Koss C220 200Watts versus (Yamaha) 600 watts

My ears tell me one thing and reviews of home theaters seem to tell me something else. I have an average size living room and my main speakers and subwoofers are about 9 feet from the couch and the back (surround) speakers about 3-4 feet from the center of couch on both sides.
I listen to mainly CD reissues of 60/70's rock music (in fact I, 10 years ago used to produce in my spare time some members of name 60's English rock bands - so I have great ears but my techncal knowledge on sound/speakers isn't great if that makes any sense). Here are a few questions I hope someone can give me their opinion on as I don't want to spend extra money on a new system if its not really necessary. To begin with, in terms of sound quality (not loudness per se) if I'm listening to music 10 feet away in a living room in an apartment, am I actually going to notice a difference in the sound quality of a (60/70's) rock CD played on my 200 watt system as opposed to a 600 watt system? I played a Free CD in a 600 watt Yamaha System (that I brought with me to Best Buy) and I noticed little to no difference in the sound quality from what I hear of the same CD on my 200 watt system. Is this my imagination, or is their really no difference if I'm playing something at a normal loud volume for myself rather than trying to blast something in a 400 foot room for a bunch of people? I also brought with me a DVD of Eric Burdon's Animals recorded last year or so and again, I noticed no significant difference in the picture or the sound. Yamaha seems to be highly rated and my Koss C220 which goes for $300 (I got it for $150 on EBAY) seems to be rated poorly, yet I did not notice any significant improvement on DVD's and Cd's played on the highly rated more expensive system. The only feature my Koss C-220 is missing is a DTS decoder (the DVD receiver has something for DTS but it can't play DTS unless I have a DTS decoder which doesn't make any sense to me. The bottom line is, should I upgrade to a more expensive home theater system when I don't notice any significant difference on my cheap system? Any advice is appreciated. Thanks

i have a friend with the same kind of home theatre in a box. his is a 200 watt, something could be koss.

it sounds "OK" at low volumes like watching tv and stuff its great. but then when you get into movies and turn the volume way up, thats when everything falls apart. i can barely stand listening to it, but thats just becuase i have a decent 650 watt in my room. and 780 high current watts in my basement.

but for him the system sounds awsome, and i can see where he is coming from becuase it is his first 5.1. your probably the same. you have yet to hear a good 5.1 set up, so yours sounds similar to all the others. and your question about the yamaha 600 watt system. it would be like yours but play louder. but if you dont listen to anything loud theres no point.


if you are going to buy something, try to stay away from the box sets. they all pretty much sound the same, in a bad way. buy seperate components, and then by a set of speakers or even buy them all seperate.

Well, if you're going to upgrade primarily to get a unit that sounds better then definitely give equal weight to your ears as to the specs. Maybe you should go for another audition, elswhere. Bestbuy probably isn't the best place, especially since their "rooms" aren't really rooms but open spaces that wouldn't even come close to the acoustics in your living room. Check out a local audio dealer that at least tries to replicate the room conditions you'll most likely be listening to your music in.

Happy hunting.