Alrighty. Since y’all have killed my dream system with all your sciency facts and objective reasoning, what would you put together for a reasonably priced system for the average size living room?
Must have streaming capabilities since you disapprove of the shiny black circles I’ve collected…
Small to medium towers or bookshelf’s on stands with spouse friendly looks. Subwoofer if need be…I like bass, but I’m not an addict.
Amplification that can do late night, low volume, jazz and acoustics but still crank the occasional Pixies/Clash/Sabbath indulgence.
I’ll entertain suggestions for EQs like the Schmitt Loki…or something with Dirac…but let’s not get carried away.
Room is average carpeted box, with a window and a large black Labrador as a sound deadening device.
Whatcha got?
My pitch is:
* KH310 (call it $4000 if you shop around; definitely don't pay the 5K list). For spouse friendly setup, I recommend grabbing 2x neumann lh 25 and mounting them on your ceiling, if you can stomach the $200 that adds.
* minidsp flex balanced + umik-1 ($675) to handle your EQ and allow for future subwoofer integration if the kh 310 don't do it for you on the low end.
* cables ($150) - if you go for the ceiling mount, grab some 25' cables to connect to the minidsp, and some longer IEC power cables for the kh310.
That's about 5k, though I guess 6k if you're not willing to have the kh310 shipped from overseas or to negotiate a bargain with one of the places that carry them. If you assume it's 5k, you've still got the money + connectivity to add a Rhythmik F12 or HSU ULS-15 MK2 for ~1100 plus the DSP to integrate it into your setup. The KH750 just doesn't seem to have bang for the buck from my perspective, but that could remove the minidsp cost and add it to your sub instead; I like that this approach lets you mix+match and possibly get away without the sub for a while but still have room correction. You could add Dirac Live to the flex later for $200 if you decide that you care about what it brings above and beyond manual EQ work.
Use Room EQ Wizard + umik-1 to measure things, then load the DSP settings into the minidsp to fix problems at your listening position. Add a second DSP profile with a smiley graphic EQ for your low-volume listening to pretend you've got the Fletcher-Munson curve covered. As you might have guessed, this is my setup and I like it quite well. The one thing I did differently was have a passive DI box doing RCA->XLR conversion from my chromecast audio before I had the minidsp, so I bought the non-balanced flex and run it through the DI box. Also, while I'm positioned to add a sub, I don't have one yet.
I guess if you're into streamers as opposed to bluetooth or the sadly departed chromecast audios, you could put a streamer in front of the flex or upgrade the flex to the SHD? I dunno, I'm happy with chromecasting and bluetooth.