Surrounds shouldn't actually sound discrete, it shouldn't stand out more than your LCR unless the mix calls for it. But in most situations, the surrounds are there to provide an extension of the soundstage made by the mains, but NOT actually creating a soundstage of its own.

Don't fall into the same mistake where many new 5, 7 or however many channels owners do: raise the surround levels higher than the mains just because they thought they spent money on them and they should hear them as discrete sources. Then they come back and complain the whole soundstage sounds uncohesive and the whole fronts sound smeared or muffled.

This applies for games too btw, even competitive FPS ones. It doesn't mean hearing someone behind you louder is better, you then just lose details of those at the side or infront of you.

How far your surrounds are depends entirely on the type of speaker and your room conditions. Typically it should be near equidistant to your front LR, but that's just a very general rule. Plenty of surround setup articles around the net that further explain how to place your speakers, check them out.

You don't need that faux audio demo by Creative because that will give you a wrong perception of the appropriate SPL and delay (distance). There is a pink noise test tone in the v679, use that instead.

The whole reason for YPAO is to take positioning of the speakers, room acoustics and seating position into account. Otherwise there's zero reason for YPAO to exist nor any other auto-PEQ calibrator to continue business.

Yes one point measurement will be inaccurate if your listening area is awkward or your room acoustics is poor.

About toe in, it also depends on the drivers. Some drivers like for example KEF's uni-q has a very wide dispersion area so it's generally best not to toe in more than 10 degrees. But there are drivers like bass reflex ones which benefits a lot from toe in even if there are no nearby side walls.

Directly to the sides? It usually does sound bad because this position is usually too distinctive (this is also why you have a hole on the back). Poor tweeter design will also make everything sound very artificial and harsh. Direct side positions should only be used for dipole/bipole speakers and even then they need to be about 3ft at least higher than the MLP.

The idea surround location for monopole (which are satellites or bookshelves) is about 2ft. behind (or more, depending on the size of the room of course), 20-30 degrees angled. Alternatively, you can just place the surround speakers directly at the back.

For reference, this is my secondary bedroom setup:




So you see, even with a bed right next to my couch, I managed to have a cohesive soundstage just with some logical adjustments despite the setup not being "correct" or "optimized".
My LR speakers on this may look more toed-in than it seems, but it's just the angle of the picture btw.

Yup, SVS Sats + SB1000. Pretty much perfect match for my 2nd bedroom.

Used to be a A2040 with KEF Q series setup (4xQ100 + Q200 + SVS PB1000). Now dismantled already as I'm in the process of planning to build a proper room for HT usage. Maybe much later in the year before I can complete the plans and what not.

Also looking to add another pair of prime sats as height/overhead speakers into my current 2nd room setup to do 5.2.2. But first need to try and mate both the SB and PB1000. Finding space for the latter is difficult lol.

Not scary la, dismantled liao. Heck it was a modest KEF Q series setup only.

No, you cannot use RCA pins into a 5 way binding posts. You need banana plugs, spade lugs or just bare wire screw in.

You can get speaker wire in many places, they're really just copper strands inside. The important thing is that you make sure it is oxygen free and the length you are going for is appropriate for the cable's gauge.

I still have a remaining roll of oxygen british cables (about 18 meters left) if you want, can sell to you cheap cheap.

Ktek bro is right. I bought an A850 for the bedroom. Selling off the A2040 to get this year's A3060 (or something else, will see how first). May seem weird why didn't I just use the 2040 for the room instead, but I got the A850 for a very good price and selling off the 2040 gave me some extra funds to get some other stuff for the time being since I'm not exactly sure when I'll be completing the HT room.

Yeah I mean, I love KEF and their uni-q drivers but... I don't know, they have this very nice wide and enticing soundstage. But the mids always sounded a little constrained to me, it doesn't have enough energy when transitioning into the high frequency ranges, as a result it can sometimes be a little 'boxy'.

My target is the Ultra bookshelves + ultra center + prime sats as surrounds + dual PB2000 or PC2000. Still need more evaluation on the subs part. PC vs PB, dang.

@ktek
Sold both pairs liao. Only left the Q200c now, pending the buyer.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Mar 23 2016, 06:44 PM

Well, 3060 is just my expectation. Past few years, Yamaha announce their receiver line up around June. So just expecting their flagship will be called 3060 this year. Kinda stupid of them if they decide to change name again.

SVS is great. Only gripe I have about the satellites is that they are not energetic enough at the top end, not enough bite. Obviously they don't go very low either, but that's what the sub is for and boy the puny looking Sb1000 beats louder than its size suggests.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Mar 23 2016, 10:26 PM

30" Sanus NF stands. Its real height is actually 28" though.

Total cost of the setup is around 7.9k.

99% certain Yamaha will announce all their 2016 models in June or the latest July.

