They don't make stuff like they used to

[Juio]

I missed the good old days where the ideal home theater was just two large speakers with 250+ watts per channel.

My cousin use to have a large stereo system with two large speakers that totally rumble the whole room and made the windows tremble. The bass was incredibly powerful and the speakers had so much potential that there was no need for a subwoofer since each speaker had two large woofer for the bass. Watching movies was a blast and listening to music felt incredible. I remember watching Terminator 2 on VHS, where during that scene where Arnold was shotgunning the T1000 at the arcade place, the sound blast felt incredibly powerful on my cousin's stereo. I also remember watching Independence Day and man it sure sounded really loud. When we wached Space Jam, the Michael Jordan slam dunks at the beginning of the movie just rumble the floor.

Nowadays, not even the most expensive home theater receivers cannot output that much power for the front speakers that are usually use for stereo listening compare to a good old large stereo system. I no longer see large speakers at any electronic stores have large woofers. Now you gotta get two large speakers and a subwoofer to get that full stereo sound whereas back in the day you only depended on the two speakers alone. I agree that the sound quality and the speakers have improved a lot over the past 15 years, but still what happened to that awesome power and bass that came from two speakers without the need of a subwoofer?

When it comes to mini-stereos, they are crap. Ever since Aiwa died because of Sony, I haven't heard a mini-stereo that had a lot of pump and sound clarity compare to my old Aiwa mini-stereo. Almost every mini-stereo I try out sounds all muffle and weak. The bass is horrible and the designs for the speakers and receiver look ugly. What happened? It feels like they are going backwards when it comes to mini-stereos.

I no longer see large stand alone stereo systems with a lot of power.

I hate how Lossy formats like mp3 is consider ideal for music listening. I hate how "stereo" devices that are just made for ipods or some crap like that is becoming mainstream for listening to music. Most of them sound like crap and don't reproduce good stereo sound at all.

My point is, I missed how everything was "better" back then in some aspects.

[LordoftheRingsEE]

But then, back then they did not have Dolby TrueHD, DTS-HD Master Audio, High Resolution Multichannel Linear PCM, HQV Realta & Reon video processors, ABT2010 video processors, Gennum VSX video processors, Audyssey MultEQ XT and MultEQ Pro, Audyssey Dynamic EQ and Volume, Audyssey DSX with Height and Width channels Doby Pro Logic IIx and IIz, THX Ultra2 Plus with Loudness Plus, Dolby Volume, seven or even nine power amplifiers, extensive DSP audio modes with zillion of adjustable parameters (Yamaha), top of the line Dacs and DSPs from Analog Devices, Texas Instruments, Burr-Brown, Cristal Cirrus Logic, ESS Sabre32 Premier, Automatic Room Correction from YPAO, Advanced MCACC with Phase Control, ICE amplifiers,
and I can keep on for years...

Nowadays, you have Yamaha RX-Z11, RX-Z7, RX-V3900/1900, Denon AVR5308CI, AVR-4810CI, AVR-4310CI, AVR-3808CI, Onkyo TX-NR1007/3007/5007, TX-NR906, TX-SR876, Integra DTR-9.9, DTR-8.8, Pioneer Elite SC-09TXH, SC-07, SC-05, VSX-21TXH/23TXH, Marantz SR8002, NAD T 785/T 775, Arcam FMJ AVR600/500, Rotel RSX-1560/1550...
Nowadays, you get excellent Surround Pre/Pros from many manufacturers; Krell, Onkyo, Lexicon, Integra, Denon, Marantz, Classe, NAD, Theta Digital, Meridian, Anthem, Arcam, Outlaw Audio, Quad, Primare, Simaudio, Rotel, and few more.
Nowadays, you got excellent multichannel power amplifiers from Emotiva, Denon, Anthem, ATI, Boulder, Krell, McIntosh, Classe, CinePro, Integra, Lamm Audio Laboratory, NAD, Onkyo, Outlaw Audio, Parasound, Quad, Rotel, Primare, Simaudio, Theta Digital and a few more.
~ And speakers, well don't let me go there, as some cost over $2 million just for a single Stereo pair with it's own amplification!

Anyway, the point is that today we are much more advanced in technology and also in full immersion of all our senses than yesteryear.
There are more powerful amps, speakers, preamps, receivers, and eveything else including SACDs, Blu-rays, Streaming, Wireless, Integration, and simply more of everything...

So, what was your post about?

[punisher]

go to www.audiogon.com

get yourself a good used pre amp and 2 channel amp...used cd player..add a pair of some good used full range speakers..like B&W nautilus and you will be in heaven

[Juio]

Wow, that's a great website, but it sucks that that some of the large full range speakers are pickup only.

[Arkadin]

I have some old Polk cabinet speakers that are just incredible.
they are the bigass boxy type speakers that they used to make back in the "old" days.
They still sound amazing.

