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Speakers recommendations wanted

jannie

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Speakers recommendations wanted
« on: January 17, 2011, 04:23:52 pm »
Hi Problemobo...and welcome to the freindly forum. well here's your first task. I just bought Creative X-FI Titanium HD card and want a nice set of speakers, so whats your suggestion. And dont say Absic and Dark Mantis, although they are a good pair ;D
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Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #1 on: January 17, 2011, 05:20:17 pm »
Hello Jannie,

How's it going.

Now, before I recommend any speakers to plug in to your new creative audio card, please could you let me a little bit more about your requirements?

What do you need the speakers for? General listening to Audio/DVD's etc. Or do you need them for making music or even engineering music?

Now, how loud do you want to listen? Quietly, while you browse the Internet or use your PC for general tasks such as Office etc,
Or are you using your PC as a media player and like to listen to your music loud?

Or, do you want to simulate full on Cinema experience in your living room?

And lastly, how much do you want to spend.
This is fairly important, as you can spend from £10 for a very basic and fairly poor quality pair of multimedia speakers, and you can spend tens of thosands of pounds on the high end Studio Monitors made for Pro Audio Recording Studios who record, engineer pro audio recordings.

So, just to recap.
1> Purpose for speakers?
2> How loud do the speakers need to be?
3> Budget?

If you can let me know a little more, I would be happy to help.
Also, please confirm it is only stereo that you want and not surround.

Cheers



jannie

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Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #2 on: January 17, 2011, 06:05:14 pm »
Hi problemobo, Well I was a hi-fi nut in the 60s and still own a quad11 amp and electrosatic speakers ( valve ofcoarse ) so not so loud and more sweet treble would be nice. The problem i find with pc speakers is that you cant go to a shop and hear them like hi-fi speakers. I was looking on the net today and come across Bowers & Wilkins MM-1. yes they have been around for a while that company.
Cheers Dave
P.S. maybe we should move this post to another part of the forum
Absic And Dm Please advice
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Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #3 on: January 17, 2011, 07:20:43 pm »
Hey Dude,
Interesting pick there. A company that I have never heard of but an interesting and stylish product non the less.

The speakers that you are looking at look quiet good.

They are active, which you probably know means that they have amplifiers built in. This can often be the wisest choice for home users, as it is sometimes possible to mismatch amplifier with passive monitor/speaker, which will cause all sorts of problems.

Now, these speakers are aimed at the home computer / hi-fi market, and are designed accordingly.
They also include some cool features. Firstly, they give you the option to plug in a standard mini jack (which, with the right adaptor allows you to plug in almost everything, from iPod and portable CD players, to traditional high end audiophile stacks).
They also include a USB streaming lead that connects directly to your PC via one of the USB 2.0 ports.

This allows a direct connection via the computer. Whether this will improve the quality of the sound I am not sure, it is hard to tell, although this certainly allows the manufacturer to control the sound quality more by the quality of their manufacturing. (the components that they use).

Well, the sonic range of these speakers seem quite large. The brochure mentions that they have a range of between: 38Hz and 22kHz
This is certainly a large range for a set of multimedia table top speakers.
The maximum human hearing is between 20 hz and 20 mhz, however, this range is usually reduced considerably as people grew older as their hearing simply wears out or is damaged.
Most middle age people have a range of perhaps 30 hz to 16 mhz.

Also, something to keep in mind is that many of the low frequencies are less consciously audible but are more perceived than heard.
and these frequencies are only really relative at higher levels.

What most Hi Fi consumers do not know is that these figures are often quoted from a specific loudness and are not constant at all levels of loudness.
Still, for a small set of multimedia PC speakers, it would be impressive that they are able to have such a range at any level.

The speaker specification also says that they include 4x18W speakers. In that case, these speakers should be relatively loud.
The speakers also look very stylish and I would imagine would look pretty cool when sat next to a modern computer such as a Mac or PC.

