5.1 - surround speaker placement

[HTHMAN]

Heh .... I need to try this. I have the RX-A2030. Been wanting to line all the speakers up front for a while .

If you do it, post your opinion. I moved into an open concept house that just is not all that compatible with surround setup. If you have good results, I may give it a shot. Well only if you have VERY good results as I do not like moving furniture and rewiring speakers.

 

[charles 1973]

I seem to remember reading that when we use Dolby Digital with only the front 3 speakers, The rear surround effects are sent to the left and right front speakers. It makes sense to me, after all it has to go somewhere.

My Yamaha RX A770 Dolby Atmos HT receiver has a selectable speaker configeration that places the rear surround speakers at the extreme front left and right position too.

 

[Spiceman50]

If you do it, post your opinion. I moved into an open concept house that just is not all that compatible with surround setup. If you have good results, I may give it a shot. Well only if you have VERY good results as I do not like moving furniture and rewiring speakers.

I sure will. I'm going to target trying to do this, this Sunday. I did however, check out how to do it. It appears all it's doing is pretty much the same thing as how Sound Bars work. Without moving my Surrounds, it adds delay and reverb to create a virtual 3D and bounce the sounds off the walls. I'll do it two ways. My surrounds are about 50 plus pounds each so will take some heff to move them, but I will. Then will use some ADS L400 for surrounds and see how those do.

 

[hnash53]

Put the center channel one in the garbage, I much prefer two large fronts and two small rears, the center channel combines the two front speakers
aka mono.

I thought that in multi channel setups, the center channel is very important for voicing... vocals/leads in music and dialogue in movies. Most AV receivers allow one to select which speakers are attached and you can also set the volume levels for each speaker.

You could try it with the center channel and without... and determine which one sounds the best to you.

 

[Grenadeslio]

For movies and television in general the center channel in a surround system is a must so the dialogue that's supposed to be front and center remains so from any seating position in the room. Which for television watching could be drastically farther from any position you would listen to music unless just as background music for doing chores etc.

Phantom just doesn't cut it if someone is sitting to one side like they may be if the gang us over for the Superbowl etc.

I don't do multi-channel music anyway, been there tried that starting with my very first system having discrete quad, simulated 4 channel etc, then moving on to surround, just never warmed up to it. I guess I just like the challenge of getting that holographic presentation from just 2 channels of music lol.

 

[MannyE]

I know, I know, I know. They’re really small and, thus, can be mounted just about anywhere. Yes yes yes.

For the purposes of this question, please just accept my premise that there is no possibility for speaker placement other than along the wall in front of the listener.

Holding that as true, sounds like everyone agrees to just do a 2.1 or 3.1 setup and call it good. Correct? Anyone care to argue otherwise?

Does it change anything when we assume he’ll be using the Audyssey processing in the receiver? Would that help maximize the usefulness of the two surround speakers, even if they’re just wide of the listener (but still in front)?

I don't understand the debate here. If you can ONLY USE THE FRONT WALL.... you set up the front speakers, (LRC) and the sub and tell the AVR you are only using those speakers, then run the Audessey programming. Done. The rear speakers are just that, rear speakers and if you can't place them behind the listener, put them away until you can. Period.

 

[Spiceman50]

If you do it, post your opinion. I moved into an open concept house that just is not all that compatible with surround setup. If you have good results, I may give it a shot. Well only if you have VERY good results as I do not like moving furniture and rewiring speakers.

I'll say this, Cheap soundbars do a poor job of imaging a 3D environment, expensive soundbars do a much better job of it, but for me, it's more novelty then anything else, and becomes a distraction leading to boredom and eventually turning off the 3D imaging. Which doesn't mean that soundbars are bad either. They can almost always sound better then TV's. (or at least the TV's I've heard). So what does a soundbar have anything to do with Cinema Surround? ... it's pretty much the same thing, only your using your speakers and your Receiver to project the sound/image. At least in my case, it was much better then most soundbars I've heard, because my speakers and amplifier are much bigger. As mentioned above, what it appears to do, is take the rear channels, add delay and echo, then bounce the high's off the walls to give you basically a phantom rear channel. For me, it becomes as I said above, more a novelty at first, up to the time I turn it off.

 

[Spiceman50]

If you do it, post your opinion. I moved into an open concept house that just is not all that compatible with surround setup. If you have good results, I may give it a shot. Well only if you have VERY good results as I do not like moving furniture and rewiring speakers.

Just thought you might enjoy this @HTHMAN. Aesthetically it doesn't work, but it was fun putting it together. It's all back in it's respectable positions now.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index...see-and-hear-it.782592/page-108#post-12625086

 

[HTHMAN]

Just thought you might enjoy this @HTHMAN. Aesthetically it doesn't work, but it was fun putting it together. It's all back in it's respectable positions now.

https://audiokarma.org/forums/index...see-and-hear-it.782592/page-108#post-12625086

It it is no better than a soundbar, not worth the effort. What I have now, with the surrounds on the floor, is passable. This house is just not built with a theater experience in mind. I have properly set up a system in the basement with an older receiver, speakers and plasma. It sounds pretty good considering the space. Damn, that plasma still looks good.