Quote Originally Posted by zinneken
Thanks topspeed, at least the bitter truth comes out. I understand through this thread that I'll have to lower my "live performance on a home set-up" expectations. Not happy about this reality, but at least you guys tell me this while a shop salesguy wouldn't have the thought of telling this truth ... Livesaving! Thanks!



Thanks Blackraven, I think this should be a sticky "read this first" sort of thing on this forum (well, at least for newbie's like me).

So, the original idea was a budget of 1500 for Amp, CDP, speakers of which I originally thought 5-600 for the speakers. This great thread and all the help for you guys scrapped this original thought. I would have been soooooooo wrong!

Now, my sister has some stuff around her place and reading through this post... Am I right in scrapping the budget for a CDP by using her old DVD player (an LG DVD 5083) as CDP and taking the budget I would have spent on a CDP on getting better speakers? I surely love the idea, but does it make sense?
Taking that idea further, should I use her Sony STR DE485E (a DVD surround sound thing she used to put on her TV, she now has a new one, I don't get people spending money on TV when you can get live sound, but that's just me having a go since she doesn't get why I put down all that money to go to classical and Jazz concerts) as an amp substitute and take the amp budget also for getting better speakers?

If that makes sense, I end up with a budget of 1500 for speakers alone. I would so love that, but does it make any sense or is the quality on these items just too low/screwing the quality the speakers otherwise give?
It's what I would do in your position.... much later on down the road, you could always upgrade the Sony and/or the LG..... $1,500 for a pair of speakers is actually a really good budget....

I'd sugest listening to as many speakers in the $1K to $1.5K range as possible to determine the kind of sound you like....

Some of the Major players to consider are:

Revel Concerta Series
B&W 600 series
Monitor Audio Silver Series
PSB Image Series
Focal Chorus 700 Series