Hi

so i have done my best and read a lot of stuff on this forum but i still have a couple of questions since i know practicaly nothing about audio.

So i think audio is more important then the image coming from my tv so i want to hear great audio but, always when i hear people talking about their surround set i have a bad thinking of it because i always associate it with awfull noise. Mayby the times i heared a surround set playing at friends houses were poor systems or something, but i associate it with really heavy bass, loud noise and i have the feeling it is only good for excample trance music. So my question is, am i wrong on this and can you play like classical music with out it being to boomey. Or is it only good for like hearing the gun sounds in a movie or trance like music?

My second question is that when i hear someone playing his audio set , they always play it really loud and i began to wonder if those surround sets only sound good at high levels. Because i like to play my music and movies at a much lower level then most people do, i atleast want to be able to hear someone else talking to me in the room and sometimes even much lower then that. So yeah the question hear is can you play a surround set at low levels and still hear clearly all the details in the music or movie and without destortion or something like that if you play it at low levels.

And my final question is about noise levels because if i buy a surround set i dont like to bother my neigbours to much, i know the best solution is to go over to them and test it out but they are away on a trip. And i dont have a sound level meter because from what i find they are a bit to much money for me and if there are cheap solutions then that would be great. So i tried out a few things to test out in my own house to replicate like if i was in their own house. I live in a row house and my neighboor and i share a wall were we both have the tv leaning to and that is the place were the surround set will be placed. Now i turned the tv on, walked outside the door, i dont know what material it is made from but it is a small door and not made of wood and has a small gap underneath it. then i walked upstairs who spirals in a 90% turn and i walked into a room who has the same door as the downstairs door both i closed ofcourse. Now im wondering if i hear the sound coming from the television where i walked to upstairs, is that the same volume as if i was there on the other side of the wall at my neighbours? or cant you compare it like that. The wall with my neighboors is one of the best concrete walls not to thick but not small either, im sorry but i dont know the translation of the type of concrete in English.

(lol i type to much, i hope people stick with me) I have tried another method in the past some time ago where i made my house as quite as possible and just listened to what i could hear from the neighboors and i never noticed the sound of kids playing, telephones, vacuum cleaner but i did noticed a crying baby talking without hearing the words but only if i put my ear to the wall and sometimes some hard noises what i think must be footsteps with shoes running up the stairs or something like that.

So i took the talking as a measure tool. Since i almost cant hear them talk from where i am i think it is safe to set the sound of a surround system to talking level. But how do i know how high that level is? Is it if i place someone near the television and put on a news broadcast and if i cant hear both the broadcaster ant the live person talking to me because they even out each other is the television sound set to talking level then? Or am i completly wrong here.

Ah so much questions and mayby not so smart ones but o well i hope some of you can take out the time to educate me.

Thanks a lot and sorry for my poor English because im not native English speaker,

Thur

I think your friend is trying to impress you with the capability of his system and is turning the volume and maybe the bass up too much. I like to hear music the way it was recorded, although you can listen to anything in processed surround if it was recorded in 2 channel then that's the way I listen. Oppo and pioneer both make inexpensive players that can play dvd, dvd-a, sacd, in surround and sound excelent. Next time you visit your friend ask if you can play with the remote and adjust the bass, volume, and surround levels to your taste and then see what you think. I think you will have to wait for your neighbor to return to see how loud it is next door to be sure. Cheap systems sound cheap, especialy in the bass region. I sugest you take your favorite cd and music dvd to a good audio shop and compare different systems with music that you are familiar with and see what you think.

With a good Calibrated system, you should be able to hear the full sensory feeling of both a Movie DVD and musical Cd at an acceptable sound levels for both you and your neighbors.
Keep reading here&find some of the tweaks that you can use. A radio Shack SPL - is $50 and you will use it for the rest of you life- you can find free calibration disc. Money well spent. It will take some time &effort on your part. But when you get it "some what perfect" you will be happy with your system. at any $$$$$ level.
db

Thanks for the suggestions already!

I to like to listen and see the way the makers intented to and thats why i calibrated my television but i didnt know you could calibrate music sets to, but i found out the surround set i am planning on buying has a sort of automate calibration, is that any good? You say cheap systems sound cheap but what excactly is cheap, because i see systems ranging in the thousends of dollars and thats a bit to much for me, i know it gets a bad name but i found a surround system in a box (i think thats how the term is called) for 350 euro's, so mayby not much compared to other sets i see around but it got great reviews, the type is Sony HT-SS1100.
Offcourse im going to the store soon and hear for myself how it sounds but i think mayby that isnt a good way of finding out because of different accoustics just like it is not the best idea to look at television sets in shops because off all that light around and the way they turn the brightness all the way up and everything.

Yes 50 dollar for a sound level meter is a lot lesser then i found (prices ranging in the 100-300 dollars). But i live in Europe and radioshack wont send to europe unfortantly. But it is good to hear that you can play a surround set instalation at an acceptable level and it still sounds good.

Thanks

A few comments:

1) Your neighbor will hear the sound regardless of it's quality level. If you turn it up to above speaking levels then it will likely be heard through the walls.
2) You have a tight budget (~ $700USD, 350 Euros) and are right in between the theater-in-a-box prices and a larger system. You have two options: get a HTIB (home theater in a box) or buy just a receiver and your front speakers. Then slowly add additional speakers and subwoofer as budget allows. Home theaters can do a very good job with stereo music. Some people like using the various surround modes on their receivers, I prefer to use just my front 2 speakers + the subwoofers when listening to music. You may want to find a high end audio store and demo a few classical CD tracks (bring your CDs to the store). Even if the system is _way_ out of your budget, you will still be able to get an idea of what options there are in the home theater market.
3) IMO, classical music will sound so-so given your budget (the speakers just won't be that great). Also, you have the noise level issue (disturbing your neighbor). You may want to consider headphones. For 350 Euro you can get a nice set of headphones, a headphone amp, and a front end that will easily compete with 1000 Euro speaker systems. Check out the forums on head-fi.org for more info (Europeans on that forum can give you specific brand recommendations).