Surround Sound/Home Cinema System

Steve1982

Hi,

I recently bought myself a nice sized sony bravia HD tv to compliment my Sky HD and Xbox 360 and I am looking to build on this by getting some form of surround sound system. My budget is tight looking to spend about £100-150 and am wondering what I could get for this range and what would be best for my need but never having any kind of system like this before Im a little confused as to what I need to get.

Any help would be appreciated.

fwor

I'm not sure your budget is quite enough for a 5.1 surround decoder/amp and speakers.

You might get one of the cheapest of the Logitech all-in systems - though the cheapest I could find - the Z-5500 is still out of your range (though I didn't look tooo hard). On Ebay you'll also probably find a cheap Chinese-made package which may be cheap enough but will sound horrid.

If you want good sound at not massive amounts of money, I'd look at one of the receiver/amp/speaker packages from Richer Sounds - but that won't quite fit your budget.

Spank

It should be, I got a 5.1 system from ASDA a few years ago for a lot less that £100 & it's not bad

This Philpis is only £125

Richie-from-the-Boro

£100 ?

- don't buy
- do without - save up
- when you do buy make sure HDMi / Toslink / SPdif compatible
- or you will wish you had not bothered
- leading to [ silk purse~sow's ear ] type regrets !

My advice is do without a little longer or buy an interim carp special LIDL / ALDI 2.+ Base computer sound system for £30 and dump it later !

almillar

Goto Richer sounds and buy a surround amp. You'll want one with more than 1 HDMI input, which might already blow your budget (this is for plugging your Sky and XBox into the amp, then the amp into the TV, amp does the switching, maybe not necessary).
After that, you want 4 speakers to start with - 2 front and 2 rear. ANY speaker will do! if you've got an old hifi, use those speakers at the front, and if you've got an old midi system or whatever, put those speakers at the back for effects. This gets you started and you can add as you can afford. Way better than the all in one boxes, and for a decent one, you'll be over £150 anyway.

Steve1982

Thanks for the variuos advice,
almiller, do you think I could use the speakers from my Logitech X-530 5.1 Speakers http://www.ebuyer.com/product/116853 with something like this? http://www.richersounds.com/product/av-receivers/yamaha/rxv365/yama-rxv365-blk

Would that give me what I am looking for, i.e. could connect my AV receiver to either my TV or Sky HD box using an optical lead?

Steve1982

does what I put before make sense?

Steve1982

What do people think of this? http://www.richersounds.com/product/av-receivers/onkyo/txsr307/onky-txsr307-blk would I be able to use this in conjunction with my X530 to achieve surround sound?

almillar

What you need is normal speaker wire, with a + and -. I don't know your logitech set, but if they've got plugs at the end you'd need to cut them off.
That looks really cheap for an Onkyo, and it's got 3 HDMI inputs, check if your local store has stock. The Yamaha is cheaper and has 1 HDMI input less. Slightly more powerful though. Don't buy expensive leads off Richer Sounds though. Either of these amps are great, you may end up buying whatever one they have in stock.
Buy an HDMI lead for around £2 off eBay or similar, and speaker cable from B&Q or Maplin or a decent hardware store. Thin, not great quality stuff will be fine if you're putting cack speakers at the back. If you need to buy speakers for the front, I prefer floorstanders, but bookshelfs (which can go anywhere, including bookshelves!) are easier to place, and cheaper. Speakers are for music rather than movies though, so you won't get that organ-shaking rumble until you get a sub, but you can save £100 for that for another day.
http://www.richersounds.com/products/hi-fi-separates/speakers/bookshelf-speakers

danthemoneysavingman

I agree with Richie - save up and buy something decent!

googler

Why not buy either ;

A surround amp, with a SINGLE pair of speakers, use it in pure stereo mode for the time being, and add rear, centre speakers and subwoofer as you can afford them

OR

A regular stereo amp with single pair of speakers. You may find this perfectly acceptable, and find you don't need surround after all.....