What are you guys using for rear surround speakers

[emovac]

Dec 6, 2012 14:10:46 GMT -5 Dark Ranger said:

I use the exceptional and extremely good sounding Bose Jewel Cubes. These are the very best surround speakers ever, bar none.





I was going to write something along the lines of chuckienut's post, but he beat me to it. I completely support the idea of matching the surround speakers as close as possible. While an identical speaker for every channel is optimal, not everyone can do that due to space or financial limitations. So most folks go BIG on the front three and smaller on the surrounds, heights, wides, presence, etc. At the very least, choose speakers from the same brand/company. If you can choose from the same series, even better.

Since I have an Ascend Acoustics based system, I use speakers from that brand. My HT room is extremely small at the moment, so I'm using four of these (HTM-200 SE):



They are sealed, small, and are an excellent timbre match for my mains.

I'm waiting for the Bose sucks crowd to come out of the woodwork. Personally, I've owned some of their stuff and it has always performed well. I like the Wave radios for soft background music.

[Dark Ranger]

Dec 6, 2012 14:16:57 GMT -5 emovac said:

I'm waiting for the Bose sucks crowd to come out of the woodwork. Personally, I've owned some of their stuff and it has always performed well. I like the Wave radios for soft background music.

It was going to happen sooner or later.

For the record, I've heard a lot of their stuff at friend's houses and in demo rooms. At the very least, it's overpriced. Does it completely suck? No, I've actually heard much worse.

[DYohn]

The "Bose sucks" crowd is just as important as "Apple sucks" or "Android sucks" or "Microsoft sucks" or "Sony sucks." They are all equally idiotic.

As far as timbre matching, for HT matching rear surrounds to side surrounds to front mains is really unimportant. For surround music it can be critical. It all depends on what sort of system you're building.

[paradigmE]

My ancient Paradigm 5se's. Although my ADS L710's (I think thats right) are about to make the move back into this room as surronds for now.

[danny01]

Dec 6, 2012 11:21:48 GMT -5 hemster said:

Paradigm ADP di-poles.

How do those blend with Studios or signatures?

[hemster]

Dec 6, 2012 15:11:52 GMT -5 danny01 said:

Dec 6, 2012 11:21:48 GMT -5 hemster said:

Paradigm ADP di-poles.

How do those blend with Studios or signatures?

Superbly! Timbre matched and the same sonic signature.

[thepcguy]

I'm using EMO in-wall speakers for surrounds. My mains are NHTs.

When deciding what speakers for surround to use, these should be considered, I guess:

1. Preference
- do you want the surrounds to be 'invisible'? (not localized)
- when watching concert videos / listening to multi-channel audio discs, do you prefer the
Musicians on a stage in front of you or you want to be ON the stage with the Musicians?

2. Materials
How many audio/video discs have done the surround recordings right?

On number1, I have heard some with instruments emanating from the surrounds. One example is 'Hell Freezes Over' DVD by the Eagles. This DVD is a Demo material IMO, but I prefer the Stereo vs. the DTS surround. The DTS surround have the Orchestra at your back.

On number 2, It's really hard to find excellent materials. I guess my favorite would be John Mayer's and Chris Botti's Blu-ray concerts: No distracting surrounds effects. On movies, I thought the effects were done right on the first Spiderman, a scene where Willem Dafoe's voice is all over the place, great demo for all speakers. Daredevil has a good scene too, the part when the young Daredevil is in the hospital and his sense of hearing magnified. And of course, the PIXAR's Dolby Digital intro where the Robot is fixing the logo, flying from front to back.

Of course, who wouldn't want timbre matched, full range towers, height and back surround speakers? I would IF I have the money to burn.

Who wouldn't want speakers like these? ;D

[flamingeye]

My surrounds are the same as my front main speakers - Klipsch kg 5.5 but multichannel music is my main use of my system , I use to use smaller klipsch surrounds- RF 15 but switching to all kg 5.5 and it really mad a difference for multichannel music

[supermac]

I use Earthquake's "Sweetspots" SS82W. They're angled in up to 20 degrees. www.earthquakesound.com/components/com_virtuemart/shop_image/product/SweetSpot_4b8719efc48ff.jpg

[traider79]

ERT 8.3 In the front and back. Before the 8.3 I had def tech bp6. Sounds much better all matched and stuff. Real technical details here

[xki]

Dec 6, 2012 16:52:49 GMT -5 flamingeye said:

My surrounds are the same as my front main speakers - Klipsch kg 5.5 but multichannel music is my main use of my system , I use to use smaller klipsch surrounds- RF 15 but switching to all kg 5.5 and it really mad a difference for multichannel music

I would LOVE to have enough room for La Scalas in back. No way! So I have 4 of these for surrounds and backs hanging from the ceiling. A little EQ and all is well. Klipsch RB-25



FREQUENCY RESPONSE : 49Hz-20kHz ?3dB
POWER HANDLING : 75 w max continuous (300 w peak)
SENSITIVITY : 94dB @ 2.83 volts/1 meter

[jerrin]

I'm using big full range line sources, the LS9, for my fronts and side surrounds. I'm using the smaller version, the LS6, for my rear surrounds. They both use the exact same drivers, just the amount differ.

