Lamp cord is the same internally as speaker wire of the same gauge and is often cheaper. There are other colors available, too. Lamp cord DOES have its sides marked for polarity when used as speaker wire- one side is ribbed, one side is smooth.
You can get it at big-box and hardware stores. Of course, prices will vary.
That’s all useful info. Thanks folks.
As i said, i’ll set up the two speakers first and see how it goes. I think we’ll use the system far more for movies and TV than for music, so it may be that a center channel will be the next purchase. There’s a Polk center that will go with the other speakers that is often available for $100 on sale.
That’s one of the great things, too, about buying receiver and speakers separately, rather than getting a Home Theater in a Box: you can add components as your needs change, or as your finances allow.
I built my current system over about 15 years. My front speakers are old JBL stereo speakers that my mom got me as a high school graduation gift. 5.1 didn’t even exist back then.
Thank you, Thank You, THANK YOU!
I was going to chip in just to say: For Fog’s Sake don’t fall for the Best Buy/Frys/Radio Hack pitch that says your sound will be better with gold connectors. You won’t hear a difference – unless you’re using gold wiring between the two connectors at the ends. [And if you’re doing that, our advice is unnecessary because you can afford to pay a pro to come and set up your million-dollar system perfectly.]
My audiophile friend noted that gold does resist corrosion better than the nickel-plated tin/aluminum on boring old-style RCA’s and other connectors but even the old style stuff won’t develop a corrosion layer thick enough to interfere with your signal for at least a decade. And when that decade is up and you start to think your connectors are corroded, a simple wire toothbrush* can solve that issue in seconds.
–G!
*Yet another fine reason for me to stock up on brass gun-cleaning brushes 
even gold wiring won’t make an audible difference. it would even be worse since gold’s electrical conductivity is lower than copper. and besides that, it’s pointless to worry about the resistance of the cables so long as they are of sufficient gauge. Audiophools like to wax poetic about expensive cables providing more “detail” or “definition,” but those are meaningless words used to make the speaker sound like he/she knows what the hell he/she is talking about. The only things to worry about with speaker wire are its resistance (which can be fixed with plain copper wire by making sure the gauge is right) and its capacitance, which practically never is a concern with speaker wire.
we’re dealing with baseband audio. this shit might as well be DC as far as the wires carrying it are concerned. If you ask me, the charlatans hawking $5,000 speaker cables should be dragged out into the street and beaten with reeds.
corrosion resistance is the only reason gold contacts are used. Period.
You have neighbors. No point to a sub if they’re going to be banging on the wall whenever you crank it enough to enjoy it. Those Polks won’t take you down all the way so that you are feeling it instead of hearing it but you probably won’t miss the few Hertz between 38Hz and subaural. (thinking) Maybe using some sort of chair-mount transducer like a Buttkicker could help. They’re fun.
A center channel you’ll use a lot and as most dialog is biased to the center you will understand it better.
If your objective is to watch movies and set up a 2 channel system then you have a mismatch right out of the box. Two channel is essentially stereo broadcasts that would serve source material limited to CD, albums and most internet music downloads.
All I’m saying is that you need to align your goals and objectives. If you want to watch movies and other similar sources to start then you need to start with a 5.1 system. The other thing you need to determine is the useful life and service of the components you choose for playback (here I am including receiver and dvd player). The video and audio capabilities of the DVD player will set the experience for what you can achive now and later for reasonable playback.
Your suggested approach will result in having to replace the receiver and dvd player once you expand beyond a 2 channel system. All you will salvage (hopefully) is your left and right front stereo speakers.
Personally, I think your priorities are doomed to failure.
On a different note, as far as the audio playback of movies are concerned a center channel speaker is far more important and useful than a subwoofer. Almost all dialog in a movie is directed to the center channel speaker whereas the subwoofer, on a properly equipped receiver, only receives the output below approximately 100 Hz, or thereabouts (yes this varies widely so please so no nitpicking regarding the crossover frequency definitions).
