5.1 Speakers - Which is more worthy of it's price?

[DiNZi]

Hi all,

Hopefully you can help me make my mind up, I'm in a bit of a dilemma here, I've got my new AV Receiver the Yamaha RX-V675 and I initally had my mind set on getting the Monitor Audio Vector 5.1 speaker set, this was a week ago.

Since then, I have bought the AV Receiver and lots of used Speakers have popped up for good deals and I'm just wondering, are they better than the Monitor Audio Vectors that I was going to go for? I haven't ordered the Vector's yet, but there are only 10 left and once those are gone, they are finished forever.

I'll be using these for movies mainly, and music occasionally, some movies which friends/family will be watching are also quite musical.

Speaker Choices:
Monitor Audio Vector - brand new - 300 - Spec: http://www.monitoraudio.co.uk/assets/files/brochures/vector.brochure.pdf
KEF KHT 2005.3 - used - 250 - Spec: http://www.kef.com/uploads/files/en/kht_brochure_en.pdf
Wharfedale DX-1 HCP - brand new - 300 - Spec: www.wharfedale.co.uk/files/brochure/20131112065258_13.pdf
Q Acoustics 1010i - used - 200 - Spec: http://www.q-acoustics.co.uk/themes/qacoustics/1000i_brochure.pdf

As you can see from above, my budget is between 300-350.

The one that struck me the most was the Q Acoustics 1010i's, theres just something about Q Acoustics which recently just looks pretty cool to me, also the dual driver Centre channel.

Is it still a tough choice?

Room size length 15 feet/4.5 meters and width 10 feet/3 meters.

 

[DiNZi]

To add as well, being honest, when looking at the brochures I saw that the Sensitivity/dB and Power Handling (RMS) for the Monitor Audio Vector is probably rated the lowest.

I don't know how significant this is, but just saying, thanks.

 

[ghatgepatil]

Where would you mount them? Wall or on stand? If wall, then you might be better off choosing front-ported speakers, which makes it either KEF or Qacoustics.

All three, MA, QA and KEF possess 4" mid-woofers. That is the minimum needed. Power available with your AVR would not create any hiccups with any of them, IMO.

Left to me, I might tilt towards the KEF, but the QA isn't bad either!

 

[DiNZi]

Where would you mount them? Wall or on stand? If wall, then you might be better off choosing front-ported speakers, which makes it either KEF or Qacoustics.

All three, MA, QA and KEF possess 4" mid-woofers. That is the minimum needed. Power available with your AVR would not create any hiccups with any of them, IMO.

Left to me, I might tilt towards the KEF, but the QA isn't bad either!

It would most likely be mounted on the wall your right.

I was also looking at the KEFs as an option, but the Monitor Audio and Q Acoustics to me look best because not only of the driver size but the wooden cabinet size they will most likely sound more deep when playing content, do you agree?

Thanks for your advice, I'm tilting towards the MA Vectors and QA myself.

If I get a used QA 2000/2000i in next few days for 300 I will purchase and forget everything else. Agree?

 

[DiNZi]

This is a question I've not asked, not many Speaker packages do give this figure but MA have for the Vector package as well as the Mass package. It's the 'Maximum SPL or dBA' figure, which for the Vector satellites it's measured at 103dB and for the Mass satellites measured at 104dB. Not much difference there, would this mean that the 85dB figure that is given as Sensitivity (1W@1M) could be more than it actually is? Maybe, my AV Receiver the Yamaha RX-V675 will be able to push it that bit further as it's not that much of a budget AVR.