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Stereo system for US$7000 or €7000

GXAlan

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Denon AVR-X8500H b-stock $3000
JBL HDI-3600 $3800

Three boxes for ease of shipping when moving from apartment to apartment. $200 for subscription to Amazon Music HD or Tidal Hifi
That budget is for stereo speakers, amp/s, DAC/s & digital room EQ solution.

1) Reliable HDMI compatibility
2) Benefits of x3600 as processor but with better DAC and amps
- in Japan, they demo the amp with B&W 802D2.
- people say Denon is mainstream junk compared to Devialet or Arcam... we know better
- not as good as separates, but good enough with efficient speakers
- if you upgrade to separates, you still get reliability of Denon HDMI with TVs and EARC
- don’t need balanced cables for short runs (unless doing high voltage Benchmark AHB2 style)
3) HDI-3600 as foundation. Add subwoofer in future for movies if needed.

https://translate.google.com/transl...eview/article/201803/29/2971.html&prev=search

———-
Option 2

X3600H $1000
Benchmark AHB2 $3000
JBL Studio 530 $300
Jl Audio F112 $4000

Receivers will go obsolete more quickly than subwoofers or amps will. The F112 will last you a long time until you get a house when you may want stereo subs. AHB2 is lifetime reference. Studio 530 images well in an apartment due to vertical horn and it is the cheapest item in your system, so it won’t hurt to get rid of them.
 

Willem

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HDMI splitter/switch? Oh, I forgot we also have a Video Chromecast that goes into the TV.
 

GXAlan

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Thanks for carrying on! :)

I will look into this now.

eARC also lets you hook a Blu Ray player to the TV and then pass HD Audio like TrueHD to your receiver via eARC. With Denon, things like HDMI CEC actually work...

HDMI switches are actually pretty cumbersome and just add more remotes to the mix.
 
OP
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Music1969

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HDMI switches are actually pretty cumbersome and just add more remotes to the mix.

Also reliability and robustness.

I know with the Denon, switching inputs will work reliably.

I had a 4520 working flawlessly for years (no longer have it).
 
OP
M

Music1969

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Denon AVR-X8500H b-stock $3000
JBL HDI-3600 $3800

Three boxes for ease of shipping when moving from apartment to apartment. $200 for subscription to Amazon Music HD or Tidal Hifi
That budget is for stereo speakers, amp/s, DAC/s & digital room EQ solution.

1) Reliable HDMI compatibility
2) Benefits of x3600 as processor but with better DAC and amps
- in Japan, they demo the amp with B&W 802D2.
- people say Denon is mainstream junk compared to Devialet or Arcam... we know better
- not as good as separates, but good enough with efficient speakers
- if you upgrade to separates, you still get reliability of Denon HDMI with TVs and EARC
- don’t need balanced cables for short runs (unless doing high voltage Benchmark AHB2 style)
3) HDI-3600 as foundation. Add subwoofer in future for movies if needed.

https://translate.google.com/transl...eview/article/201803/29/2971.html&prev=search

———-
Option 2

X3600H $1000
Benchmark AHB2 $3000
JBL Studio 530 $300
Jl Audio F112 $4000

Receivers will go obsolete more quickly than subwoofers or amps will. The F112 will last you a long time until you get a house when you may want stereo subs. AHB2 is lifetime reference. Studio 530 images well in an apartment due to vertical horn and it is the cheapest item in your system, so it won’t hurt to get rid of them.

Thanks but sub bass is really important for me.

This comes way under budget

Denon AVR-X3600H + Audyssey = US$1000

Revel M16 pair = US$900

4 x SVS SB-1000 subwoofers = US$2000

Total retail = US$3900

With 4 subs, it probably means no need for big ugly bass traps also.
 

Karu

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Thanks but sub bass is really important for me.

This comes way under budget

Denon AVR-X3600H + Audyssey = US$1000

Revel M16 pair = US$900

4 x SVS SB-1000 subwoofers = US$2000

Total retail = US$3900

With 4 subs, it probably means no need for big ugly bass traps also.

Why not add a strong center channel to this combo? Or upgrade the speakers to JBL HDI-1600 and then in future add the matching center? (edit: meant the JBL bookshelf)
 
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Music1969

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Why not add a strong center channel to this combo? Or upgrade the speakers to JBL HDI-1600 and then in future add the matching center? (edit: meant the JBL bookshelf)

Great recommendation

JBL HDI-1600 - US$1800 a pair

Denon AVR-X3600H + Audyssey = US$1000

4 x SVS SB-1000 subwoofers = US$2000

Total retail = US$4800

With 4 subs, it probably means no need for big ugly bass traps also.
 

