Upgrading a pair of Kali LP-6 or LP-8 to 5.1 surround?

[Cifer]

Hello everyone,

what would I generally need to upgrade a pair of Kali LP speakers to 5.1 surround? And how important would the quality of the three other speakers be?

I mainly care about the sound from the Kali for music and want the surround mostly for entertainment purposes. The sound quality from the other speakers would therefore not be too important.

However, I have no idea how it works when you have music playing during a movie for example. Would the worse speakers bring down the overall sound?

Thanks a lot!

 

[sweetchaos]

LCR are, by far, the most important speakers in 5 channel setup.

I would buy 3 Lp-8’s and reassign Lp-6 to rears.
Or better yet, 3 of In-8’s if you can afford it.

 

[Cifer]

LCR are, by far, the most important speakers in 5 channel setup.

I would buy 3 Lp-8’s and reassign Lp-6 to rears.
Or better yet, 3 of In-8’s if you can afford it.

So I take it all of the speakers should at least be of roughly the same quality and equally powerful?

I am mainly curious because I've often read about people using cheap speakers as the sattelites, but I don't know if that would make music sound notably worse during a movie. For random sounds I figure it wouldn't matter too much?

I'll probably start with a three speaker setup first and add the two others speakers later as I see fit. To my understanding adding a center speaker would already make a pretty significant difference.

 

[Benedium]

So I take it all of the speakers should at least be of roughly the same quality and equally powerful?

I am mainly curious because I've often read about people using cheap speakers as the sattelites, but I don't know if that would make music sound notably worse during a movie. For random sounds I figure it wouldn't matter too much?

I'll probably start with a three speaker setup first and add the two others speakers later as I see fit. To my understanding adding a center speaker would already make a pretty significant difference.

Not sure, but in my small room, my polk xt15 surround speakers seem to really change the sound of my polk s20 LCR. You could borrow a pair of spare speakers from friends to try first. I would stick to identical speakers just to eliminate variables and 2nd guesses. I remember i was happiest using 5x mission lx2. Gets harder when u want to upgrade speakers though. Maybe go dual subwoofers for better bass response first?

 

[Chrispy]

Ideally more LP speakers? Ideally you'd have the same speaker all around. For multich music I think it matters more to have matched set of speakers than a movie, but of course the quality of the speakers will come thru to an extent if theyre being used. I'd think if mixing sizes at least put the larger set up front....

 

[sweetchaos]

So I take it all of the speakers should at least be of roughly the same quality and equally powerful?

Center channel is more important, since it often plays 3db louder than L-R, so that's why I don't skimp out on power and recommended the 8" woofers immediately.
The L-R is where the majority of sound comes from (except speech of course, since it's handled by Center).
The surround left and surround right speakers don't need as much power as LR, which is why you can often get away with 6.5" woofers (or sometimes 5" woofer depending on your listening distance and how loud you play movies).

 

[Cifer]

Thanks everyone. I'll stick with the same speaker model for all five then. I already had a feeling that mixing - especially mixing in low quality speakers as the satellites - wouldn't be a good idea.

Now I'm starting to wonder if I should move my PC setup to a smaller room and set up the surround for the entire room. Having so many fairly big speakers surround a desk in the middle of a larger room seems like a hassle, and I presume optimizing/treating the room will also be more annoying.

 

[Chrispy]

So it begins....

 

[abrxxx]

Hello everyone,

what would I generally need to upgrade a pair of Kali LP speakers to 5.1 surround? And how important would the quality of the three other speakers be?

I mainly care about the sound from the Kali for music and want the surround mostly for entertainment purposes. The sound quality from the other speakers would therefore not be too important.

However, I have no idea how it works when you have music playing during a movie for example. Would the worse speakers bring down the overall sound?

Thanks a lot!

I current have at Atmos 11.2 setup in my Family Room:

FRONT LEFT & FRONT RIGHT - JBL 305 (active)
CENTER - Monitor Audio BR something center (passive)
SUB LEFT & SUB RIGHT - JBL 310S (active)
Back Surround Left & Back Surround Right: Fluance Bipolar Surrounds (passive)
Surround Left/Right & Atmos overheads - Leviton/JBL AESS5-WH (passive)

Sounds amazing. I've broken all the "rules" If I could change one thing, it be to have a matching centre channel, so I agree with that. Otherwise, the above set-up works well for me.

Edit: I'm planning to upgrade the FL and FR to Kali IN5's.

 

[delta76]

So I take it all of the speakers should at least be of roughly the same quality and equally powerful?

I am mainly curious because I've often read about people using cheap speakers as the sattelites, but I don't know if that would make music sound notably worse during a movie. For random sounds I figure it wouldn't matter too much?

I'll probably start with a three speaker setup first and add the two others speakers later as I see fit. To my understanding adding a center speaker would already make a pretty significant difference.

no. LCR would be your priority, especially LR. Center is mostly for dialogs (critical for TV series) and LR is for things like explosions.
And yes Center is a must for home theatre. Without it, the dialogs seem to be a little off

 

[Cifer]

no. LCR would be your priority, especially LR. Center is mostly for dialogs (critical for TV series) and LR is for things like explosions.
And yes Center is a must for home theatre. Without it, the dialogs seem to be a little off

This is probably something I should know, but is music during a movie not played through all three of the front speakers? Where does it usually come from? I presume it depends on the way it was recorded, but in my understanding it would mostly be all three front speakers and not just L and R?

 

[delta76]

This is probably something I should know, but is music during a movie not played through all three of the front speakers? Where does it usually come from? I presume it depends on the way it was recorded, but in my understanding it would mostly be all three front speakers and not just L and R?

It depends on the mixing of the movie. Most will be at least 5.1 and yes you will hear music from all channels, but most will still be from LCR

 

[abrxxx]

It depends on the mixing of the movie. Most will be at least 5.1 and yes you will hear music from all channels, but most will still be from LCR

Depends on the scene as well. If its background music with dialog on screen, I expect centre would hold most of the talking, and L and R would have most of the music. When its a music only scene, its common for a surround mix of the song to be used, using many/all of your speakers.