Which surrounds for Quartet - Academy - Quartet in the front?

[kdjk5467]

Hi all,

I have Quartet fronts L/R and I am going to get an Academy for a center (almost have wife buy-in). I have been browsing this forum for advice on surrounds/rears that match. Klipsch recommended the Academy for the Quartets as a center but does not list a matching surround speaker. I can not go with more quartets due to space constraints. I understand that some say more Academys would work but I would like to know what else.

So far, I have read here couple folks recommend something from the KG series. Everything from .5 through 2.5!

I would love in-wall speakers due to the limitations I have with space. Are those even worth looking at for a match with my older speakers?

I am interested in "learning how to fish" so to speak so if you feel like sharing how to make this decision that would be great. Is it just experience and listening? Or do I look at response and horns and such....?

Thanks for your time,

JK

[USNRET]

While not "purist", when I first bought this place I did not have a dedicated room so I bought white RS-7s for WAF. They worked well in the living room and then when I built the basment I continued to use them. I have since moved along and put the Belles up front and tried switching out the sides/rears with the RS7s/Chorus IIs and Quartets. To the naked ear I can not tell the difference between them. There are some measurable differences on my PAA 3 with equalization but the RSs work just fine in my environment especially so for movies. So with that said I think that unless you want a certain speaker than a good Klipsch (anything else?) will work fine as the side/rear. SACD music is better with my Quarts or Chorus IIs bringing up the rear but I can't remember the last time I listened to that format. I have found that the L/C/R must work well together; the rest is gravey.

My 2 cents.

Edited to say: I suppose it matters what 'room' you have the system in. A correctly treated room will get you the best and show the faults in any system. I'm OK with mine with a less then ideal room shared with the family and treated with homemade (but researched) acoustic material.

[SilverSport]

I have used KSP-S6s (there was a pair on sale in the garage sale section a bit back for a great price) and KSF-S5s with Quartet Mains...

Bill

[kdjk5467]

Thanks for your time to respond. I'm looking into the two mentioned here so far.

My room is nothing special. The medium-small family living room with stuff everywhere so it is far from ideal (unless it happened to magically turn out to be good by chance!).

I am not going to max the sound quality with this at all with this room but I hope to get reasonably matched speakers. Currently I have a KSC-C1 as my center and the dialog in movies is terrible. The incidental sounds and music coming from left and right overpower the center even if i try to adjust the relative levels in my Pioneer Elite VSX-26TX

[USNRET]

Thanks for your time to respond. I'm looking into the two mentioned here so far. My room is nothing special. The medium-small family living room with stuff everywhere so it is far from ideal (unless it happened to magically turn out to be good by chance!). I am not going to max the sound quality with this at all with this room but I hope to get reasonably matched speakers. Currently I have a KSC-C1 as my center and the dialog in movies is terrible. The incidental sounds and music coming from left and right overpower the center even if i try to adjust the relative levels in my Pioneer Elite VSX-26TX

Want to borrow an Academy to see what it's like? Pay the $30 +/- shipping both ways and I'll send you the WO for a trial.

[SilverSport]

what a deal and the Academy is the best (next to another Quartet) Center for your Mains...I ran one for awhile with my Quartets...

Bill

[kdjk5467]

Want to borrow an Academy to see what it's like? Pay the $30 +/- shipping both ways and I'll send you the WO for a trial.

You sir, are incredible. Thanks for the offer but I'm not prepared to purchase the surrounds for a couple/few weeks probably (depends on a couple things).

Are you suggesting Academys for surrounds? I need to get the Academy for my center first. I already decided that it is a good center match for my quartets fronts. I'm waiting on a forthcoming check and then I get my center.

Thanks again for the offer You restore my faith in humanity.

[Cal Blacksmith]

In truth, the rears can be KG series. There is not a lot of info that comes out of the rears and the front 3 are the most important. I have Forte 1s in front with an Academy center and Quartets for rears and KG1.5s for back. The sound is great and the envy of all that hear it.

[USNRET]

Want to borrow an Academy to see what it's like? Pay the $30 +/- shipping both ways and I'll send you the WO for a trial.

You sir, are incredible. Thanks for the offer but I'm not prepared to purchase the surrounds for a couple/few weeks probably (depends on a couple things).

