About Dave Hathaway Expertise Questions about any aspect of Home Theater Systems including video-- TV and projectors, projection screens, High Definition Television ,audio/video receivers, DVD, speakers and placement, wiring, Satellite TV systems. Familiar with all these areas from the operating priciples, system design and installation viewpoints.
Experience Electronics engineer with 30 years experience, own a small Home Theater Business and do custom installs of Home Theater, Dish Network Satellite, Surround Sound systems, TV antennas, plus commerial and industrial satellite and TV distribution systems.
Question Thank you so much for your response. It made me not go for the ebay speakers because they looked pretty cheap, not much watts either. Anyway I was looking (and heard at walmart in person) at "Sony 420-Watt Home Theater Sound System, HT-DDW660" at walmart and am very pleased with the sound from it. I also wanted something without the dvd player to save money because the xbox I have already does that of course. So have you heard anything about that system? Any better bang for my buck?
Also I need to know exactally how to hook it up. I want the xbox and the tv (and the stereo if possible) to have surround sound. I need to know what wires I need, what converters, what hook ups needs to be in the back of the the tv etc. Thank you very much for all your help!
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Followup To
Question -
i am looking at some 5.1 surround sound speakers on ebay and i was wondering what it would take for it to hook up to tv/xbox to play surround sound out of it? specifically i need to know what outlets the tv has to have, what the speakers need to have etc. i would want it to play out of my tv so would i have to plug my existing stereo into the tv and then plug the speakers into the stereo? even when i get that far i wouldnt know how to actually make it surround sound, it would just have 3 speakers playing one thing and 3 speakers playing another thing, it wouldn't be true surround sound. in order to "tweak" it for surround sound should i get a good head unit? as you can see i dont know much, so honestly anything you give to me for advice would be greatly appriciated! thank you!
ps-if i am not makeing sense please tell me.
Answer -
Hi Jared,
The speakers do not a surround sound system make! It really takes both a set of speakers and a surround sound amplifier/receiver do to the trick. A true surround sound 5.1 system has six speakers; a pair of left and right front speakers, a center speaker, a pair of left and right rear speakers (also called the surround speakers or back speakers) and a sub-woofer. There are five speaker channels; which are left front, right front, center, left rear and right rear. The .1 in the 5.1 is the sub-woofer so there are really six channels and six speakers that are needed to do true surround sound. All true surround amplifiers have all six channels available and the various surround decoders (Dobly Pro Logic, Dolby Digital, etc) built into the amp.
So to answer one of your questions--three speakers will not do it! A stereo amp will not do it, no matter how many speakers are connected as it only has two channels.
The TV does not generate surround sound, it is carried in the left and right stereo signals which can be decoded by a surround amp into Pro Logic analog surround sound. It only happens if the program is in stereo and in surround, otherwise the TV just produces stereo sound. So when you tune in a channel that is in surround, the TV audio can be sent to the amp and surround sound (analog Dolby Pro Logic) can be produced. The Dolby digital (much better surround sound) is produced only from Satellite, Digital TV broadcasts, or DVDs. Oh yes, the XBox does have digital sound in surround and it can be decoded by an amp to produce full 5.1 Dolby digital audio. Sounds very good too!
There are lots of good surround sound systems that can do full surround and you may even find some of them on Ebay--but I would recommend that you visit Best Buy or Circuit City and listen to some of their surround systems. They start at about $200 for a compact system and go up from there. Pioneer and Yamaha make very good small systems at reasonable prices.
There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers! You need to learn a bit more about surround and listen to it. This will give you a good idea of what it is all about. If you have other questions, just come back in with a follow up. I'll try to help.
Dave
Answer Hi Jared,
I would also take a look at the Yamaha systems if I were you. There is nothing wrong with Sony,but you may find more features on the Yamaha for no more money. Sony is kind of over priced lots of times.
The Sony unit you are looking at will do full surround sound and is easy to connect to do so. Just connect the Xbox digital output to the digital input of the Sony and that is all there is to it. Then both DVDs and games will play in surround. For the TV, connect from the audio output RCA connectors to RCA inputs on the Sony receiver. It will then do Pro Logic surround sound as well. You will only get surround from the TV when on a local station or cable that is sending stereo sound and is also encoded in Pro Logic surround. Read the hook up instructions carefully and you should have no problems. The surround decoders are built into the Sony and will switch to the right mode of operation automatically.
