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First look at this hack reminded me of the Bowers & Wilkins PV1. IMHO, a much much better deathstar subwoofer.

Sigh. If only i could afford one of these babies.

I would rather be stuck in stereo with two very high quality speakers, than surround sound with 7 crappy ones.

that is exactly what i have and most people who come over (except for the audiophile who helped me pick out and set up my equipment) say that dvd's and music sound better on my system than anywhere else they've been. multiple people have said that dvd's sound like the theatre (even though they are listening in stereo, not surround!), and that they would rather watch a movie at my place any day.

i have 2 B&W floor speakers, B&W sub, rotel preamp/processor, and rotel amplifier. total cost was just over $5,000 for everything (that's not including the 50 inch samsung dlp). trust me when i say this setup sounds unbe-freakin-lievable. much better than an inexpensive 5.1 or 7.1 surround setup with preamp/amp in one unit, and cheap speakers.

Could be any number number of manufacturers. Just to name a few. Google for Electrostatic Speaker Manufacturer to see some more high end stuff.

You would be suprised at the different materials conventional speaker cones are made from. You've probably seen plastic and paper cones. Probably even a few different types of plastics.

Speaker cones have to low resonance or at least a very narrow frequency range they resonate in. With a narrow resonating range, you can just put a low-pass/high-pass filter on it so it never receives the resonating frequencies - they get sent to another speaker with a different resonant frequency.

Metal tweeters have become very popular recently. Any really light, but tough metal is good. Alumin(i)um and titanium are the most commonly used, but there are some more exotic ones like Focal/JMLabs beryllium tweeters. The problem with metal cones is that they act like tuning forks - a really narrow resonant frequency range, but if they hit it they really resonate. My B&W 603s have aluminium woofers - which I just love the sound of. They cut them off pretty low though.

Kevlar (yes, the bullet proof vest material) is also a popular material at the moment. B&W and Wharfdale are two companies that make Kevlar based drivers. B&W have some interesting documents on their web site on what makes it such a good material.

Wooden cones would have a nice wide frequency range. Think about how wood sounds when you knock it with your knuckles - a nice dull thud. Yes, I'm ignoring all the musical instruments made of wood. I'm talking about your normal block of wood. They already make the vast majority of speaker cabinets out of wood precisely for the low-resonant properties that it exhibits.

This is interesting news in the world of hi-fi.

One of the other applications I could see this being really useful is speakers. Light, flexible and strong material - the perfect blend for a speaker. Kevlar is already being used (and boy do those puppies sounds sweet). You've got to admit, it would be an uber-geeky cool thing to have silk cones. I'd even bet it's been done before. But buckets of cheap artificial silk could be the next big thing.

I've actually heard one "art" type speaker that was worth someting, and that is the B&W Nautilus. I've got no idea if all their chatter about the tapered tubes has any foundation in science, or is just marketing hype. However, the speaker does bak up all its hype with good sound. It really does sound great and measure flat. But, interestingly enough, I'd say it is no better than the SC-Vs from the now closed down Dunlavy Audio Labs. They built your standard boxy speakers ranging from large to huge, with a semetric driver arrangment, 1 tweeter in teh middle and 2x of each mid/woofer on the top and bottom, moving out in order of size. All in all they were the most accurate for the money I could find. But ya, boxy, boring speakers seem to be the way to go. I've seen some small modifications, but every kind of speaker that has impressed me (other then the Nautilus) has been a normal box type, with a normal arrangment of drivers.

I think the point of bi-wiring a speaker is so that you can use two separate power-amps (ie. one for the tweeter and one for the woofer). Having two wires going to the same amp is pretty pointless.

The B&W Nautilus speakers actually require four separate stereo power amps (or eight mono amps) for each pair of speakers, since there are four driver units in each speaker. This would obviously require four wires going to each speaker. So if you want to drop $25,000 on a pair of speakers, be prepared to drop another $25,000 or so on all the amps you'll need :p

The best example of this was a double-blind study done on speaker cables a while back. They compared $200/ft solid core silver speaker wires against $.10/ft 16-gauge copper lamp wire (you can get a 250ft spool at home depot for about $25).

