Home sound system advice needed

Cafe Society
1

Need advice for a cost effective solution. Targeting the receiver and all speakers for under $1,000. I would appreciate any advice and specific recommendations on how to make this work (or if I’m smoking crack and there’s no way to do it in this price range).

I’m a total noob. I now understand we need a amp/receiver to power the speakers, and that the receiver will have HDMI, USB, and basic inputs from the TV, Xbox, PC. Bonus points if the system can be controlled from a Win Phone or at least a Windows PC.

I have a new home under construction and need to wire for sound in the next 2 weeks. I need a 2 zone system.
• Zone one is your basic “home theater in a box” with 4 recessed speakers in the ceiling and a sub woofer (somewhere?).
• Zone two is 3-4 separate rooms (kitchen, laundry, master, master bath)
• Nice to have if zone 1 and zone 2 can play different things at the same time but not necessary
• My wife wants zone two mainly for talk radio, to stream Chinese pop music and basic background music. A killer fidelity system is not what we need.
• Speaker should be built into the ceiling
• Need to be able to take inputs from the TV, Xbox, PC, maybe a music player/zune. Room will be wired with CAT6.

Best Buy had a couple of 2 zone home theater receivers for $549 (Denon AVR1912, Pioneer VSX-1021 and Yamaha RX-V671). I’m not clear though if the zone 2 would be able to power 3-4 pairs of speakers? Would this require a splitter or something else? The sub-contractor recommends this router http://www.atonhome.com/DH44Router.html

Please recommend a low end ceiling mount speakers (eg, speakers would be recessed in the ceiling/speaker grill flush with the ceiling)?

Thanks in advance

2
  1. You need five ceiling speakers if you also want to use it for video.
  2. And the three in front should not be in the ceiling but aligned with the screen so people’s voices seem to come from them and not somewhere overhead. Especially the center channel.
  3. And, for that matter, the rear surrounds should be no more than a foot above ear level, meaning ceiling speakers are no good.
  4. Zone 2 can work if you mess with the impedences. I could never understand it, being a mere designer, but I had a guy who could wire up anything so that it sounded good and didn’t catch fire. The greatest compliment I ever got was when he said a theater I designed was sounded better than any he’d heard. After his adjustments, of course.
3

I’ll second **dropzone’s **advice to get the front 3 speakers in Zone 1 pointed at you, not the floor. My first reaction is you’re asking for a lot for your budget, but your requirements really only dictate 1 bottom of the barrel speaker per room for Zone 2.

4

And bear in mind that the “bottom of the barrel” will still get you a pretty good speaker for casual listening and background music.

5

Have a look at Sonos.com

6

What would you recommend for bottom of the barrel?

I’ve checked out Sono’s. We may go that route.

7

I would rather have wall mounted speakers for surround sound and a free standing speaker or a wall mounted center channel speaker directly below the TV for voice. If the source feeding the system has a built in equalizer than that can be used to correct a multitude of sins.