A 3.0 or 3.1 system is perfectly adequate for movies. The surround channels are nice, but not necessary. The subwoofer is nice, but also unnecessary.
None of this makes any sense. The OP has already stated that they are buying a 5.1 receiver. Any Blu-ray player will have HDMI output. All that’s needed to update up through 5.1 is the addition of additional speakers and a subwoofer.
I definitely suggest getting both the center channel speaker (first) and the subwoofer.
Having the center channel audio come out of an actual speaker in the center of the soundstage rather than being fed out to the sides is a big step up. Bang for the buck, it blows away any benefit of bi-amping or imagined benefit of high end speaker wires. With only 2 speakers up front, if you are not right in the sweet middle spot, center channel info will tend to sound like it’s coming from the side you are sitting on, rather than from the middle.
The sub is important for a couple of reasons, although being in an apartment you may not be able to enjoy it or the full potential of your main speakers either for that matter. So take the following as assuming you can get away with decent volume from time to time, otherwise it’s not as relevant.
The speakers you linked to don’t really go very low - they are rated to 38Hz but are 3db down at 48Hz. So a decent sub will reproduce bass you would never hear out of those speakers anyway, both for music and movies, and even at lower volumes. Plus it relieves your mains from trying to reproduce that bass so they should sound cleaner. Let a sub handle the bottom couple of octaves (up to 80-100Hz or so) and let your mains do what they do best - everything above that.
Another reason the sub is important is because it relieves your left/right main channel amplifiers in the receiver from wasting power on frequencies your speakers can’t reproduce well anyways. At 50 watts/channel, the receiver is modestly powered. Not low powered like some high end 10 watt tube amp, but it’s not a 200-300 watt/channel beast either. So use those 50 watts to cleanly drive the relatively less power hungry frequencies of upper bass and higher. That will also help your main speakers sound better, at least at louder volumes where your receiver would be driven into clipping distortion by trying to put out more power than it can.
I checked and your receiver does have a pre-amp level line out for the sub and this is definitely the connection you will want to use to get the benefits I mentioned in the last paragraph. Do not use a speaker level hookup for the sub or you will not get the benefit of offloading the bass power from the receiver to the sub amp. If at all possible, try to get something one rung up from entry level, even if you have to put it off for a bit. And don’t feel like you’re tied to Polk for the sub. I would definitely stick with Polk for the center to better match your main speakers - but it’s not necessary to match the sub brand-wise. There are some really good subs out there for a few hundred bucks that are worth the step up from say a $100 one.
Finally, give some thought to eventually getting some surround speakers when you are able. They can be small and relatively cheap since they won’t have to handle much power. Also, your receiver already has those amps in them and the surround processing just waiting to be used. I know you think you aren’t in a good room for “rear” speakers, but you can do it if you want to. It is also, IMHO, a big step up from just front speakers. I have used surround speakers in a room similar to yours with the couch essentially against the back wall. There are options for where you could place them and it’s worth the effort.
To me, adding the rears is as big an improvement as adding the mains up front to replace the television speakers. That is the point at which you will truly enter the realm of a home theater. Even if it takes a while to get there, as money and motivation allow, it’s a goal worth pursuing.
This is not true.
The receiver he is getting has both the surround sound processing (5.1) and the amplifiers to drive surround speakers.
Also, even the cheapest disc players (DVD or Blu-Ray) should be able to pass a surround sound signal to the receiver.
ETA - Sorry, friedo - didn’t see you had already addressed this.
I’ve owned at least 6 Carver amps and loved everyone of them.
At the height of it, I had a TFM-35 for the mains, a TFM-25 in bridged mono driving 4 subs, a TFM-15 bridged mono for the center, and another TFM-15 for 2 pair of rear speakers. Like the pic here but with a slightly bigger one on the bottom and 2 smaller ones on top of those. : )
I think I probably liked looking at all those analog power meters almost as much as listening to them. Sadly I’ve worn out all of them except the 25, which is now used for the mains. The 35 is probably worth trying to get fixed, but not the 15’s even as much as I liked them.