The results were damn near 50-50, with the slight edge going to the lamp wire. I'm now using lamp wire to connect my B&W DM601 speakers, and they sound fabulous.

"CD quality" does not been just having something recorded at 44.1KHz at 16 bits. A $5 rat shack microphone and a sound blaster is not going to get you anywhere near the capabilities of that low (vs. 24/96 or even 24/196) sample rate. Good audio equipment costs some real money. Take a look at this for a good quality entry level audio card. With good audio equipment (pre/pro, speakers), your $5 rat shack microphone recording will sound like utter crap compared to something recorded with this card (and a sennheiser or comparable microphone). Simple playback of normal CDs through this setup will also be an eye opening expierience.

Hardly. There are two I can think of that outclass EVERYTHING in the US. B&W's line, specifically the Nautilus, are some of the most trick speakers on Earth... the 601 coming it at $400 to the 801 used at Abbey Road studio to the $30,000.00 Nautilus - all made in the UK. From Holland we have BD Design's Oris. There are many more. Focal from France, Morel from Israel, Peerless from Germany, Solen from Canada... the list goes on. I really cannot name a US company that can compete with the exception of Magnepan (which comes to mind when you mention these thin speakers). If you are thinking of Bose as a world leader, they make crap... but my point is the US retaining leadership is a stretch of the imagination. The US has market share, but I current audio reviews claim that B&W is the hallmark of design. Many agree.

You absolutely must check out B&W Speakers. They're imported from across the pond, and nothing even compares to their sound. The midrange/bass cones are woven kevlar which (a) produce exceedingly clear signal response, and (b) since they're bright yellow, look damn cool.

I have a pair of B&W 601 S2s (I paid $450/pair) on the left/right channel and a CC6 S2 ($360) for the center channel... and some cheap bookshelf speakers on the rears. Do *not* get a cheap center channel speaker; you will pay with crappy sound.

The received I use is a Sony STR-D845... I'm pretty happy with it. I know Sony commonly includes a feature called Auto Format Decode, which monitors the digital *inputs*, figures out the format, and decodes appropriately. Do other receivers do this?

Too the best of my knowledge (I've looked around a bit) there are no consumer level products that support true Dolby Digital format (preferably with a digital output). Creative labs Live cards support 4 speakers, but not a true 5.1 dolby digital, though they sometimes make it seem like it does by advertising their speakers (cambridge soundworks) as Dolby Digital or whatever. They are not. But the card does have an SPDIF output, which will allow you to connect it to a high quality stereo with a good D/A converter.

I recommend what a previous poster had said, get a high quality Dolby Digital reciever (or seperate components if you can afford them). Regular Sony models and most other basic brands Marantz, Harmon-Kardon and others for good quality sound which can be had for around $1000 (US), or less. I have a Proceed system, but expect to pay $10k+ for something of that caliber (along with Krell and others).

If you get such a reciever, make sure it has at least 2 (preferably more) RCA SPDIF inputs. That way you can use the SPDIF (Dobly Digital) output from your MPEG decoder that the DVD is attached to and the SPDIF of a soundcard to the reciever using a RCA cable. This will move the digital to analog processing OUT of the computer, into the reciever, which has much higher quality components and a much reduced noise floor.

Combine the reciever will a high quality set of speakers and a subwoofer and you have an incredible home theater system. Important: Don't skimp on speakers any more then the reciever. DO NOT BUY BOSE SPEAKERS!!! There are far better quality and better sounding brands that cost less money. Bose, like Microsoft, is based on marketing, the quality of their products is inferior to many others. Go for a traditional bookshelf or floor standing speaker as opposed to Bose type mini cubes (if you get floor standers you may be able to forgo getting a subwoofer initially, though it is recommended). B&W offers some of the finest loudspeakers available, from $250 to $40,000. I highly recommend the 300 and 600 series for an affordable home theater. Match it with a Velodyne subwoofer, and you have a system to die for.

Sorry if I rambled a little off topic here, but Audio is hobby of mine :-) I have a similar situation in my dorm room. Next I want to get a video projecter with a d-sub or RGB input so I can connect my computer to it and project my DVD's on a huge screen!

Spyky