Ilkless

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Great recommendation

JBL HDI-1600 - US$1800 a pair

Denon AVR-X3600H + Audyssey = US$1000

4 x SVS SB-1000 subwoofers = US$2000

Total retail = US$4800

With 4 subs, it probably means no need for big ugly bass traps also.

I would say jump to the KEF R3 over the HDI-1600. Dedicated woofer, smoother all around, similar price. But otherwise that is a very well-rounded setup. Just that I find the price excessive for the HDI-1600 performance and size.
 

FrantzM

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Maybe Denon AVR-X3600H + Audyssey + Revel M16 + pair of SVS SB-2000 subwoofers

And plenty of cash left over, for room treatment?
I second that system. Later on you can add more speakers for surround.. You will need at least 2 Audyssey settings: One for 2 channel and the other for more. thus the Audyssey app which is inexpensive considering what it is allows that, not the AVR by itself ... Those settings need to be edited for taste ... This can't be done in the AVR either, only in the App which loads your setting to the AVR .. a minor inconvenience: it takes less than 5 minutes to load different settings.
The Audyssey App is powerful, editing to find the best curve is more cumbersome than it should. I suggest you sue a Tablet rather than a phone for that purpose...
 
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GXAlan

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With bass as your priority, I would still do dual subs rather than quad subs. Quad subs are amazing but not at the expense of quality.

Dual SB-4000 should beat quad SB-1000.

https://www.jblsynthesis.com/about/acoustics.html
That’s a great article on subs. One key line is that data on multiple subs is based on theoretically perfectly symmetrical rooms. Having two subs gets you benefits of multiple subs and allows you to spend more per sub.
 
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ex audiophile

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I purchased a number of speakers with "built in" subs", in fact the original def tec BP2000s, then GE tritons, then def tec Mythos ST-l. It seemed like a very efficient solution but now I would discourage anyone else from this path. The amps are prone to failure according to some, and indeed I had failures in the BP2000s and tritons. What a PIA to get them replaced! More important sound wise is the critical nature of positioning with subs, which obviously you can't do when they're grafted onto your mains. And common sense indicates that a plate amp sequestered into the bottom of your tower speaker just cannot be as good as a dedicated lump that does nothing but produce lower frequencies for a living. Kind of like your general practitioner taking a weekend class in heart surgery compared to a specialist with 30 years of experience.
I encourage you to look at the Matrix Element P as the heart of your system, it includes a streamer/preamp/amp in one compact unit with superb engineering. I don't recall the particular ESS dac that it uses but I would not worry about its performance, given the testing done here on others in the Element series. Hell, I believe that Amir uses an Element I himself.
For speakers just choose the Revel tower that meets your budget, the F 206 or 208 would both be superb, and you'd have a SOTA system within your budget. Then save your bday money for a pair of great subs. Amir has just started testing subs so the timing is perfect. I've had at least 8 SVS subs, a pair of GE XXL subs, and now JL audio fathoms. The latter are excellent, but starting out with a pair of SVS 3000 subs would be close in performance at a fraction of the budget. Good luck to you and most of all, enjoy.
 

GXAlan

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I've had at least 8 SVS subs, a pair of GE XXL subs, and now JL audio fathoms. The latter are excellent, but starting out with a pair of SVS 3000 subs would be close in performance at a fraction of the budget.

@Music1969 ^^^ This is important.

If I had the luxury of starting from scratch, as you are, I would likely go for a JL Audio Fathom class sub from day one. As much as multiple subs sounds great for scientific reasons, going with 4 SB-1000's means 4x the depreciation when you eventually sell them and move on. I would go as far as to say that a single JL Audio F112 will make more sense than dual SB-3000's in the grand scheme of things since 3-4 years from now, you will be able to have dual F112's.

The KEF R3 may be harder than the HDI-1600 for the X3600h to drive. Also, Amir felt that the subjective experience with the R3 was worse than the HDI-1600 despite the objective measurements.
 

richard12511

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The GoldenEar Triton Two+ I mentioned in the opening post features built-in 1600W subwoofers, so that's a pair of subs.

The problem with this is that the subs are attached to the speakers. Arguably the biggest benefit of having external subs is that you have the freedom to place them around the room to get the best bass possible. Unlike the treble and midrange, the quality of the bass is HEAVILY influenced by the dimensions of the room, as well as where the subs are within the room. Often, the best spot in the room for your speakers(for imaging and soundstage) is going to be a bad spot for good sounding bass, so you don't want to be forced to put the subs there. I ran into this issue when I was setting up my current system. My main speakers get down to about 27Hz in room, but the bass sounds terrible due to 10-15db swings in the frequency range. I could EQ it out, but that would take away a ton of headroom. Adding separate subs and crossing my mains over at 100hz took those 10-15db swings down to under 5db and made it super easy to EQ a flat response.

