Pair of bookshelves, amplifier for music + TV

Speakers & Subwoofers
1

Hey there, I have been given free reign to set up sound for our TV area. Budget around $800 (rough conversion from Danish kroner).

Our house has a merged living room/dining room/kitchen 12 x 5,6 meters (39x18 feet) so I imagine the speakers need to have some punch to sound full bodied. The TV hangs on the long wall in one end of this room.

I try to stick with bookshelves rather than floor standers for the flexible placement (On TV bench or stands if I need more distance between them). I will probably augment with a subwoofer later.

Important to me:

  • Large sweet spot so most of the sofa is covered decently.
  • Good imaging.
  • Good bass/upper bass as I love it when the bass guitar is treated with dignity in the mix.
  • Good clarity but not harsh treble. I have a studio monitor setup for analytical listening. This set will be for easy listening and movie/TV watching.
  • Decent design for WAF (I’m afraid SVS Ultra and such are ruled out here).
  • Might be nice to have a decent center channel option.

I’m currently deciding between Q Acoustics 3030i for $300 and Wharfedale Diamond 12.2 for $280 (approximate conversion to USD. I’m in Denmark). The former seems to have everything I’m looking for while the latter just seems to be a better speaker but it’s hard to know if the sweet spot is as wide as on the 3030i. There’s a lot less info on the Diamond compared to the 3030. I can also get q3050i for $400 but it seems those need expensive amplification to work decently (Muddy bass on cheap equipment). I’m also open to suggestions.

For amplification I’m looking at the Yamaha RX-V4A ($390, 80 watts/channel) and RX-V6A ($550, 100 watts).

  • I like the idea of using our phones to stream from Spotify.
  • I think I need ARC/eARC to control the volume directly with the TV remote (WAF requirement).

Would I gain anything from the extra 20 watts? I might add a center channel.

I’m off to work I’d love some thoughts on this setup.

1 Like
2

I would say get the V6A for the L/R preout hopefully yamaha improved the output voltage. 6in woofer or larger on bookshelves, definitely subwoofer(s) with that size space. Sit back far enough to get good center image and dispersion.

3

Can’t go wrong with the 3030i for that price. I listened to them in a showroom and they have quite a full sound.
They also look better than the wharfedales imo.

4

Great, I’ll probably stick to the Yamaha/3030i combo, then.

What should I use the L/R pre-out for?

1 Like
5

Yamaha has a bad reputation for poor preout signal. But if they improved the voltage or run a line level booster you can add an external amp to have headroom for L/R. might never need it but its nice to have if you start collecting speakers. Also, if you add a center ch you can set the AVR to “none” rear ch. Turn the levels up for the center ch with the L/R running off an external amp. All my budget small center ch (micca neumi) dialog is sometimes hard to hear.

All my setups are TV based. Got one of those V6A in my wish list to go in my front room 25x25ft just for those preouts the room correct digital crossovers and yamaha reliabilty.