Others have already discussed the banana plugs versus just bare wires, etc. so no point in rehashing that.
After reading the specs on the receiver and speakers the only item I would note is that the Polk’s have a minimum power input of 30 watts at 8 ohms and a maximum power input of 300 watts at 8 ohms. The Marantz can only deliver 50 watts max per channel (into 5 channels at 8 ohms); therefore, depending on the configuration and setup of your room (dimensions, carpeting, drapes, etc) you may find the Marantz a little under powered to drive the Polks. However, the Polk 65T’s can be bi-amped (and bi-wired but that is useless AFAIAC) but you will require four output channels on the Marantz to accomplish this leaving only one more output for a center channel. This 3.1 setup with bi-amping (with a separately powered sub which the Marantz will support) may be all you need for your setup and it may be what you need to fully appreciate the sound from the Polks.
The Marantz does not support either 4K or 3D video though, again, you may not consider this an issue. The Marantz is a 2012 model and I would just check and make sure it is compatible with whatever cable box (or DirecTV or Dish, etc.) you are using. There is also no Bluetooth input so you will need to rely on your TV and/or DVD player.
I also note that the Marantz is lacking in terms of analog audio inputs. One other specific problem that you could encounter is trying to hook up a turntable to the Marantz. The Marantz does not have its own pre-amp for a phono input (in fact there are no phono-in inputs) so you would need a separate pre-amp for a turntable. Again, this may not be an issue.
Hope this helps!
I am appalled by the lack of a phono input on that receiver. Appalled! Well, not that appalled.
Any HD cable box should have an HDMI output so that shouldn’t be a problem.
Is it even worth investing in a system to be used in an apartment?
Any system I’ve built or heard usually needs considerable volume to be worthwhile. None of which would seem appropriate for an apartment building.
I had an awesome system when I was renting a house but when I moved to an apartment for a brief while everything got packed away. There’s no way the neighbors or landlord would have tolerated it so I didn’t bother.
This is manifestly untrue.
Unless i’ve been living in a dream for my whole life, i believe that i have, in fact, been watching movies in my living without a 5.1 system. This suggests that such an arrangement is, indeed, possible. Indeed, as i suggested in the OP, i’ve been watching movies for the last few years on a TV with a great picture and crappy sound. In those years, while i’m sure i’ve missed out on some great audio by using nothing more than my television’s speakers, i can assure you that i have, in fact, really enjoyed a lot of the movies that i watched.
I’m also not sure what you mean by “align your goals and objectives.” Align them with what? My goals and objectives here are to set up a system that will improve my media experience, while taking into account the fact that i have a relatively small living room, and a relatively limited budget for audio-visual equipment. I really think that the components i’ve chosen will be able to do that, especially if/when i add a center channel and/or a subwoofer.
While i am sure that some players (like the Oppo mentioned in a previous post) are better than others, i was under the impression that it’s perfectly possible to get pretty decent sound from a regular old Blu-Ray player pushing its signal through HDMI to a receiver/speaker setup.
My Blu-Ray player is an LG BD-670 networked player. It’s a few years old now, but it still works fine, and i really don’t think, based on my reading, that its audio capabilities are below my expectations. The quality of the video it passes to the TV has always seemed, to my eyes at least, to be excellent. As i said, one high-quality aspect of my system is the picture quality; Panasonic plasmas provide a fantastic picture.
Well, as i already pointed out in the OP, and as a couple of other people have pointed out since, i am buying a 5.1 receiver, so i’m not sure what you’re talking about here.
Failure by what standard?
My aim here is to end up with a system that provides substantially better sound than my television’s own speakers (not a very tall order), and that also allows for playback of CDs, digital music files, and streaming music.
