Rear/surround placements?

[buzzyng]

I am moving to a new house that is going to provide some challenges for the home theater setup. I am new to this and been reading alot of past posts but still am not sure the best config so I thought someone might be able to assist.

The room has walls on the front, right side, and rear (there are 2 big windows on the rear wall). The left side is open to the kitchen. The ceilings are 9'.

The RPTV will be on the front and the seating area is against the back wall.

I want to setup a 5.1 or 7.1 configuration but cannot put the surrounds on the side. Should I put them in the ceiling or on the back wall for a 5.1? How to config for 7.1? What type (dipole/direct) for each location?

Thanks in advance.

[Burke Strickland]

Can you draw us a picture? Literally. A floor plan of the rooms involved would help us figure out the best way to answer your questions.

How big is the room? Does the seating area have to be against the back wall? (That makes it harder to achieve an effective surround sound field.) Not knowing the room dimensions other than ceiling height makes it difficult to visualize how far the RPTV will be from the seating area and how things might be (better) arranged to acheive your goals.

How are you planning to cover the two big windows? Light coming through can ruin the video picture and sound reflecting off the glass doesn't help either.

Give us a few more clues and we'll be better able to help solve this puzzle! :>)

Burke

[buzzyng]

OK. I guess the seating doesn't have to be against the back wall, that is where I assumed the sofas would go. The windows will have coverings over them plus there is a covered porch outside that will limit the amount of light coming in.

I've attached the room layout.

thanks again

[buzzyng]

I'm moving in a couple of weeks and want to purchase the equipment ahead of time so it is ready to go when we move in. Any suggestions on the config?

[junior77blue]

Some suggestions...

I would stick with 5.1 for now, put them in the corner, up high. Typically ~4ft higher than your listening position. Bring the sofa somewhere between the fireplace and the rear wall.

7.1 might be over kill, possibly 6.1? Another speaker between the windows?

I would go with direct radiating with this setup.

[Burke Strickland]

Thanks for the floor plan and dimensions. And, by the way, a belated welcome to HT Guide -- glad you are posting here.

As luck would have it, your room is very similar in size and layout to my own HT. My room is 16 feet x 18 feet x cathedral ceiling starting at 8 feet peaking at 12 feet -- fireplace on one side wall, open to kitchen and hall to front door on opposite wall. I started with my seating at the back wall and gradually moved it forward until it (sofa now replaced with three Ekornes chairs) is about one-third into the room, about perpendicular to the right side of the fireplace.

One difference between our, ahem, projected setups is that I am using front projection rather than an RPTV. If I were using direct radiator speakers in front, I would try to rearrange things so that the screen was in front of the fireplace and the projector suspended in the "passthrough" area between the kitchen and the HT (living room). That would allow me to place the main spekaers in a postion where both would have solid walls to reflect against. Haviing one fire against a wall and the other into empty space means there might be balance problems. In fact there were when I was using floor standing direct radiators. Never got the blalance quite right, although room treatments helped. Upgrading to a planar dipole design solved the dilemma; since they radiate a "null" pattern to the sides, it doesn't really matter as much what is or isn't at the side wall postions.

In your situation with an RPTV, if you want to use the fireplace (and to see it from the sofa), you pretty much are stuck with the arrangement you've proposed (except with the sofa pulled into the room rather than against the wall with the windows.) You will probably want to use some sound absorbing material on the fireplace wall near the front right speaker to try to "equalize" the reflection pattern, since the left speaker will have no side wall to reflect against. Or use planar speakers, such as Magnepans or Martin Logans.

Behind the sofa, you could put a sofa-back-height table the length of the sofa instead of havinga big coffee table in front of the sofa. The area behind the sofa would also be a good location for tall house plants.

For flexibility on positioning and to equalize the mounting options on both sides of the room, I'd suggest "bookshelf" speakers on tall stands for the surrounds rather than wall mounted (no wall on one side) and especially not ceiling mounted. Unless you buy something like the pricey Theil ceiling surface mount speakers that are designed to use the wall boundaries (as opposed to the typcial inexpensive in-walls or in-ceiling speakers that end up sounding like a small speaker in a can, which is what they are). :>)

With a 5.1 configuration, you will want to start with the surround speakers parallel to or just slightly behind the plane of the sofa back. You may find that given the configuratiion of your room, one or the other or both surrounds need to be closer to the back wall. It is a lot easier to cope with location changes if the speakers are floor standing instead of screwed into the wall.

Your room has enough space for a 7.1 configuratuon if you should choose to have one. I resisted the temptation for a long time, but when I got a pre/pro that happened to have the capability, since I also had a couple of extra speakers (my former main L/R) and amps laying about that I couldn't sell for enough to feel like I wasn't just giving them away, I opted to rearrange things to do 7.1. And I like it. But if it requires extra investment up front, instead of splitting your speaker investment 7 (or eight) ways. I'd recommend concentrating first on excellent front soundstage (main three -- front left/center/right) then a high quality sub and equivalent surround for 5.1 (if you plan to do multichannel music pay special attention to timber matching the surrounds to the fronts even if they are less expensive models in the same line) then later consider adding the last two surrounds.

Good luck!

Burke

[buzzyng]

Wow, thanks for the great info.

One day we'll have a front proj but for now have to settle for a RPTY :-)

Ok, I will move the sofa away from the windows and get some stand speakers - although we really hoped to not have to have speakers sitting out in the open but I guess we don't have a choice.

We have been using Bose accoustimass 7/5s for our current theater and are somewhat satisified but want to upgrade to better system in the new house. What would you recommend for the front/rears? I don't want to spend alot of money but want to get a good system that will last for many years. The Bose has lasted us for about 10 years.

If we want to plan for 7.1, how would I configure speakers 6 & 7?

thanks again

[buzzyng]

I would like to spend around $2000 or so ... probably $2500 max. Any recommendations in this range?

thanks

[buzzyng]

OK, what type of speaker should I look for? I ;ve now talked to several vendors and they have direct radiating, bipolar, dipoles. What is the best type for the layout I have.

thanks