Not sure what I want to do yet, maybe spring for the ultra bookshelves + ultra center or prime tower + ultra center. The sats are perfect for surrounds because of their imaging, I kidd you not its imaging is as good if not even better than the Prime Tower.


Lazada.

That's what I thought. I've heard both the Prime Towers and Ultra Bookshelf.

Prime Towers + Prime Center + Prime Sats setup is at Actcessory SS14.
Ultra Bookshelf + Ultra Center + Prime Sats at a friend's place.

Granted, the listening conditions were different (size of room also different), different subs setup. But tonality wise, I prefer the Ultra Bookshelf. It was more resolving, has more energetic and sparkle in the trebles, there was also that mid-bass that I crave: punchy and impactful, with tactile response.

The Prime Tower couldn't achieve the same response, it does have more low end impact but everything else... it's just one step behind the UB.
Of course, I couldn't compare pure dynamics nor could I do a 1-to-1 comparison in the detail retrieval. That's the only reason why I'm pondering between either of them.

Ringgit getting better now, so hopefully prices start to come down to more sane levels, will hope for some decent deals in KLIAV 16'.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Mar 24 2016, 04:34 PM

http://www.lazada.com.my/sanus-nf30-natura...ch-2084745.html

RM305 now.
When I bought it, it was RM298 or something. Obviously I used the Lazada discounts so at the end it's only like RM550+ or something for 2 pairs.

Yes the height is perfect for my sitting position, tweeters are just half an inch higher than my ears which is just nice. It technically could be perfectly in line to my ear height, but I added those "earthquake prevention" pads from Daiso under the speakers which added half an inch of height. No biggie.

Amazing pads though, they're sticky with no residue so I don't have to use blu-tack to prevent my speakers from failling over if someone bumps into them and yet they really did stop the slight resonance between the top plate and the speakers.

This are the ones - http://www.cooltoyzph.com/viewitem.php?iid=12
Though I'm only using the blue ones.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Mar 25 2016, 12:57 AM

Yes the daiso pads are good. You can even stack 3 or 4 them to make heights and they remain stable (as long as you don't stack like 10 or something ridiculous, it'll be fine).

I bought as many as I could because they can work in many different kind of situations.

Hope you can get your setup right.
My LR speakers are about 6.8ft apart, toe'd in approx 15 degrees. Center channel is exactly in the middle, between the front and rear speakers. It's also exactly on the same horizontal plane as the front LR, despite not being on the same vertical height. This gives me that seamless transistion of sound from front to back, especially more so since I'm using 5 exact same drivers and tweeters.

The surround LR are 4.25ft apart, it's important to make them face exactly forward if you place the surround speakers directly behind you so that it creates this passing-of-the-baton fluidity from the fronts to the rears. This makes it that even with 7.1 sources downmixed into a 5.1 setup, I could hear the back LR effects without losing much.
I see a lot of people who place the rear speakers behind them due to not having space to the sides tend to toe them in to the MLP, this will create 2 gaps (or holes) at the sides. Don't make that mistake.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Mar 26 2016, 02:51 PM

Pioneer Elite speakers....

They're very decent, but I don't agree with the whole bouncing audio bullshit for atmos. Only people who wants to be hip and waste money buy them, I'll leave it at that.

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Apr 2 2016, 08:24 PM

Might as well wait for v481.
At least this year's all Yamaha models fully support 4k60p @ 4:4:4 (v479 only 4:2:0) and more importantly HDR.

v481 is coming out in April (yeah this month).

This post has been edited by SSJBen: Apr 3 2016, 12:54 AM

No, other than what I already mentioned. Components wise, pretty much all the same including the power supply and transformer.

It's a decent receiver when it works. But when it doesn't, it's the best paperweight in the world.

Pick your poison.


Never heard of those sats.
But generally, if you just want surround effects; yes they work and the cost effective way is to buy cheap satellites.

Surround effects are not as as critical as the LCR and sub indeed, but to me personally I do like decent quality speakers for the surrounds. Why? Because I place soundstage and dynamics as two of the most important criteria in audio, be it in HT, stereo or even headphones.

The point I'm making is, yes many cheap speakers will work just to give you the surround effects. But there's a stark difference if you want those effects to sound huge, dynamic and engaging, all the while with the soundstage sounding even bigger than you'd imagine them to be. Puny drivers cannot give you that kind of dynamics handling, at least not without having a compressed soundstage or sacrificing something else along the chain. Where by then you'd have gaps within the whole listening area as well.

... Except, they do.

Yamaha, like many other companies put their money in their high end products. They care very little about their entry level stuff.

I may be wrong, but just skimming through some opinions on those speakers pretty much confirms my suspicion that they're very subpar products.

If you want cheap, get miccas or something.

The Onkyo.

Just pray every night before you go to bed that it'll work the next day.