Feel free to discuss if these go up to 11. ;)

Meh. I've tried these for installs. They are ok. Monoprice for the 1/3 the price beat these.

I own four of the 8" Elite Series speakers and I can say they are worth well more than the price offered here. I think I paid around $400 a pair when I did my install.

I'm not saying the monoprice speakers are bad because they aren't but to say they are on the same level means you likely don't hear the difference between lossless and 320k MP3 files.

These speakers are for the audiophile who can't really afford the massive tens of thousands of dollar entertainment system.

I will also say for my installation I went with speakercraft for my ceiling setup because they have better adjustment than the pioneer but they cost twice as much too.

Here is a picture of the set of Pioneer speakers I own. At the time no center channel was available so I bridged two full range speakers instead and it sounds amazing..especially when finished off by a pair of subwoofers one. For high bass (10" 150watt pioneer) and one for the low bass to add a punch to explosions (12" 350watt Klipsch).

http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-media/product-gallery/B003BI3NB6/ref=cm_ciu_pdp_images_all

It looks like only the single-cone rectangular frame Elite 6.5" and 8" units are sold as pairs. The rest are sold as singles, which ups your price pretty substantially if you need to buy in pairs.

kuma99 wrote:Meh. I've tried these for installs. They are ok. Monoprice for the 1/3 the price beat these.

is monoprice legit or radio shack quality??? i mean you CAN't beat their prices thats for sure. but does the saying, "you get what you pay for" apply to monoprice?

sdownin wrote:It looks like only the single-cone rectangular frame Elite 6.5" and 8" units are sold as pairs. The rest are sold as singles, which ups your price pretty substantially if you need to buy in pairs.

Plus the 8" elite unit includes:
(2) Pain Masks
You can't beat that. Pain Masks will come in handy with Halloween around the corner.

IMHO, the difference between 320k and lossless is so minor it's never worth spending the extra money to spend. Don't believe the hype...media tricks make you believe that the difference is better in lossy. If you heard a track for the first time ever, you would never know (or even care) if it was lossy or 320 (and studies prove even down to 256)...there are a lot of discussions on this on Hydrogen Audio.

sphui5 wrote:is monoprice legit or radio shack quality??? i mean you CAN't beat their prices thats for sure. but does the saying, "you get what you pay for" apply to monoprice?

I don't have the monoprice ones but I'm taking an educated guess that they are made by the same people... I think I paid $100-ish for 5 speakers on clearance. 3 of them are the 8" rectangle shaped, 2 are 8" round. all of them also have an aim-able tweeter.

Mine are awesome. No one notices that they are even there (put all mine in the ceiling). I didn't expect much out of them but they sound really good. I think the biggest factor is what is pushing them. I have an older Sony 6.1 surround that was a top end Sony model at the time. An audiophile might have a problem with my setup but for the average joe, it's fantastic. Also note I have no sub in my setup and they produce a ton of bass (in reference to Movies). my wife, in the bedroom on the other side of the house, says she feels like she is under attack when I'm watching a good action film.

sphui5 wrote:is monoprice legit or radio shack quality??? i mean you CAN't beat their prices thats for sure. but does the saying, "you get what you pay for" apply to monoprice?

I don't know about monoprice's speakers, but their cables are all top notch. I don't buy A/V cables anywhere else any more. A $4 cable from monoprice is better quality than some $60-$150 cables at a big box electronics store. Monoprice sells you high end quality cables at cheap crap prices.

It says 'Illuminated', do they light up?

Are any of these ideal for a center channel? I don't know much about home theater audio, but am in need of a center channel (sellers took only the center with them...). Thanks for any help!

kuma99 wrote:Meh. I've tried these for installs. They are ok. Monoprice for the 1/3 the price beat these.

Ummm.... no. These are actually very well engineered speaker systems. You're selling them way short.

zagro002 wrote:Are any of these ideal for a center channel? I don't know much about home theater audio, but am in need of a center channel (sellers took only the center with them...). Thanks for any help!

The S-IW691L is ideal for center channel use.

sphui5 wrote:is monoprice legit or radio shack quality??? i mean you CAN't beat their prices thats for sure. but does the saying, "you get what you pay for" apply to monoprice?

Funny you should say that. Actually, Radio Shack speakers (when they made them in their own factories), were some of the best speakers you could get in those price ranges.

Remember the Mach I speakers? Those were only $200 each and nothing on the market could beat that. The sound quality was awesome.

Nobody that owns those speakers wants to let them go. There's a guy on eBay selling them for $300 with $100 shipping which is more than they cost 30 years ago.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/REALISTIC-MACH-ONE-SPEAKERS-VINTAGE-/300780944970?pt=Vintage_Electronics_R2&hash=item4607f0fe4a

Regarding Monoprice speakers, the random few that I looked at were 8 ohm speakers. These Pioneer speakers are 6 ohms.

So you might ask what is the difference?!?!

An 8 ohm speaker is normal. A 6 ohm one is lower than usual for a home speaker (car speakers are usually 4). This will cause the speaker to draw more power from the amplifier so you should verify with your amplifier's specs to make sure it's okay to use these speakers.

So why use 6 ohm speakers at all. Good question and I'm glad you asked.

Watts is a measure of power. You can increase your watts by increasing either voltage or amperage since Watts = Volts x Amps. Audiophiles will tell you that it's better to increase the Amps instead of Volts for better sound. When you use a lower impedance speaker, you will be decreasing resistance and that will be increasing your amperage but not all amplifiers can provide that kind of power.

Are this things wireless?

justafreak wrote:I'm not saying the monoprice speakers are bad because they aren't but to say they are on the same level means you likely don't hear the difference between lossless and 320k MP3 files.

Ahh, but can you hear the difference between the regular speaker wire and oxygen-free-gold-alloy-drop-forged-strands-wound-in-multiples-of-the-resonant-frequency cables?

(It's not that it's impossible to hear the difference between 320K and FLAC, it's that between the cost of kit required to reproduce it plus the time required to train your ears to hear it, it tends to be not economically viable.)

rootatlocalhost wrote:Ahh, but can you hear the difference between the regular speaker wire and oxygen-free-gold-alloy-drop-forged-strands-wound-in-multiples-of-the-resonant-frequency cables?

(It's not that it's impossible to hear the difference between 320K and FLAC, it's that between the cost of kit required to reproduce it plus the time required to train your ears to hear it, it tends to be not economically viable.)

There's no training needed on a well put together system. Where do people come up with this malarkey?