The music system in the house is kinda lame. I have a set of surround JBL speakers sans subwoofer, a center speaker below the television, and smaller speakers hanging on the wall by the television and from the ceiling above the couch. It's been ok for the almost 3 years I've had it, but it is obvious the bottom is missing, the lack of a sub gets to me every once in a while. So, I got a bug up my ass and decided to go shopping for one. A friend of mine that installs this shit for a living wanted me to buy some high end equipment, but I'm too cheap and the room just wouldn't do it justice anyhow. If I were designing a room around a system that would be a different story.

So my wife and I went to Circuit City and looked around. There was nothing to look at really, and nobody to help anyone. I was surprised, usually you have a salesman so far up your ass you can't walk. I decided to go down the street to Best Buy. I walked around there and found the subs, but then someone stopped us and asked if we wanted help. I mentioned the reason for our visit, and the guy snatches a salesman walking by. He relays the information, and tells us the guy is an expert. It was everything I could do to keep from rolling my eyes. He steers us away from the subs that are on the shelf, and we go to the 'sound room'. I figured they would have demo models of the subs from the shelves.

Nope. After screwin with the controls for a few minutes, the 'expert' finally got them working and showed me a $300 woofer. The set up was all nice and shit, but I wanted to know where the low end woofers were that they had on display. I didn't ask him though, and it turned out the model he was showing me wasn't in stock. He did say that the $400 model was, and he could give it to me for $25 off. I said that was ok, because I had had a gander of the price of the cables they were wanting to sell me. See, the subs don't come with cables, those are 'specialty' items, sold separately. $40 for a good 'set'.

I decided to do what I was trying to avoid, I did my own research and had one delivered. I didn't delve into them too much, just to find out what was adequate for a cheapskate like myself. I know enough not to buy soundesign, but I don't think they put that label on electronics anymore, so what I really wanted to know was what to avoid.

I found I wanted one that was independently powered, with an automatic off switch. A real audiophile would lose dinner contemplating what I got I'm sure, but it is fine for this house. I decided what I wanted, then found the best deal would be with Amazon. The thing was delivered two days later! Turns out they have a warehouse, the one that stores shit like this, in phoenix. I did have to buy a separate cable, but I just bought a standard audio cable with RC jacks. The sub is probably too big for the system, it is a 10 inch down firing speaker, and I can't turn the independent volume control up past 3 if the music has some really low levels. I can deal with it though, as long as the kids don't turn it up nothing will break.

So now the system is just about complete, with the computer up there looking like a piece of stereo equipment, pulling music off the computer in the back room, where I have extra hard drives hooked up and recently loaded with all the music I have. It has to be accessed from another computer in the house using VNC, so my wife won't use it even though I tried to make it as simple as possible. She can always throw a CD in the DVD player if she needs to, and she does at times.

Next I'm thinking ceiling speakers in all the rooms, and maybe an honest to goodness entertainment box built by myself. I can get the box and all the components for under a grand, and use it to watch movies off the network. Maybe a plasma TV is in the future, it would be hung in front of the space the TV occupies now, and the rest of the equipment I could put behind it with cooling fans inserted in the walls for circulation.