Listening to music and surround sound

[boybeck]

Hello

I am the proud new owner of a Pioneer 508XD which is waiting to be put on the wall of my new house.

My next purchase is a surround sound system and this is where I need your help.

I want to be able to listen to music through it as well as use it for watching movies. Is this possible using one piece of kit and can you recommend anything?

Jason

[pixelpidgeon]

hi. how much you able to spend on your surround sound system?
pixel

[boybeck]

Probably about £500

I tried a Bose acoustimass 6 system at home but the music sounded awful through it.

I want the whole cinemas surround sound system but also to be able to plug my pc into it so I can play my music through it via itunes.

At the moment I have a bog standard Sony hifi with two big speakers, am I ever going to get that sound using a surround sound kit?

[inzaman]

Moved to all in ones

[pixelpidgeon]

morning. This is a good starter system for £550. Its not an all in one, its amp + speakers + cables.

link: http://www.av-sales.co.uk/Audio-Pack...GE-414-354.htm

or these speakers are good with music, so long as the room isnt massive, for £300 http://www.av-sales.co.uk/Speakers-a...IER-180-22.htm

or these for £249.99 http://petertyson.co.uk/ebuttonz/ebz...ival_5.1.shtml

paired with ONKYO TX-SR506 for £225 delivered http://www.creative-audio.co.uk/ONK_506.htm

it looks like the SR606 is £399 everwhere...

[boybeck]

Thanks for the advice pixel pidgeon.

Am I right in thinking that people don't tend to use their surround sounds systems to play music on?

The sound just doesn't seem to be as good with these small speakers compared to the big "traditional" hi-fi speakers.

[Matt_C]

I have a "seperates" system, as in an amp/AV Reciever with speakers. I have big floor standing front speakers, then "home cinema" centre, sub and rear speakers. This allows my amp to use all 6 speakers to be used for 5.1 movies, but when I listen to music I have just the front speakers working, as the amp can switch between 2 and 6 channel mode depending on input.

I would have thought most "all in one" systems would do this aswell tho...

[pixelpidgeon]

As Matt C states, av amps can be selected to use only the front two speakers for stereo i.e. music. Its just that you generally pay a bit more to implement to floorstanders into a 5.1 home cinema system. Rather than a syatem souly used for home cinema, which implements a subwoofer to get that extra bass usually missing from bookshelf speakers. Im sure you can still use the subwoofer and the 2 front bookshelf speakers when set to stereo on the amp. Some amps even have a 'direct' setting, my yamaha home cinema amp does, and this automatically sends the signal (stereo, 5.1 etc) to the relevent speakers.

Im far from an expert in this. Im sure there are others on here that will be able to explain this better than i can. pixel