I’d like to get surround speakers around me while gaming and yes I do want speakers not headphones. My knowledge of surround speaker systems and speakers in general is lacking and would like to receive recommenditions from people who actually know about the subject. I don’t have any real budget but I can say that there is no way I will spend 1k for speakers, also am not looking for big subwoofers.
Would recommend running HDMI from your computer to an AV receiver.
Budget http://www.monoprice.com/product?c_id=109&cp_id=10906&cs_id=1090601&p_id=10565&seq=1&format=2
Extremely Budget http://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=8247
Monoprice makes good stuff. They also sell Yamaha receivers, and if you're planning on picking up the speakers there anyway, there is nothing wrong with Yamaha receivers.
Edit/Addition: If you want a bunch of fancy stuff like bluetooth support and wifi compatability, maybe not get a Yamaha receiver.
Just get a generic 5:1 setup from Amazon since there is no such thing as "For gaming"
I never look "for gaming" tag for my products, was just specifieng the use of my setup.
Thanks for that, and yeah totally not going to need wireless stuff.
In which case just search for 5:1 setup with aux which should work fine :)
I used an elcheapo rca 5.1 while i was in high school. It worked well for gaming but out was amazing for movies and music.
High end Yamaha AVRs have those features.
I have the 10565 (first link) and they are pretty decent.
I don't recommend getting the ones in the second link though. The internet is fairly unanimous that they are terribad.
I was in the same situation a few months ago, so I can tell you what I did:
I was looking for a 'higher end' PC 5.1 system ($500 ish), since most 5.1 systems for PC are bad. There wasn't anything out there so I went AV receiver and unpowered speakers.
I went with the Monoprice 10565 speakers (first link in the first reply) for $200. They sound fairly good, but I do kind of wish I did spend a little more money.
For a receiver I went with the Yamaha RX-V377 5.1 receiver @ $250. If you want to go this route I strongly suggest getting this particular receiver, since it has a 'virtual cinema front' feature, as well as microphone calibration (YPAO) in an entry level model. Any Yamaha will have these features, but this one is the cheapest.
The virtual cinema front allows me to have my surround speakers in front of me and sound like they are coming from behind me. Very useful feature for a surround system at a computer desk. The YPAO also calibrates the volume of each speaker, and the delays to match where they are positions, and the acoustics of the room.
There is one annoying downside to running an AV receiver if you have to use displayport or DVI to connect your monitor (instead of running HDMI through your receiver). If you don't run your video through your receiver, Windows still detects another display device in the HDMI connection and makes a 'ghost' display device where your mouse cursor can get lost in. It is frustrating to set up, but you can have the monitor corner to corner with the top left side of your current display, and it won't get in the way.
Here is a video for 5.1 setup:
(there are also annotations linking other setup videos you will want to see, such as receiver auto calibration (YPAO), and bass crossover)