Can I upgrade two of the speakers on a 5.1 surround system?

[AlexC1981]

Hi All,

I have a set of Creative A500 5.1 speakers. It consists of one 17W RMS subwoofer and five 6W 4 Ohm 2" satellite speakers. The satellite speakers are passive and connect into the subwoofer using RCA connectors.

As they are only 2" speakers, would I be able to swap the front left speaker and front right speaker for a couple of slightly bigger bookshelf speakers with tweeters? Would this improve the quality of the sound or mess up the balance of the surround sound?

Thanks,

[Red 5]

AlexC1981 said:

Hi All,

I have a set of Creative A500 5.1 speakers. It consists of one 17W RMS subwoofer and five 6W 4 Ohm 2" satellite speakers. The satellite speakers are passive and connect into the subwoofer using RCA connectors.

As they are only 2" speakers, would I be able to swap the front left speaker and front right speaker for a couple of slightly bigger bookshelf speakers with tweeters? Would this improve the quality of the sound or mess up the balance of the surround sound?

Thanks,

It won’t give you what you want I’m afraid, as there will be cross-over electronics in the subwoofer part.
The signal sent to the 5 small satellite speakers, will be tailored to their limited capabilities.

[AlexC1981]

Ah thanks, I wondered if it would be more complicated. I'm not looking for more volume, I just thought the bigger speakers would sound better. They are for use with a PC for gaming mainly.

I was given the 5.1 speakers, I'm not sure if it is worth me upgrading to them being as my 2.1 speaker system uses slightly bigger speakers. I can't test it at the moment as I don't have a 5.1 capable soundcard.

[Dr Doofenshmirtz]

You can do it, and it will almost certainly sound better. As per the previous poster said, the amp will send the bass to the sub, probably everything <200Hz...but you will still get bass from the bigger speakers as it will only attenuate those sub frequencies, not remove them altogether.

[AlexC1981]

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

[heisthegaffer]

AlexC1981 said:

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

May not be what you're after but you could upgrade bit by bit. Maybe start with an older 5.1 receiver with optical in or a newer one with hdmi in. Then some satellite and sub speakers. I bought a jamo set from avforums for 40 quid. Pretty good albeit only for surround rear duties.

Good luck.

[gmaz]

Just make sure you replace with 4 Ohm ones.

[Red 5]

Dr Doofenshmirtz said:

You can do it, and it will almost certainly sound better. As per the previous poster said, the amp will send the bass to the sub, probably everything <200Hz...but you will still get bass from the bigger speakers as it will only attenuate those sub frequencies, not remove them altogether.

X-over is for exactly that. 100% removal of frequency ranges above a pre-determined point.
It will be set really high on that system, as the satellites are SO limited.
There will not be bass being sent to them, as the small units have no internal cross-over. They are just speaker units in an empty bix.
There’ll not even much in the way of lower mid range sounds.

[Red 5]

AlexC1981 said:

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

You are correct that there is a gap to be filled.
The sound to fill the gap is not being sent down the wires from the sub, to the speakers though.

If you wire up conventional speakers with separate mid-bass and tweeter units, you can’t force the sub to re-think its signal distribution.
Sending such a low power output through a passive bookshelf speaker cross-over, will just see an overly strident treble from those speakers.

[Red 5]

heisthegaffer said:

AlexC1981 said:

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

May not be what you're after but you could upgrade bit by bit. Maybe start with an older 5.1 receiver with optical in or a newer one with hdmi in. Then some satellite and sub speakers. I bought a jamo set from avforums for 40 quid. Pretty good albeit only for surround rear duties.

Good luck.

This is a PC system. There is no way of feeding it from an AV amp.
The sub in the system is already the amp.

[Red 5]

gmaz said:

Just make sure you replace with 4 Ohm ones.

That part has almost zero relevance, a this is nominal.
The sensitivity and design of the speakers cross-over is what matters for adding different speakers.

.

[heisthegaffer]

Red 5 said:

heisthegaffer said:

AlexC1981 said:

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

May not be what you're after but you could upgrade bit by bit. Maybe start with an older 5.1 receiver with optical in or a newer one with hdmi in. Then some satellite and sub speakers. I bought a jamo set from avforums for 40 quid. Pretty good albeit only for surround rear duties.

Good luck.

This is a PC system. There is no way of feeding it from an AV amp.
The sub in the system is already the amp.

I was suggesting replacing it completely.

[Red 5]

heisthegaffer said:

Red 5 said:

heisthegaffer said:

AlexC1981 said:

Right, yes I thought the two medium sized speakers would fill in a gap, considering the size difference between the satellites and the sub. Not sure if that's exactly how it works, but to my mind a range of sizes makes sense.

I'll stick the sub under the desk, the bookshelf speakers front left and right, a satellite in front centre and two satellites behind left and behind right.

May not be what you're after but you could upgrade bit by bit. Maybe start with an older 5.1 receiver with optical in or a newer one with hdmi in. Then some satellite and sub speakers. I bought a jamo set from avforums for 40 quid. Pretty good albeit only for surround rear duties.

Good luck.

This is a PC system. There is no way of feeding it from an AV amp.
The sub in the system is already the amp.

I was suggesting replacing it completely.

If you mean all in one go, then that would of course work
Nobody would ever question the effectiveness of wholesale replacement.

I was replying to the ‘bit by bit’ method suggested above, which won’t be possible.
The Creative speaker system won’t work with an AV amp and Andy new speakers won’t work as part of the existing Creative set up.

[AlexC1981]

Whoops, too late now. A surprise seller offer of £8 + £8 postage for the below speakers made them hard to resist on Saturday morning! It's only for gaming, so I thought these would do.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/PAIR-SAMSUNG-PSZJ8E-BOO...

I was given the Creative 5.1 set for free, so not much total outlay. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't downgrading from my mid-90s Altec Lansing 2.1 set.

I've got the sound card on the way too.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ASUS-XONAR-DGX-ASM-5-1-...

I suppose I may as well give them a go when they arrive and see how they sound. I could buy a separate 5.1 amp, but then I would need to buy a sub-woofer as well. Got to have that rumble!

I've been perfectly happy using the same set of PC speakers for over 20 years, then a "free" upgrade has suddenly given me an outlay of £45

[AlexC1981]

Got my new (to me) stuff now. I thought the soundcard was not going to work at first as the drivers would not install, but they installed fine after a restart.

There is a noticeable improvement using the Samsung speakers with the Creative system. It sounds more rounded and less tinny. I know it's not supposed to work, but it's definitely better.

Actually, if I hadn't bought the Samsung speakers I would be very dissapointed with the Creative system after spending £29 on a soundcard. They don't sound as good as my 90s Altec Lansing 2.1 speakers, but with the Samsungs they are better.

Thanks to all who advised in the thread.