[ack_bak]

I totally do not agree. I find modern speakers and subwoofers to sound better than the big speakers I grew up listening to. If you are talking home theater, just check out Favelle's thread on his homemade subwoofer build, or other subwoofers from eD, HSU, SVS, etc. I would take a dedicated sub (or 2, or 4) anyday over some big bulky tower speaker that just has a massive woofer.

And you could just buy something like this:
http://www.jtrspeakers.com/triple12.html

[Gunyaga]

the ability of newer tech to resolve fine detail at inflation-adjusted prices compared to the prices and size of "old," tech back in the day represents a huge leap forward in my opinion.

Nice stereo speaker setups are exactly that, new OR old, nice new surround setups deliver much more information to the viewer with alot more clarity and resolve for the buck han old systems did.

I'm not knocking some of the older tech, and appreciate alot, but then again, I am responding to a post that held up Aiwa mini systems as a reference for audio quality, so what does it matter?

[Arkadin]

I think good modern speakers are better for sure as far as overall sound quality and musicality.
I was mainly responding to the idea of having just 2 speakers with no subwoofer.
many speakers today cannot produce anywhere near the bass of some of these older speakers, but I would never use these old Polk speakers in my home theater.
But to listen to music in stereo without the need for a sub they are amazing.
They work great with a turntable and an Allman Bothers live at the Fillmore lp.
much more powerful than my HT speakers by themselves.

[Irishman]

Wow, that's a great website, but it sucks that that some of the large full range speakers are pickup only.

It seems like you're missing sheer volume over precision and accuracy.

Am I right?

[Favelle]

I'd take a dedicated subwoofer (or 4) over ram-jamming all my frequencies into a bunch of tower speakers. That might have worked well on low-bitrate crap from the 80's and 90's, but not now.

[Juio]

I think good modern speakers are better for sure as far as overall sound quality and musicality.
I was mainly responding to the idea of having just 2 speakers with no subwoofer.
many speakers today cannot produce anywhere near the bass of some of these older speakers, but I would never use these old Polk speakers in my home theater.
But to listen to music in stereo without the need for a sub they are amazing.
They work great with a turntable and an Allman Bothers live at the Fillmore lp.
much more powerful than my HT speakers by themselves.

I agree that modern speakers do have better sound quality and clarity. This past weekend when I went to Fry's, I saw some nice $400+ Polk speakers and they sounded great and I was impressed with the overall sound quality. However, a subwoofer was needed to get the bass and that I did not like. I just missed the idea where you can simply just walk in to any electronic store that sells decent speakers and buy full-range large speakers at a decent price. I have to go to a thrift and see if they have some good old large stereo speakers and cheap prices.

My friend did bought a pair of RCA speakers for $80 at the thrift store (and in great shape too) and they sounded amazing once it was hook up to a 110 watt Onkyo receiver. The bass was powerful enough that he didn't need a subwoofer for his home theater system. Even though these speakers were under power since it can handle twice the output, they still sounded great. I can only imagine how they would sound like at full power.

For my setup I do use two full range speakers for my front channels, but they still need a subwoofer since they are under power. They sounded amazing when I had these hook up to an old stereo system we used to have.

[Josh Z]

However, a subwoofer was needed to get the bass and that I did not like.

Sonically, it's better to route bass to a subwoofer than to large main speakers. Directing the bass to the woofers in loudspeakers can cause it to muddy up the mid-range and high-end from those speakers. You'll get cleaner sound by separating the bass from the rest of the signal.

It's generally recommended that even if you have full-range loudspeakers, to set them for "Small" and let a dedicated subwoofer handle the low frequencies.

[punisher]

Sonically, it's better to route bass to a subwoofer than to large main speakers. Directing the bass to the woofers in loudspeakers can cause it to muddy up the mid-range and high-end from those speakers. You'll get cleaner sound by separating the bass from the rest of the signal.

It's generally recommended that even if you have full-range loudspeakers, to set them for "Small" and let a dedicated subwoofer handle the low frequencies.

that depends on the speakers and your equipment..not to mention your environment ,ie "room acoustics"..that's like saying cd's sound better than vinyl..in the right set up..cd's are no match for a turntable

[godamongmen]

big woofers on speakers don't even come close to a good subwoofer. Big Woofers on speakers will only go down about 50hz, maybe 40hz at -3dB if they are really awesome. And yeah you would need a TON of power. While subwoofers (good ones) go as low as the human ear can hear. They are self powered(most of the time) and you get all the low frequencies and the thumping you just can't get without a dedicated subwoofer, which makes all the diffrence in the world.

[CaptainCanuck]

If you go to an audiophile stereo store you can find all the giant speakers you want and big ass tube amps to run them.