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Modestly priced bookshelf speakers for cabin.

I have a small cabin in the country where I spend weekends.

Current system is a 1980's Toshiba 25wpc receiver I got in high school. Bose 2.2 bookshelf speakers that are about 28 years old. They actually sound okay to me most of the time. $14 Sony DVD/CD player from Goodwill.

Even though this 'system' is sufficient most of the time, I've got the hi-fi bug since getting my home system and I've started thinking about slowly upgrading the cabin system on the lowest budget I can.....since I can't really justify doing it at all. ;-)

Rarely do I do any serious listening down there but would like to be able to when I have the chance.

So my first step is to replace the Bose speakers. Looking to spend no more than $350 or so. Is it possible to significantly improve on the Bose at that price? (I'm assuming yes).

The only thing I've even considered is the Klipsch RB-61 IIs or RP 160Ms. Why Klipsch? Back in the 70's my eccentric uncle used to have a massive pair of them that I thought were cool. Open to other options and advice.

Thanks for any advice.


n80
shazb0t's avatar
shazb0t
2 posts
 
The Debut 2.0 deal recently was a pretty awesome one! Don't sleep on the Elac Uni-Fi UB5's either. Great value 3-way bookshelf when on sale for $350 per pair. Very well reviewed for stereo. 
n80 OP
1,227 posts
 
Finished the shelves for my old Bose speakers. Nothing fancy but they will do and have enough room for a little aiming if necessary.

Up until now they have been sitting on the floor, which is pretty much the worst place for this sort of speaker. I'm sure they'll sound much better at ear level. Bass port faces out.

The cabin is pretty rustic. My daughter (who helped me build it, along with many others, when she was in elementary school) is peeved that I'm mounting speakers on the wall next to an antique Winchester cartridge board and deer horns. The things we do for music.

Maybe I'll tell her that I'll take them down if she gets me a nice set of towers for Christmas!
bigkidz
1,784 posts
 
Best small monitors I have heard are the Sony SS-A3 speakers if you can find a pair.
n80 OP
1,227 posts
 
Reviving an old thread. Was listening to some good recordings down at the cabin and found myself disappointed even with the minimal expectations that low end system warrants.

So now I'm looking around for some low priced speakers but will probably go with some small tower speakers since placement of bookshelf speakers has turned out to be a problem. Given space constraints the only options are too low or too high.

But as I was looking at bookshelf speaker again it became apparent that most bookshelf speakers have the base port in the rear.

Why would you put the bass port in the rear for speakers which are, almost by definition, going on shelf or a wall or fairly close to a wall? It looks like Klipsch has discontinued all of its bookshelf speakers with forward facing base ports.

I know they can go on stands. I've considered that option but would prefer a tower if I'm going to do that. I'm looking at a low end Polk Audio tower with downward facing base port.
loomisjohnson
1,526 posts
 
n80, you've gotten some good suggestions like the acoustic energy and klipsch quartet (if you have the space); my personal recommendation would be to look for a good 80s speaker like the ads l520, which are easy to find <$200 and sound shockingly big and good for such an unassuming piece. something like the polk monitor 10 (or smaller monitor 5) are also vg sounding.
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