Proper surround sound

[Nick Laslett]

1 hour ago, Pocster said:

It does - auddsy or something . Apparently Dirac is much better ….

I would recommend Dirac. 

[Thorfun]

1 hour ago, Pocster said:

I know 😊 there’s an okyno amp for a bit more that includes Dirac it’s spec virtually matched denon 3800h . Seller suggested it as they don’t have the d3800h 

who the (expletive deleted) said my house or myself was normal ?

Many years ago when I was buying a home cinema setup I compared Denon with Onkyo as the specs were similar but I found the Onkyo quite treble-y and the Denon was much warmer. 
obviously it depends on the speakers you’re pairing it with which is why it’s important to go listen to different combos. Although that’s not perfect as it’ll sound different in different rooms too!

 

but eventually you’ll just get used to it anyway so it probably doesn’t matter. 

[Pocster]

6 minutes ago, Thorfun said:

Many years ago when I was buying a home cinema setup I compared Denon with Onkyo as the specs were similar but I found the Onkyo quite treble-y and the Denon was much warmer. 
obviously it depends on the speakers you’re pairing it with which is why it’s important to go listen to different combos. Although that’s not perfect as it’ll sound different in different rooms too!

 

but eventually you’ll just get used to it anyway so it probably doesn’t matter. 

Truth is probably denon , onkyo , 7.2 , 7.1 etc I won’t hear the (expletive deleted)ing difference . But I’m pretending I’m a expert before I part with 4K ( yeah , it’s gone up to accommodate my lack of knowledge )

[SteamyTea]

Is that Scottish-Japanese company still going.

 

Akai

 

 

[Pocster]

1 minute ago, SteamyTea said:

Is that Scottish-Japanese company still going.

 

Akai

 

 

Beko 

[Beau]

Following this with interest but quickly coming to the conclusion its very expensive and pretty complicated with so many speakers required. Will now probably stick with a good stereo and treat ourselves to a subwoofer. 

 

Good luck with your project Pocster

[Thorfun]

9 minutes ago, Beau said:

Following this with interest but quickly coming to the conclusion its very expensive and pretty complicated with so many speakers required. Will now probably stick with a good stereo and treat ourselves to a subwoofer. 

 

Good luck with your project Pocster

It doesn’t have to be. You can get all-in-one kits to give a pretty good surround experience. 
 

[Thorfun]

1 hour ago, Pocster said:

Truth is probably denon , onkyo , 7.2 , 7.1 etc I won’t hear the (expletive deleted)ing difference . But I’m pretending I’m a expert before I part with 4K ( yeah , it’s gone up to accommodate my lack of knowledge )

Just read through AVforum for a few days and you’ll be an arm chair expert and quoting impedance value of different speaker wires like a pro. 

[ProDave]

11 minutes ago, Beau said:

Following this with interest but quickly coming to the conclusion its very expensive and pretty complicated with so many speakers required. Will now probably stick with a good stereo and treat ourselves to a subwoofer. 

 

Good luck with your project Pocster

Buy something like this.    https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/134888823698?

 

I have 2 such systems in use, one Panasonic, One Sony.  Both old and almost worthless as you can see from the pricing, but in their day expensive good kit.  Still working well and sounding good. Though no doubt not as good as @Pocster £4K new system.

 

[Kelvin]

4 hours ago, Pocster said:

@Kelvin you use Dirac ?

 

should I bother ? £200 for the licence then another 130 quid for the mic !!

I don’t and you shouldn’t bother either. My amp supports Audyssey MultEQ XT32 and that’s good enough for me. Spend the money on a better Sub, a Blu-Ray player or centre speaker. 

Edited Tuesday at 19:37 by Kelvin

[Kelvin]

2 hours ago, Pocster said:

Truth is probably denon , onkyo , 7.2 , 7.1 etc I won’t hear the (expletive deleted)ing difference . But I’m pretending I’m a expert before I part with 4K ( yeah , it’s gone up to accommodate my lack of knowledge )

I’ve mentioned this on here before. During lockdown a local HiFi emporium decided that loaning out all his demo kit was a good way of his shop not getting robbed and a possible sales opportunity. I had two sets of £10,000 speakers from Fyne Audio and PMC and a full Rega PL10 with their dear cartridge and phono stage. My speakers are 30 year old Tannoy DC3000. I couldn’t hear much of a difference between my speakers and the other two. My son was home from uni due to lockdown so he used his 20 year old ears and reckoned the PMCs had the slight edge at the higher frequencies. Comparing the Rega to my upgraded Linn Sondek was more interesting as the Linn was much better to my ears this was despite the Rega being able to play every track on my test LP whereas the Linn struggled with two of them. 
 

TL;DR you won’t hear much difference and whatever differences you might hear will be forgotten about. Our long term memory for sound is quite poor. 
 

The biggest impact to the sound you hear will likely be your room and speaker placement. The Audyssey stuff tries to correct for this but you should aim to maximise both rather than relying on room correction alone. 

Edited Tuesday at 19:54 by Kelvin

[Pocster]

10 hours ago, Beau said:

Following this with interest but quickly coming to the conclusion its very expensive and pretty complicated with so many speakers required. Will now probably stick with a good stereo and treat ourselves to a subwoofer. 

 

Good luck with your project Pocster

A soundbar is a great easy step . My Samsung q900c does a very good job if budget and space are limited . I’ll be selling it if interested ….

[Beau]

1 hour ago, Pocster said:

A soundbar is a great easy step . My Samsung q900c does a very good job if budget and space are limited . I’ll be selling it if interested ….

The problem is I've have been spoilt with a decent hifi system. If I just chuck in some basic surround sound gear I think my inner hifi snob would rear it's ugly head 🤣

 

I'm so out of touch as last time I looked at surround gear it was 5.1 haha. Denon used to make a surround amp that just did 3 channel and used your regular system for the front which is the rout I would have taken. This doesn't seem to be a thing any more. 

[Simon R]

On 02/06/2025 at 17:05, Kelvin said:

The important speakers in a surround sound system is the centre, sub, front main in that order. Focus the money there.

 

Agree complete, using Bose cube or Cambridge Minx for the satellite speakers also means you can get them out of the way by wall mounting them. They're readily available second hand  and give excellent sound.

[Kelvin]

20 minutes ago, Beau said:

The problem is I've have been spoilt with a decent hifi system. If I just chuck in some basic surround sound gear I think my inner hifi snob would rear it's ugly head 🤣

 

I'm so out of touch as last time I looked at surround gear it was 5.1 haha. Denon used to make a surround amp that just did 3 channel and used your regular system for the front which is the rout I would have taken. This doesn't seem to be a thing any more. 

It’s much easier and cheaper to provide decent amplification to drive multiple channels in a single box nowadays. Most AV amps have pre-outs so you can provide your own amplification for some of the channels. I use my HiFi amp to drive the front mains for example. You can also get AV processors with no amplification and you use any amplifier you like (more or less) They tend to be at the dearer end of the market. The average house doesn’t need that imo but if you have a large room to fill then this might be the way to go.