no trouble.
the reason why we have these forums is to share infomation.
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160eur (222usd) isnt a bad price point for low end but still half decent 5.1 receivers. completely up to you though if you feel comfortable spending this much cash on a receiver and more on some home theater speakers (you didnt list what the energy take 5.1 goes for in greece?).
yes, generally you do get what you pay for. i agree. however budget and your personal preferences have alot to do with it.
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the z5500 is discontinued and has been for years. the z906 is its successor and while not as good its also a bit cheaper than the z5500 was. even in the usa the old z5500 is listed for huge prices (because of the greed of sellers and the hype and demand from buyers). not worth buying over here either.
you wouldnt buy a receiver if you went with the z906. you would probably get a soundcard (unless you stuck with the mediocre one you have now).
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half a grand? do you mean 500usd or 500eur (big difference!) i'm guessing euro.
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in most cases i would not suggest home theater in a box (HTIB) solutions. that LG set is one of these sets. i didnt delve into many reviews but the tiny bit i saw on youtube
>click here< mentioned about a few issues and how it was too expensive for what it offered. the reason i personally dont recommend them is because they are often built cheaper than seperate components and sometimes they dont play nice with inputs from other sources (some hdmi input models dont support 5.1 only 2.1!).
also the vast majority of content is 5.1 so finding 7.1 or 9.1 content is hard. there are a few technologies to fake the rest of the channels in but on your budget i wouldnt pursue anything more than 5.1
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time? if you bought a set of speakers like the energy take 5.1 and a receiver time isnt a real issue. all you need to do is run some speaker wire, hook things up and then run the receiver setup. this sounds like a warzone with gunshot like sounds, pops, lasers (seriously.. its odd) which auto times your speaker delay for ideal sound.
honestly once i ran the wires (1-2 hours of installing boxes and running wires through the walls) it took me 20 minutes to unbox and install everything. another 10 minutes to figure out how to run speaker setup and then a month to learn how to use the remote (kidding... but there sure are lots of buttons!)
you dont save any time going HTIB for setup.
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now... you can definitely buy speakers seperately however for a first timer like you and with your budget you might be better off with a kit. again, i highly recommend going with the energy take 5.1 classic set as its pretty much the lowest cost kit (all 5 speaker and a sub) which actually sounds good. a more expensive option would be the klipsch hd theater (though not sure if thats available in the usa only). i know boston acoustics also makes a kit and they are okay speakers but i'm not sure about details on them. there are likely some other brands (from europe) that i'm not familiar with who have similar decent quality sets at a non-heart-attack price.
my suggestion would either be the
z906 + soundcard, or
ET Classic 5.1 + Receiver
of course the full system being a bit more costly but a bit better on options and quality as well as being able to be added to and/or upgraded in the future. supporting multiple devices is also nice if you want to keep it around for many years and use it for your living room.
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thanks. its not laid out exactly how i would like it but this room is temporary.
as far as equipment is concerned, i'm very happy with it. its a huge difference from using computer speakers.