Now, I am not sure how much these speakers cost, and with out hearing them in contrast to other speakers on the market in their price range, it would be hard to put my stamp of approval on whether you should buy them or not.

What I recommend, as most Audio experts will also recommend, is to go into a shop that sells these speakers, with a range of your favourite music, perhaps on iPod or CD, and ask to listen to each system independently in order to check out how your favourite music sounds.

Now, when testing out each system, listen to each of your chosen tracks at varying levels.
Quiet. Medium and Loud.

First see if there are any distortions which should not be there.
Then, listen to see how defined each aspect of a recording is (well, at least in some music, you should be able to hear defined instruments clearly).

Some also suggest to include in your repertoire of favourite music a favourite classical music track and a favourite acoustic music track.
These shall reflect how good the speakers are at representing the natural sounds.

I guess when it comes to the crunch is that do these speakers represent good value for money, and do they give you what you want for the money paid?

If the answer is no, there are still plenty of other products to choose from, and you don't need to limit yourself to multimedia speakers.
I would imagine that you have several outputs on your computer which you can, if you choose, plug into a good quality HI Fi amplifier connected to some decent speakers, or, if you wish, you could even plug into a midi hifi that has an auxillary input built in.

Its really your choice.
If you give me more of an idea of your purposes and your budget, then perhaps we can hone in more on other competing products.
Cheers





Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #4 on: January 17, 2011, 07:39:53 pm »
http://www.johnlewis.com/231072508/Product.aspx?s_kenid=1518ef7d-9bde-50c9-f26a-000067ab05ee&s_kwcid=paidsearch
£400 MM-1's

For this amount of money, you have quiet a lot of alternative products to choose from.
http://www.wharfedale.co.uk/

For a reasonably priced Hi Fi speaker, many of the Wharfedale range offer fairly good quality for a fairly cheap budget.
They start from £200 and up.
In fact, for £400 you might be able to get a half decent set of ACTIVE stereo speakers and a matching ACTIVE sub woofer.

They may not be labelled as multimedia, but their is no one stopping you from using them with your PC.

For example, I have a PC plugged into my 32 inch HD PC, with the PC, my freesat box and my Xbox 360 all plugged into a Hi Fi multi source amplifier, which is then plugged into a set of half decent Hi Fi speakers. (not surround yet).

By doing so, is a relatively cheap method of creating a great sounding PC / TV / Game Console, which knocks spots off the regular TV audio built into the HD TV.

:-)

And it hasn't broken the bank!!!
« Last Edit: January 17, 2011, 07:41:18 pm by problemobo »

Dark Mantis

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #5 on: January 17, 2011, 07:44:44 pm »
P.S. maybe we should move this post to another part of the forum
Absic And Dm Please advice

Hi Jannie
I have moved the topic to General Discussions as I thought that covered it better.
DM
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absic

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #6 on: January 17, 2011, 08:02:54 pm »

Hi Jannie
I have moved the topic to General Discussions as I thought that covered it better.
What a crawler!!!
Remember, when all else fails a cup of tea and a good swear will often help! It won't solve the problem but it will make you feel better.

Dark Mantis

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #7 on: January 17, 2011, 09:54:13 pm »
No! Just didn't want it clogging up the Intel section  ;D
Gigabyte X58A-UD7
i7 920
Dominators 1600 x6 12GB
6970 2GB
HX850
256GB SSD, Sam 1TB, WDB320GB
Blu-Ray
HAF 932

Gigabyte Z68X-UD5-B3
i7 3770K
Vengeance 1600 16GB
6950 2GB
HCP1200W
Revo Drive x2, 1.5TB WDB RAID0
16x DLRW
StrikeX S7
Full water cooling
3 x 27" Iiy

jannie

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #8 on: January 17, 2011, 10:24:27 pm »
See I told you they were a couple of good speakers ;D
No problem jerry
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jannie

