Planning for me room..could use some adivce

amarules

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Was advised to post this in this section so hopefully Im in the right place for some good advice.


I've been browsing these forums for a few months now after kind of getting the itch for a better setup so this is sort of where I've got to in terms of planning so far.

I'm a 22yr old student, unfortunately stuck living in rented accommodation at least until late 2009. This annoyingly places a few restrictions on what I can do with the room due to a small matter of a £250 deposit I'd rather not lose.

To start off I've made a few scale sketches of my room as it is now using sketch up (which I must say Im having amazing fun with, kinda wondering why Im doing forensic science and not a design course ..but anyway I digress :D)

My basic room layout





Plan View




And heres my current speaker setup.

Im currently running a basic 5.1 kit with a desktop pc not a laptop, hooked up to a dell 24" LCD which does 1080i through component for ps3 but lacks HDMI though.






So down to the details. I'd decided I wanted a decent HD tv and have pretty much settled on the Toshiba 37" XV503 which has plenty of great features and performance for my budget. Due to my deposit and contract rules I won't be able to wall mount it though..which in a room this size obviously cuts down my options.

Secondly the room only has two different power points. One on the wall in the right hand corner of the desk and the second on the wall behind the bedside cabinet.

The final problem is neither the wardrobe or desk can be moved around to achieve a better layout as they are fitted to the walls.

Next is the audio setup.

If im in my room I pretty much always have music on so decent music quality is something I do want but I'd also like a good performance for watching movies from my ps3 or gaming.

I think I'd like to go with seperates..and for the meantime I can do with just an amp and speakers to start off with but a cd player would be nice also.
My budget is gonna be about £750 max.

I don't know whether an AV amp or a simple stero amp would be better for my needs. Iknow an AV amp gives me the option to add more speakers later on anyhow but will will it still produce nice stereo sound (im not looking for totally amazing here..this is bargain land ;) )

As for speakers Im kinda wanting to do away with the wires of a 5.1 setup as I cant hide much in here so I don't mind going for a stereo setup with sub if needed.

I like the idea and look of floorstanders and I kinda mocked up what my setup might look like below.





I checked measurements and everything should fit fine where placed but Im not sure if the speakers are a bit too close to the screen.

So what I'm after advice on:

1) does that setup look ok or pant's?..if so what could be changed
2) would I be better off with bookshelf speakers in a room this size?
3) suggestions for a decent amp + speaker (either bookshelfs or floorstanders) setup.. given a budget of ~£750


Thanks in advance for any thoughts
 
Can't offer any advice, but just thought it worth mentioning that your sketch up diagrams are excellent.

I'm having building work on kitchen/dining/lounge at the moment and I'll now be using sketch up to plan where I put everything - so thanks for the link to an excellent bit of free software :smashin:
 
Moved to General AV Chat :)
 
Pics are great and v. helpful. I think that floorstanders would be overkill and you would be better off getting a set of bookshelves. Your budget could easily stretch to some quality gear particularly if you go second hand. I would look at Cambridge Audio, as they're good quality amps, have plenty of power and sound good. They're also quite compact. They lack HDMI audio but make up for it sound quality wise. If you do go down the 2.1 route wouldn't go for a stereo amp, simply by own experience. I have a 2.0 stereo setup in my bedroom that also drives a pair of in-ceiling bathroom speakers (A&B) but I get serious lip sync issues sometimes which at least if I had an AV receiver would be able to sort out. BK make some good compact subs you should look at. Also, I wouldn't bother with a CD player. If you have a decent sized hard drive I would look at ripping your music to a lossless format such as FLAC and get a streaming device like the Squeezebox 3. That way you have access to all your music and it would get rid of the CD's cluttering up your small room. There are separate forums for such devices (Roku soundbridge is cheaper) or check slimdevices.com etc.
 
Was advised to post this in this section so hopefully Im in the right place for some good advice.


I've been browsing these forums for a few months now after kind of getting the itch for a better setup so this is sort of where I've got to in terms of planning so far.

I'm a 22yr old student, unfortunately stuck living in rented accommodation at least until late 2009. This annoyingly places a few restrictions on what I can do with the room due to a small matter of a £250 deposit I'd rather not lose.

To start off I've made a few scale sketches of my room as it is now using sketch up (which I must say Im having amazing fun with, kinda wondering why Im doing forensic science and not a design course ..but anyway I digress :D)

My basic room layout





Plan View




And heres my current speaker setup.

Im currently running a basic 5.1 kit with a desktop pc not a laptop, hooked up to a dell 24" LCD which does 1080i through component for ps3 but lacks HDMI though.






So down to the details. I'd decided I wanted a decent HD tv and have pretty much settled on the Toshiba 37" XV503 which has plenty of great features and performance for my budget. Due to my deposit and contract rules I won't be able to wall mount it though..which in a room this size obviously cuts down my options.

Secondly the room only has two different power points. One on the wall in the right hand corner of the desk and the second on the wall behind the bedside cabinet.

The final problem is neither the wardrobe or desk can be moved around to achieve a better layout as they are fitted to the walls.

Next is the audio setup.

If im in my room I pretty much always have music on so decent music quality is something I do want but I'd also like a good performance for watching movies from my ps3 or gaming.

I think I'd like to go with seperates..and for the meantime I can do with just an amp and speakers to start off with but a cd player would be nice also.
My budget is gonna be about £750 max.

I don't know whether an AV amp or a simple stero amp would be better for my needs. Iknow an AV amp gives me the option to add more speakers later on anyhow but will will it still produce nice stereo sound (im not looking for totally amazing here..this is bargain land ;) )

As for speakers Im kinda wanting to do away with the wires of a 5.1 setup as I cant hide much in here so I don't mind going for a stereo setup with sub if needed.

I like the idea and look of floorstanders and I kinda mocked up what my setup might look like below.





I checked measurements and everything should fit fine where placed but Im not sure if the speakers are a bit too close to the screen.

So what I'm after advice on:

1) does that setup look ok or pant's?..if so what could be changed
2) would I be better off with bookshelf speakers in a room this size?
3) suggestions for a decent amp + speaker (either bookshelfs or floorstanders) setup.. given a budget of ~£750


Thanks in advance for any thoughts

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