If the set-up i’ve described does that, i’m not sure how one would call it a failure. If the standard you are using for success is “Your system is not going to be great as a much more high-end, expensive, and elaborate system,” well, i guess i’ll have to concede that my plan will be a failure by those standards. But if were an audiophile with thousands to spend on high-end equipment, i probably wouldn’t have waited until now to move beyond my TV’s own speakers, and i probably wouldn’t have started my home theater collection with a pair of budget speakers and a budget receiver.
I’m well aware that this is not an audiophile’s dream system that i’m setting up here. But you have to judge success based on expectations, and i firmly believe that this system will do everything thast i want and need it to do, at a price that i’m willing to spend.
You understand, i assume, that i’m in a condo-style apartment that is relatively narrow, as i said in the OP? When watching TV i will be sitting no more than about 10 feet from the screen and speakers, and it’s just my wife and me. We’re not trying to fill the great room of a mansion here. Even when playing music, the furthest away we’ll be is in the kitchen, and our downstairs is an open-plan layout with kitchen/dining/living spaces all connected in a room about 40x15 feet.
From the reviews i’ve read of the Polks and the Marantz, it will be easily possible to turn the sound up to a level that is not only perfectly sufficient for our needs, but would actually be rather un-neighborly and intrusive for the people who live next door.
We have a 3D television. We have used the 3D function exactly once in the three years we’ve owned it. The TV came with a set of 3D glasses and a complimentary copy of Avatar. We watched it once, just to see if the 3D was good (it was fine), and then i put the 3D glasses in a cupboard and haven’t taken them out since.
As for 4K, i guess it’s possible that this will become the new 1080p very quickly, and that everyone will be watching 4K video very soon, but i think i’ll be able to struggle by with regular old HD for a while yet. To be honest, i find that even 720p video through my TV looks pretty damned good.
We don’t have a cable box. When we watch cable-TV type shows, we generally do it through Netflix or Amazon Prime or Hulu Plus, or via other online sources. Our TV signal comes through a basic coax cable.
As for bluetooth, i actually purposely selected a receiver without networking and wireless and bluetooth built in. The Marantz got excellent reviews for sound quality, and i also like the fact that it’s less than five inches high—unlike so many receivers which are massive—which makes a difference in our limited space.
For streaming and networking, i can use the TV or the Blu-Ray player, and i also have a Raspberry Pi running RaspBMC that can stream media from my home network and from the internet, and that can be controlled wirelessly either by a wireless keyboard or by an app on my Android device.
Lamp cord for the speaker wire! Cheap, pretty and works just as well. If you need other cables I highly recommend www.monoprice.com. I use their products and have had no problems at all.
As noted by others, centre channel first as it will be the biggest bang for the buck overall. Try and get the same make if you can as it will help with making the front soundstage seamless. Manufacturer’s speakers tend to have a certain “sound” and mixing and matching them well can be tricky. I have seen setups using three bookshelf speakers across the front but for what you want a dedicated centre channel would be the way to go.
For subs, you can go with pretty much any reputable make, I’m partial to Paradigm personally, but any decent brand (Polk, Klipsh, Paradigm, JBL, etc.) will do. Use the dedicated line out for the sub as line level is noisier and won’t work as well.
I own an Oppo BDP-83 and it has been worth every penny. When the time comes I will be buying another when I eventually upgrade my TV and surround system. If you use a turntable, phono preamps can be had relatively inexpensively, just use the cd input.
There has been some great advice given already, so I can’t really offer up much more. Happy Listening!
Both the newegg link he supplied and Polk’s website show a recommended power of 20 to 200 watts. I don’t know where you got your info but it seems incorrect.
The Polks have a rated sensitivity of 90 dB so he should be able to hit around 106 dB no problem. That would be 20 watts into each of the speakers, which should leave a reasonable margin for dynamics both in terms of continuous power and whatever headroom is built into the receiver. If he adds a center speaker and/or a sub it would be able to go a bit louder than that. Is that loud enough? Not for me, but he lives in an apartment and might not be able to get away with even that.
