Ok, just moved house, where I asked the previous owners to leave the speaker wires running hidden into the top corners of the rooms for me. We have an ageing Sony 880 5.1 Surround which I paid a lot for back in the day. Originally I was looking at getting a new system with satellite speakers up on the walls.

Here’s the realism – we have two young kids, so spending loads on a posh system that KJ01 or KJ02 might poke lego into in sounds daft.

So I want to know, a) are Soundbars with virtual Dolby any good and b) I note the 5.1 Surround is cheap these days, so buying a £100 – £150 system – is it worth it?

Any recommendations also appreciated.

Really depends on your expectations.

Soundbars are utter rubbish but people who have spent their money on them think they are great.

I would rather have £150 worth of 2 channel than £150 worth of 5.1 for instance but you may place more importance on the surround effect than sound quality.

I bought a Wharfedale (I think) speaker set from Richer Sounds for £150 about umm… 7-8 years ago maybe? Silvery plastic units, nothing special, but they are much weightier than cheapo supermarket jobs, and the sub is a large solid box which does the job.

Used with a similarly old Marantz AV unit thingy it’s decent enough for movies, although music is not so great.

We just have to empty out the subwoofer of lego, remotes, cameras etc occasionally, that’s all. The speakers are not really vulnerable cos the cones are hidden.

molgrips, rolling down to RS with a budget in mind is probably a good thing to do.

I dreamed of a Marantz filled household 15 years ago before I got into MTB’ing…… 😕

Or mount your speakers high up and out of the way (until they can throw stuff that is!) 🙂

I got some unit or other, I forget – it’s a big double height separate thing, it’s ex-display with a small dent in the top and was only £150.

It suddenly stopped working about 6 months ago, I finally got around to opening it up, nothing wrong inside, but the fuse in the plug had gone. Continues to work perfectly – odd.

Went with my girlfriend’s father to test a Bose soundbar – sounded really good in the perfectly square Bose test room with smooth walls, sounded rubbish in a 300 old house with wonky walls and all the other clutter people normally have in a lounge!

Here’s the realism – we have two young kids, so spending loads on a posh system that KJ01 or KJ02 might poke lego into in sounds daft.

Sorry, but what are they going to poke Lego into? The amp has nothing to poke anything into, the sub should have a grill over it, and the satellite speakers ought to be mounted up on the wall, where you specifically asked the previous tenants to leave the speaker wires. Spurious argument, TBH.
I would recommend these:
http://www.richersounds.com/product/speaker-packages/kef/kht2005-hd1/kef-kht2005-hd1
The satellite speakers come with stands, there are wall brackets available, and they are really excellent speakers.

Oh wait – the stuff I have isn’t Wharfedale, it’s Tannoy SFX5.1:

http://www.richersounds.com/product/speaker-packages/tannoy/sfx5.1/tann-sfx5.1-blk

Cheaper here tho:

http://compare.ebay.co.uk/like/230848726980?var=lv&ltyp=AllFixedPriceItemTypes&var=sbar&adtype=pla&crdt=0

These days when people say how great a new movie is, and I find it pretty tedious, I often suspect it’s because they’ve got a flashy surround system and 46″ screen, and I’m using the tinny speakers from my 3 year old 26″ sony.

As an owner of a not particularly flashy TV and surround system, let me tell you it does absolutely nothing for the quality of the movies 🙂