Thinking of a plan, need critique

[beardking]

I'm a complete newbie here and I'm a complete newbite to the whole DIY speaker building concept. I've visited a few sites on the idea, but have never built my own set yet. That being said, I have an idea that I'd like to get some feedback on.

I want to build a media storage center for my flat panel tv. This would house my receiver, dvd player, cable box and my DVD's. Within this media center, what I've wondered about doing is making it an integral part in the audio part by building it so that it actually houses the front, center and subwoofer speakers. So, the media center itself would become the enclosure for each of those speakers.

Does anyone know if this would actually work? Has anyone seen something like this that I might be able to copy? If it would work, any suggestions on what components to use? To that question, I need to state that I'm not looking for super high end. I'm looking for decent sound that the everyday Joe would find decent, I'm not worried about impressing the audiophiles of the world. Mainly, I'm looking to impress my wife with my abilities to hide the components that she constantly complains about. ;-)

Thanks in advance
Beardking

[ThomasW]

Let me see if I can find a picture of Pete Mazz's installation it's exactly what your talking about...

EDIT...

Here we go.

https://web.archive.org/web/20081228212544/http://mysite.verizon.net/buckswwkg/birth_of_a_media_center.htm

Now you don't need to build speaker like Pete's, you can use any design adjusted for on-wall/in-wall use. We have several of those in our Missions Accomplished section.

https://www.htguide.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=39

[beardking]

Holy media center, Batman. Now THAT is cool. It's a bit more advanced than I was figuring on going, but it does give me some interesting ideas.

I know that bigger is better and all, but are there any 6-8 inch "sub" quality speakers out there? I've seen a lot of decent designs for moderate bookshelf speakers that I could incorporate for the front channel, but most of what I see for subs tends to be along the lines of 12-15" speakers. Honestly, something that big in my living room would have my wife leaving me (or kicking me to the curb) in short order. ;-)

[ThomasW]

6"-8" sub is sort of any oxymoron unless you plan on using a 1/2 dozen drivers. One needs to move big-time air to reproduce bass.

If you can post a picture or a floor plan that would make it easier to discuss the viable options

[chasw98]

Holy media center, Batman. Now THAT is cool. It's a bit more advanced than I was figuring on going, but it does give me some interesting ideas.

I know that bigger is better and all, but are there any 6-8 inch "sub" quality speakers out there? I've seen a lot of decent designs for moderate bookshelf speakers that I could incorporate for the front channel, but most of what I see for subs tends to be along the lines of 12-15" speakers. Honestly, something that big in my living room would have my wife leaving me (or kicking me to the curb) in short order. ;-)

If you are looking at the unit that Pete built, you have to realize that he is a master furniture maker! And we can only dream of coming close.

If you are thinking of building a unit for your living room, remember that you can hide things like 12 or 15 inch drivers in the bottom of units facing the floor so that they are not visible but can still be heard quite well. A lot of possibilities exist that are doable. As Thomas said, give us some more clues as to what you have room for, what room is it going in and what you can get away with. :B

[robfive]

I know that bigger is better and all, but are there any 6-8 inch "sub" quality speakers out there?

I am currently using a TangBand W8-740 found here: http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/showd...number=264-854

Sure, it does not put out as much as the 12" TC Sounds sub it replaced but it holds it own in my living room. We typically don't watch movies at reference levels. The enclosure is a little over 1 ft^3, ported and tuned to about 30Hz.

OTOH, if you are building the entire media cabinet yourself you should be able to design in enough space to incorperate a downfiring sub. This way you could get away with a 12" sub without even seeing it.

Edit: chasw98 beat me to the downfiring idea :T

[beardking]

Yeah, I had never thought of downfiring on the subs, definitely would open up the options. I think what I'll have to do is sit down this weekend and put what is in my head into CAD so I can show what I want and see where I can go from there. I do appreciate the input so far.

[Dennis H]

The Dayton HO 12" will work in a .75 cu.ft. sealed enclosure and I doubt you'll find an 8" that will fit in anything much smaller. Since you're going to be setting the TV on the cabinet, you might want to consider two 12" firing in opposite directions to get cancellation of the mechanical vibrations. You could fire them out the two ends so they aren't visible from the front.

http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&Partnumber=295-466

[beardking]

Alrighty, I'm attaching a rough idea of what I'm thinking about. Basically, the middle "box" would be the subwoofer. This wouldn't really be a separate panel as is shown, I just showed that for clarity in design. The other to solid boxes would be the front channel speakers. I still need to think about where to put the center channel, of course.

With this being shown as 50" W X 22" D X 25" H (top of main unit, not including panel behind the TV) I could end up with about 1.64 cu. ft for the sub (18" W X 19" D X 8" H) and .67 cu ft for the fronts (12.25" W x 10" D x 9.5" H).

As far as the volumes, from what I've looked at online, I believe that I can make it work, but really other than the monumental task of building it, I'm mostly worried about the vibrations screwing up the sound from each of the speakers as well as messing with the structural integrity of the unit.

Image not available

[ThomasW]

Well the sub box is pretty small.

How big is the room, and how far will you sit from this piece?

[beardking]

The room is about 16' x 19' and the front of the couch is MAYBE 11' away from the tv/receiver/speakers.

[ThomasW]

Can you give the lower storage space on either side to volume of the sub?

[beardking]

It's possible. Was basically just doing it like that for a place to put the DVD's and so it didn't look too overwhelming.

What would you think about the possibility of making the panel that the TV is mounted to into the sub? I could adjust that to be deeper and then I'd have plenty of volume. ;-) Then where the sub is could become the center channel speaker.

[ThomasW]

You want the TV decoupled from the sub. So the TV needs to be attached to the wall or floated above the lower section of the unit.

[Dennis H]

You want the TV decoupled from the sub. So the TV needs to be attached to the wall or floated above the lower section of the unit.

Or use two opposing drivers.