Are you suggesting Academys for surrounds? I need to get the Academy for my center first. I already decided that it is a good center match for my quartets fronts. I'm waiting on a forthcoming check and then I get my center.

Thanks again for the offer You restore my faith in humanity.

First thanks for the kind words but my ex would disagree with you.

geeze Louise, I should lay off the juice! I read this as you were looking for a center, OK I am a DA and can not read but yes the Academy would be Ok for surrounds I would think but for the price of them you could get better like another set of Quarts. Offer still stands if you want to try it as the center before you buy one.

Ever since I was a young sailor with no money, I have lusted over stereo but could never and will never have the "best". What I have now is quite acceptable, thank you. I have never been able to audition anything before I bought and then wanted something else. I went into the local Klipsch/Mcintosh guys and wanted 5 LS IIs with cash in the pocket, asked some questions concerning a turntable and the guy couldn't be bothered to look up and specs for me. Needless to say I bought nothing there. I've asked to put down money on used amps/pre-amps to take home and try in my system and you would have thought I was an alien from the looks I got, So now if the urge moves I'll loan out stuff for folks to try so they can know not just go in blindly. There are 3 more Klipsch fans in my engineering group at work because they took a couple of mine over gave them a try. All three bought new from Klipsch in the last 6 weeks. To me speakers are very personal, what I like some people are turned off by and go home happy with their HTIB.

[Mikekid]

Retired Navy:

May not be the "best" but I'd take your set-up anyday! Awesome gear!

[IronNad]

JK - My name is Dan and I am following you in the same journey described above. On a separate note I am actually moving from Milwaukee back to a condo I own in the Lincoln Park area (in July 2009). My girl and I are pumped to get back to Chicago, which we are planning to be there long-term. Anyway.......

I was wondering if you could share your learnings in the following two areas:

1) Best avenues for me to source buying an Academy (to use as my center with current Quartets)? Price range I should expect to spend? Assuming you got one, how do you like it? Would you recommend this same plan for me?

2) Did you find any great direction or recommendations on what kind of surrounds to add to the Quartets/ Academy combo? What did you end up doing?

Current Speakers: L/R Quartets (staying). RC-35 Center (needing upgrade to Academy. Klipsch advised my #2 option would be the RC-64 for $1,000). My surrounds currently are the RB-25's (at this point leaning towards getting the RB-81's- I have Klipsch stands that these will fit on). I run a 5.0 system.

Power: In the process of upgrading from older Onkyo receiver to: Integra DTC 9.8 (surround processor) with a Parasound - Halo A 51 - My Quartets are STARVING for power.

Any learnings, direction, advice and opinions would be greatly appreciated! Thank you in advance for any help you can provide. All opinions are welcome!

[kdjk5467]

Dan,

I can't really speak to the amplifier. I don't have much experience there. I have a Pioneer Elite. It's several years old and I am very satisfied with it.

As far as the academy, it is better than I even hoped for. Completely changed my system for the better. It replaced a Klipsch SC-1.

I am happy that I got it here from a forum member but another good place is http://audiogon.com/. I paid 400 for mine which is pretty average. You probably won't find a good condition unit for under 350 and shouldn't pay more that 450 in my opinion. Ebay probably wont save you much if anything and you never really know who you are dealing with. That said, I'm sure many fine speakers are sold on ebay, some by members of his forum (although they are commonly offered here first).

I have klipsch SS1 for surrounds and they seem ok to me. One of the things I heard a lot when asking these questions that you are is that the surrounds really do not have to be stellar to work well. I think they should be surrounds though. Directional speakers will not work as well. As the result of some advice I got, I may eventually upgrade to KSP-S6 or similar, maybe RS-7 if I have the money. Again, you don't really need to spend as much on these to get good results.

So, in summary, academy is great and worth getting from someone here or audiogon.com I think. Ebay is probably fine, but I like getting a used speaker from someone who appears to care about them. The one I got from USNRET was great and so was he to deal with.

Good luck

JK

[wuzzzer]

I just picked up a pair of KG 3.5s as my surrounds and I must say they are much better than I had hoped them to be. I just watched the Eagles Farewell HD-DVD and they were amazing as surrounds. I previously had RS-42s and the KGs sound much more like the Fortes than the RS-42s did.