Towers or Horizons?

[tonyb]

Hi folks. I am looking to upgrade my home theater sound system, and debating between a few choices. Please help me decide!

I currently have a sierra horizon center, sierra Lunas for left and right fronts, and . The upgrade options I'm considering:

1) buy 2 more horizons to replace the left and right front lunas
2) buy 2 sierra towers for a tower-horizon-tower front arrangement
3) sell em all and go with something like the KEF R11s plus center

Since I'm posting on this forum, I imagine the debate will be between 1 and 2. What you don't know is whether there will be any sound difference between three horizons across the front vs two towers plus a center horizon.

Any thoughts?

[racrawford65]

If you go with 2 more Horizons, do you have stands/rack/furniture/something else you'd place them on so tweeter is at ear height approximately?

Otherwise, option 2. FWIW, I have the ELX Towers & ELX Horizon for my front stage.

In either case, you can move the Lunas to surround (if need surround), use them elsewhere (e.g computer), or sell them.

As to sound of option 1 vs. 2, my guess is no difference but Dave's input would be definitive.

[jerome]

I've not heard the ELX towers for comparison, but have the ELX Horizons for LCR, and LX's for surrounds, and couldn't be happier.

If you're doing more theatre than music, the titan tweeters would probably be the more recommended option vs the RAALs. Dave and Dina could work with you on recommended options, based on your space and listening habits. I went with a RAAL for just the center (mostly due to indecision), and after 6 months, think the titan would have been just as good for 50/50 mixed listening. They're just so close.

Unless you already have another furniture or mounting option for the Horizons, you might consider some barrister (lawyer's) bookcases. They fit nicely in an 11.5" - 12" shelf height, which is a fairly common option for those types of bookcases.

Towers for LR would probably sound even better, but I wasn't able to justify trading usable shelf space in the living room.

The guy who runs AudioScienceReview maintains a large dataset (LINK) of various speaker ratings based on the reviews he does. The horizons fall in what you might call the "Gartner Magic Quadrant" (upper right hand area), in terms of price/performance. With most reviews, there is always some opinion and flaw mixed in with measurements, so take them with a grain of salt, and use multiple sources.


Hope it's helpful, and best of luck with your decision.

Jerome

[racrawford65]

To add to my post above, my Towers/Horizon have the RAAL tweeter. I'm mostly music. Primarily rock/metal/progressive rock with some jazz/classical/female vocals thrown in. I've read that the Titan is generally recommended for rock/metal but the RAAL is no slouch here either. I also have the LX and did put them in place of the Towers for a few weeks...I still preferred the RAAL but could easily live with either.

[tonyb]

Thanks folks. Think I'm going to go with the towers and keep the horizon as the center. Now to decide on whether to splurge for the ELX towers...

I'm sure there have been some good side-by-side comparisons between the ELX and Sierra v2 towers... What's the consensus?

[natetg57]

Thanks folks. Think I'm going to go with the towers and keep the horizon as the center. Now to decide on whether to splurge for the ELX towers...

I'm sure there have been some good side-by-side comparisons between the ELX and Sierra v2 towers... What's the consensus?

I think the consensus is that the V2 upgrade gets you about halfway from V1 to the performance of the ELX. I went from V1 Raal to ELX Raal and am very happy. I know if I just went to V2, I would've eventually wanted to upgrade again.

[racrawford65]

I did the same as Nate - from v1 Tower with RAAL to ELX RAAL. I did communicate with Dave whilst making my decision as it was a lot of coin to drop at the time (since I also did my Horizon) but well worth it. Plus, if I'd have only gone v2, FOMO would set in.

[jerome]

My approach ended up being "Buy once, cry once." Agreed that FOMO was a significant concern, but figured this was one of those purchases that wouldn't necessarily require regular maintenance, unless upgraditis hit in the future.

Part of our calculus was that the family spends a ton of time using the audio system daily... working from home, music while cooking, relaxing with popcorn and a movie on the weekends, so it wasn't too difficult to amortize the cost as legit value. We leaned into the higher end, to avoid chasing upgrades sooner.

You always have 30 days to try them out, or perhaps someone local could demo for you, if you're not near CA.

[davef]

Hi folks. I am looking to upgrade my home theater sound system, and debating between a few choices. Please help me decide!

I currently have a sierra horizon center, sierra Lunas for left and right fronts, and . The upgrade options I'm considering:

1) buy 2 more horizons to replace the left and right front lunas
2) buy 2 sierra towers for a tower-horizon-tower front arrangement
3) sell em all and go with something like the KEF R11s plus center

Since I'm posting on this forum, I imagine the debate will be between 1 and 2. What you don't know is whether there will be any sound difference between three horizons across the front vs two towers plus a center horizon.

Any thoughts?

Hi Tonyb,

Do you use your system mostly for home theater or music?

Please feel free to reach out to us directly

[muzz]

Maybe 2ex or something like that if you your using them to listen to music ALOT..,if just games, don't bother IMO.
Want Badass, get the floorstanders..
THAT HORIZON is a monster, not sure why you have that.