No way would I ever go back to non full range speakers. It's really something to hear thunder in a movie from the sides and have it vibrate the room.

[fireguy]

Just purchased two pair of EMO's XRM 4.1's. My room best accommodates a direct radiating design. Need to replace some Polk RMS that been around for a while. They'll be sent to my vintage audio (2.0) space to help out the TV audio. The other pair will be going to my son, he's going to turn into an audiophile whether he knows it or not.

I placed the order with Vincent on the land line and must add the experience was flawless. Great start for sure. Here's anticipating the audio experience will be identical.

Axiom M22's V3 (x2) Main
Aperion 5C Center
Outlaw LFM1 + Sub
Denon AVR 1906
AudioSource AMP110

[danr]

I absolutely will never use anything other than floor standing "full range" loudspeakers for surrounds. Right now, I am using Revel Concerta F12s. Soon, these will be Revel Performa3 F208.

[bulldozer]

I'm using the b&w 684 but if i could i would use the 683's for all 5 positions. IMHO all speakers in the system should be identical, in a perfect world this would be practical but it isn't.so get as close as possible.

[thepcguy]

Dec 6, 2012 20:51:18 GMT -5 danr said:

I absolutely will never use anything other than floor standing "full range" loudspeakers for surrounds. Right now, I am using Revel Concerta F12s. Soon, these will be Revel Performa3 F208.

Music only set up I guess?

[bulldozer]

Dec 6, 2012 20:51:18 GMT -5 danr said:

I absolutely will never use anything other than floor standing "full range" loudspeakers for surrounds. Right now, I am using Revel Concerta F12s. Soon, these will be Revel Performa3 F208.

I meant to say that but was scared to. ha ha i have the same opinion.

[Deleted]

Dec 6, 2012 13:48:30 GMT -5 70383roadrunner said:

Dec 6, 2012 13:21:39 GMT -5 @chuckienut said:

I use the exact same surround speaker brand as my front speakers and from the same series. That means they have at least the same tweeter and mid too if possible. I find dipole or bipole are usually the best versus direct radiating since they trend to have the best mix of direct and ambient sound. Not to get into the old argument here but I have heard the difference and it is very audible in improvement. The old statement that surround speakers are just for sound effects and it doesn't matter if you buy a different brand surround speaker doesn't hold water with me. Many movies have music in the rear channels and even sound effects as rear ambient sounds of front effects. Multi-channel sound is even more reason to have voice/timbre matched speakers. Some of the multi-channel music whether Blu-Ray sound tracks, SACD, DVD-Audio or DVD concerts is superb and even lots of music thru Dolby Pro II. Why would anyone settle for anything but perfect 360 degree voice matched sound is beyond me.

That said if you insist and have smooth tweeters such as silk domes or the non-edgy metal tweeters then the Emo ERD-1's are maybe one of the finest surround speakers made.

Sorry folks but when I read here day after day about how so many folks can hear such amazing differences between DAC's, speaker wire, etc. and they supposedly can't hear a mis-matched surround speaker, I just don't get it.

I may have found a used pair of ERD-1's and was wondering if they have to be mounted on the wall or can you use speaker stands with them?

Ideally wall mount is the best because it is good to get the surround speaker up above the listeners ears several feet if possible. That can be difficult without a very tall speaker stand or the stand on a box, etc. If you use a stand then try to have them back against the wall as they are designed sound wise for on the wall mounting. The position of the dual toggle switches on the back of the ERD-1 is very important. Read the owner's manual carefully. Normally dipole for side walls and bipole for rear walls.

[puft54cs]

GR-Research AV-1 RS

I built these from a kit. They are mounted on the wall and reflect the sound from the ceiling. I like them and the reflected sound is quite convincing.

[dcg44s]

Dec 6, 2012 22:45:50 GMT -5 puft54cs said:

GR-Research AV-1 RS

I built these from a kit. They are mounted on the wall and reflect the sound from the ceiling. I like them and the reflected sound is quite convincing.

Hmm,very interesting.I wonder how these would work in a situation where the seating is pushed back pretty much against the rear wall making conventional rear surround placement impractical?