How do you propose he accomplishes bi-amping with this receiver? While the speakers are set up for easy bi-amping, the receiver does not support it as far as I can tell from looking over the user manual that can be found here:
You can’t just hook up one section of the speaker to the front speaker outputs and hook the other up to the surround speaker outputs (when the receiver doesn’t support that as this one doesn’t) and get anything but trash. You’d get front bass and rear treble (or vice versa) out of the Polks and it would sound horrible.
The amazon link he provided, and the Marantz website, and the owner’s manual all state that this receiver will pass a 3D video signal.
There is a Bluetooth adaptor available for this receiver if that is something that is important to him. See page 19 of the owner’s manual.
I guess it depends on your definition of “lacking”. There are 3 analog inputs on the receiver. Even though 2 are doubled up with HDMI inputs, that would still leave 3 other HDMI inputs on the back, an additional HDMI input on the front, as well as the M-XPort if he wants to add the Bluetooth adaptor.
Thanks. I think that maybe i’ll get going on a center channel sooner rather than later, although when the receiver and wire and banana plugs arrive today i do want to set up the system with the two Polks just to see what it’s like. Adding the center channel next week or something should be pretty easy, although it would require recalibrating the receiver to deal with the new speaker.
That’s all very interesting. I never realized, before i started researching this stuff, how technical the whole business of reproducing sound can be.
We can get away with decent volume sometimes, because we have schedules that often allow us to be home during the day, and although we’re often working when we’re at home, we also sometimes take time off during the day to watch a TV show or a movie. At that time, the neighbors aren’t usually home. We are also the end apartment, so we only have neighbors on one side, and the audio equipment is all going to be against the opposite wall from where the adjoining apartment is.
One thing that might cause me to wait a bit for the sub is that my wife is not a big fan of base. She’s constantly turning down the base on our car stereo, for example. I understand that movie and TV show base serves a somewhat different purpose than music base, and i’ll try to convince her of that, but the sub might have to take a backseat, especially if the consensus is that TV and movies will probably benefit most from a center channel.
I’d love to. It’s more a matter of space, and the fact that they’d probably have to be wall or ceiling mounted, and i’m not the most competent handyman in the world.
Thanks for the info. The fact that i had not even checked this might give you an indication of how important 3D is to me. 
Yes, although they want 100 bucks for it, which seems pretty damn expensive for something like that these days.
You’re probably right, but at the moment basically the only thing we have is the TV. We don’t even have a stereo in our living room, so this will improve our TV experience and also allow us to play music in a place where we currently cannot, with half-decent sound. Right now, if i want to listen to music, i usually do it through my computer upstairs in my office (headphones, or speakers), and my wife usually does it through her laptop through headphones or the tiny, tinny speakers on the computer.
I thought about going with a cheap Home Theater in a Box, a little 5.1 system for a couple of hundred dollars. That would probably work fine for our needs, to be honest. But we may move at some stage in the next couple of years, and we might move to a house. It wouldn’t be a very big house, because there’s just two of us and we don’t have or want kids. It seemed to me that this system would be (a) not too expensive, (b) perfectly good for the apartment we have now, and (c) good enough also (maybe with an upgrade or two) for a living room in a modestly-sized house. Especially for people who are not experienced or picky audiophiles.
This may fit the bill and I didn’t suggest it earlier as you already have speakers, reciever etc.
The sub really will add to the experience, mhendo. The trick is to not make it too obtrusive. Most people have the level cranked too high to the ppoint that it becomes a distraction. I suspect that you’ll be fine as is with the floorstanders for now, but like the centre channel, a sub will give you just a little bit more of the sonic picture.
I own the Orb speakers and not only are they great sounding, they are unobtrusive and generally spouse friendly, unlike the K-Horns I want to make a home theatre out of…