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #9 on: January 17, 2011, 10:28:57 pm »
Ok Absic What Speakers are you runnung.
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Dark Mantis

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #10 on: January 17, 2011, 10:33:28 pm »
Well I must admit mine are the oldest part of my kit. They still work admirably though and that is why they are still there.  They are an old Logitech 5.1 surround sound sytem and even though they are now sprayed black to match everything else I can't see the point in changing them. However I did just buy some Logitech G930 wireless 7.1 surround sound headphones which are incredible.
Gigabyte X58A-UD7
i7 920
Dominators 1600 x6 12GB
6970 2GB
HX850
256GB SSD, Sam 1TB, WDB320GB
Blu-Ray
HAF 932

Gigabyte Z68X-UD5-B3
i7 3770K
Vengeance 1600 16GB
6950 2GB
HCP1200W
Revo Drive x2, 1.5TB WDB RAID0
16x DLRW
StrikeX S7
Full water cooling
3 x 27" Iiy

bytheway_r

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #11 on: January 17, 2011, 11:34:35 pm »
This is well beyond me as I'm more of a headphones person and stick to a much lower budget but I'd take a look at some audio forums and maybe ask there. 400£ is quite a lot of money and there must be some interesting options to choose from. Lastly, I wouldn't really look at speaker brand as it's quite common that some less known company can offer you a lot more for your money.

DM, that's some crazy looking equipment you got there ;D.

Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #12 on: January 18, 2011, 12:31:06 am »
As of late speaker systems made for PC's are crap. I have the first gen Klipsch 4.1's and love them. IMO they were the best of the best as far a speaker systems made for PC's. They are no longer made or I'd buy another set. I have been doing some digging lately and found KRK makes self powered studio monitors that get great reviews. Not cheap by any means but you get what you pay for. http://www.krksys.com/product_rokit.php

Bill
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absic

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #13 on: January 18, 2011, 09:04:27 am »
Ok Absic What Speakers are you runnung.

It all depends on what I am actually doing.
For general purpose stuff I run a pair of Sony 100 Watt Hi-Fi Speakers I bought about 5 years ago. Don't forget though, I am also using a Delta 1010 Soundcard and most of my audio passes through a mixing desk and 100 Watt Sony Studio Amp prior to being blasted out of the speakers.

If I am recording, mixing or mastering some audio tracks I use a pair of Fostex NX-6A Nearfield Active Monitors. These are connected directly to the Studio Outputs on the Mixing Desk and have an excellent tonal range. When mixing or recording I can switch between the Sony and Fostex Speakers for direct comparisons of the audio being produced

For 5.1 Audio I use a Sony Home Theatre System.This has it's own built-in amp and is connected via the SPDIF from the Delta 1010.

I have a variety of headphones and once again it depends on what I am doing to which ones I use. I haven't tried 5.1 Headphones, such as the ones DM has but they are something I might consider, especially as DM rates them so highly.

Taking into account the cost of the soundcard, speakers, mixing desk, amp, headphones, cables, etc., I guess it would cost me about £2000 - £2500 to replace just the audio part of my set-up but, as it has been said, you only get what you pay for.
Remember, when all else fails a cup of tea and a good swear will often help! It won't solve the problem but it will make you feel better.

jannie

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Re: Speakers recommendations wanted
« Reply #14 on: January 18, 2011, 12:32:55 pm »
Thanx all for your input and thanx problemobo for your expertize, I am going for a demo at the weekend with speakers, so I will see what my ears prefer.
Cheers Dave
2x Cooler Master HAF X full tower
Gigabyte GA-890XA-UD3 AMD 790X AM3 Motherboard
AMD CPU Phenom II 1090Tx6
Corsair Memory XMS3 Classic 8GB DDR3 PC3-10666 (1333)
Corsair HX 850 W  (PSU)
Noctua NH-U12P-SE2 CPU Cooler
1GB Gigabyte NVIDIA GTX 460 OC Graphic