the receivers in a similar price range have all the same basic features. I have a Sony STRDA30ES, and love the sound, but but I think the remote stinks. I'm using a universal/learning remote as a replacement to make the thing easier to use, but since the Sony remote is a two way remote, I still can't operate all the functions. Others may disagree, but I prefer a remote with direct access to certain functions, such as the input selection, and surround modes. I hate having to scroll through a menu (either on the remote itself or on a tv).

Other little quirks aren't so apparent, but can bug you. For instance, older Denons (and possibly they still do this) use relays on the speaker outputs, so when you switch from one input to the next, or between surround modes, there's an audible click and slight moment of silence as things are changed. Not so with the Yamahas and Sonys.

It's getting increasingly rare to find Dolby Digital only models among those receivers which internally decode 5.1 surround formats, even the low end models are going to both DD and DTS. In my experience, DTS sounds incredible, and though the amount of software is certainly far less than DD, it's not nearly so scarce as when DTS first came to home theater. Also, DTS DVDs are now the same price as the DD, and sometimes even on the very same disc (and also include the same extras - a complaint about the early DTS DVDs).


Aaron Gilbert



[This message has been edited by aaroncgi (edited 02 April 2001).]

[KvHagedorn]

Sorry, LS.. just that Polk and HK are about the best CC has to offer, and they are much better than the other things they have to compare them with (except the Onkyo receivers, which are not bad at all.. especially the Integra series, though they are mighty expensive, so they'd better be good.) Personally, I sell and own Yamaha. It's good stuff and very straightforward and well thought-out. The RX-V1 receiver (their top of the line) is really good. It has the power (and weight) of a serious power amplifier, plus an excellent preamp and processor section. It powers a pair of B&W CDM-9NTs effortlessly, and they are fairly demanding of amp power. (I would be sure to listen to these speakers, along with the matching CDMCNT center and CDMSNT surrounds. This system would not be cheap, but for the money spent you couldn't do better, IMHO)

Yamaha RX-V1 $2800
B&W CDM9NTs $2600
B&W CDMCNT $600
B&W CDMSNTs $1200
Velodyne SPL-1200 $1400
Total $8600

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Kind Regards,

KvH