Do you have placement flexibility? or are you limited by WAF(wife acceptance factor)? If you do have freedom to place the speakers/subs, I would heavily recommend separate subs if you care about good bass.

~5 meters

Wow, this is actually pretty far away. Very few(if any) hifi speakers in this price range are going to get you to movie theater "reference" levels at this distance(JTR and PSA are the only two I know of that would leave you room for subs). You also mention that you love bass(I do to). You'll definitely need some great subs to pressurize the room, and you may want to even run one of those subs near field.

I would look at Rythmik and PSA for subs in that range. For good sound(not necessarily total output) 2 subs are almost always better than 1, and 4 subs are better than 2. Two of these or 4 of these. The 2 bigger subs probably gives more bass, while the 4 subs probably gives better bass, but I haven't looked that closely. PSA also has good subs in that range.

That said, most people don't listen at movie theater reference levels. For the majority of people, reference is too loud. It's likely that you are in this camp, but without a real reference to compare to, I wouldn't be sure. It may be worthwhile to spend a little money on a cheap pair of speakers(something like the JBL 530) just to push them and see how well they satisfy your needs. $7k is a lot to spend on a first pair of loudspeakers with no other loudspeaker experience to help guide you.

And I think leaving more cash over (half the budget) for treatments is the right approach.

Possibly. The problem with room treatments is you kinda have to know what you're doing, or you can end up making it sound worse. I'm an example of this. I spent $5-6k on room treatments, but I only ended up using $2-3k of those, as adding more made the room sound too dead. I now have several thousand dollars worth of treatments just sitting in my garage, collecting dust. Good room treatments can really improve the sound of the system, but it might be best to wait on this, and budget for it later.


Genelec 8351B plus GLM kit, DAC, DSP, room correction eq all in one package. You do need to get your audio to AES out though.

In many situations, I would second this recommendation, but here, given what OP has told us, I don't think this is a very good suggestion, unfortunately. 8351B is one of my end game speakers I'm really looking at. In many ways, it might be the best loudspeaker there is, but it I don't think it fits here, for a couple reasons.

1) It's $2k over the OP's budget :p
2) It would leave no room for subs. OP has said he will be listening at 5m, likes to crank it, and loves bass. These little guys are not gonna sound very good at all running full range at 5m and trying to satisfy someone with those needs. A cheaper pair of bookshelves(or towers) crossed over to subs will sound much better. OP will run into the same problem that @amirm ran into with the 8431, but possibly even worse.


OP, I would take your time in deciding. That's the best way to make sure you're 100% satisfied. Check out the speaker review section of this forum. Spend some time going through those reviews, learning about the measurements, and read the discussions around those measurements. Some of the ones I would start with are the Revel F208, Kef R3, and the two JBL HTI speakers.

The Revel F208 ($5k/pair) and 4 Rythmik L12 subs($2k) would be right on budget and sound awesome.
 

ex audiophile

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@Music1969 ^^^ This is important.

If I had the luxury of starting from scratch, as you are, I would likely go for a JL Audio Fathom class sub from day one. As much as multiple subs sounds great for scientific reasons, going with 4 SB-1000's means 4x the depreciation when you eventually sell them and move on. I would go as far as to say that a single JL Audio F112 will make more sense than dual SB-3000's in the grand scheme of things since 3-4 years from now, you will be able to have dual F112's.

The KEF R3 may be harder than the HDI-1600 for the X3600h to drive. Also, Amir felt that the subjective experience with the R3 was worse than the HDI-1600 despite the objective measurements.

I think you are right about the subs. I am the master of losing money on audio equipment so instead of buying a lesser item then reselling it at a loss, just wait until the Fathom is within budget. I know I won't be buying any more subs :)
 

lashto

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Cool. 4 SVS-SB1000's symmetrically at the front of the room is now what I'm leaning to.
I know 4 across the front is not ideal but front is the only option I have.
Even in this case, I imagine 4 is still better than 2, for even bass across the room?

4 subs across the front is probably a waste of both money and space, see https://www.harman.com/documents/multsubs_0.pdf. Yes 4 are slightly better than 2 but only if placed properly (just jump to slide 28 of that PDF for conclusions & best configs).
 

Koeitje

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Don't get 4 subs if you are just going to stick them in the front. Just get 2 better ones in that case.
 
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