In-walls as rears?

[sikoniko]

I am currently working on my theater room and have SCM1's as rears. We hope to do 2 rows and due to the size of the room, this will put the back row only a few inches from the back wall. This would mean that the SCM1's would be above those sitted there, instead of behind.

My wife wants to do a second zone in the house at some point, so I have been looking at b&w's in-wall speakers. I came across the CWM 8180, which appears to be a new 3 way in-wall comperable to the 800 series speaker, maybe close to the 804s(?) but a lot less money since there is no cabinet. I was thinking that maybe I could sell the SCM1's and get these and put them in the back wall, or in the ceiling above.

I don't have any experience putting surround speakers in the ceiling, so I don't know how effective that actually would be. It seems the it would locallize a lot of the sound. Obviously it would be heard elsewhere, but how well? And since they would only be surround speakers, would that really matter?

Please provide feedback and opinions.

Thanks!
dan

[Aussie Geoff]

Sikoniko,

I have in ceilings for my rear centre channels and they are surprisingly effective - especially as a lot of the rear sound effects are thngs flying overhead, raiin, creaking etc... Interestingly they blend well with my high mounted side surrounds...

The only significant compromise is for 5 channel DVD-As etc (music) but my side speakers deal with that

I've helped a friend put in a 4 rears as centres and with careful placement - this worked well too...

Geoff

[DavidB]

I have the CWM DS8's as rear speakers in the wall behind my sofa. They are dipole's so work particularly well for surround sound. I am very happy with them, they work well with the 802D's I have as front speakers.. I also have some Signature 7NT's in my dining room which I am very happy with too. Key thing with in walls is to make sure they have the right mounting or back box. The back box for the DS8's is huge about twice the size of the speakers. I have pictures of the wall during installation if you're interested.

[Aldo]

Sikoniko:
The in wall speakers will be extrimely close to the head for the ones sitted at the back row, if I had to decide I would keep the SCM's and put them high or on the ceiling, remember that sorround speakers do not need to be pointed directly to the ears in fact IMO that is a bad idea.
A lot of people think that hearing the speaker sounding during the movie is great but if a sorround speaker make you turn your head IT FAILED, they are intended for ambience and space, If you have your back speaker too close you will hear the speaker making the noice of a turbine when a plane is flying over but if you place those speakers right you will hear a plain flying 100mts above your head as it is in the movie!
Just look at your nearest theater, they even have bipolar speakers wich radiate part of the sound away from you!
I know these because I have my 6th and 7th channels (802D's) too close to my coach and sometimes the sound is very unrealistic!

[DavidB]

Aldo mentions bipolar speakers in his post above. Anyway my CWM DS8's are dipoles (same as bipolar I believe)which means that they have two tweeters that fire sound to the left and right as well as two bass units. They can also be switched to act as a monopole so that a third forward firing tweeter comes into action. They aren't cheap though!

[dmensi]

in wall surrounds

I installed Paradigm SA-35 in wall surrounds as I was in the same situation as yourself. My home theater room doubles as a family room and my wife did not want the obtrusive look of surrounds in the room, and my sitting area was close to the back wall where the surrounds would be placed. Therefore my decision to use in wall surrounds. The SA-35's have a tweeter,midrange and bass and sound great with movies. As one previous poster commented they don't make you turn around when you hear various sounds during a movie, but they enhance the experience with whatever movie you are watching. The most difficult part of the install was running the wires from one side of the room to the other.